As summer creeps around the corner and all remnants of snow cover and cold weather are but a fading memory, the growing grass and flowers bursting from the earth remind us that summer will be here soon. Here is the southern United States it can get particularly hot, sometimes reaching above the one hundred degree mark. Here the humidity can and does reach 100%. On these sweltering days we like to cut on the ceiling fan and sip tall glasses of iced tea while trying to do as little as possible. Today it got somewhat warm, at least it seemed that way with everybody working in the house cleaning or fixing things that have needed to be done for ages. At one point while taking a break someone mentioned that it would have been nice if the ceiling fan would work. Reminding me that it has been broken for over five years now and that the replacement was in the hall closet still in the box. I was tired of being reminded about the fan so I jumped up and grabbed my trusty tool box. Within minutes I was disassembling the broken 30 year old Hunter. I unwrapped the ages old electrical tape and dissected the wiring in the J-box. I pulled the old motor down and as I was separating the wires it happened; I was electrocuted. I happened, as luck would have it, to be standing on an aluminum ladder. The ladder conducted the electricity from my fingers to my toes. Might I mention at this juncture that it left no part untouched? I jumped and the sparks erupted from the ceiling and as far as I knew, my bottom as well! I woke from my daze on the floor looking up through the smoke at the still singed ceiling. I tried desperately to understand how a supposedly �dead� wire had just knocked the ever-loving piss out of me. It was that moment that the Queen Mum, my Mother-In-Law decided to inform me that particular circuit had been rigged with a hot line from the kitchen, so in effect, was �double-hot�. �Gee Whiz, thanks Maw!�

So as I type this, there is a charred portion of the den's ceiling where no ceiling fan lives, and without doubt, where one won't live until an electrician arrives to decipher that mess of wires up there.

No wonder I am so damned jumpy!