This week it has been overwhelmingly apparant that the gaps in my knowledge are vast. Last night I blew a fuse upstairs when I turned the bathroom light on and it popped, and I was suddenly plunged into darkness. I was aghast, not really sure what to do, and debated just going back downstairs to finish watching the programme I had on the laptop, ignoring the issue all together. Then I remembered that I need electricity to use the shower, and that, if I didn't have a shower, I would wind up rocking up to work the next day smelling of...well, smelling!
Thing is, when I was looking at houses before moving back up to Durham, I'd remembered having a conversation with the landlord's son whilst we stood upstairs on the landing. He'd said something like "Oh, and the fuse box is right there, so you know if one goes you can just sort it straight out, that sometimes happens..." or something akin to this. He'd pointed to the wall and I'd seen a plastic box and then above it, something else box-like. I surveyed them both for a while, trying to look like I knew what he was talking about. Afterwards, my boyfriend informed me that I'd been looking at the wrong thing. I didn't question this because I had no idea which of the two things I was supposed to be looking at. Anyway, long story short, now that I've been living here nearly a year, I'm quite aware that the "something else box-like" is in fact an electricity meter. This means, by default, the plastic box below is the fuse box.
Right okay, but what is a fuse box? This is the moment in a film when I have to go down to the basement with a torch, and there is a leak in the ceiling, and a rat-tat-tat-ing on the window whilst I'm trying to do something in a fuse box, but what? What am I trying to do? Of course I know now, because I had to ask my boyfriend, evidently, but.... that's a pretty ridiculous situation. For a 25 year old to not know what to do when you blow a fuse.
However, I have discovered something even more ridiculous: I'm 25 and I have never changed a lightbulb before.
This only became apparent once the power was back on, and I realised the bathroom light wouldn't switch on, and then I remembered the 'pop' which I think was the bulb going. Somehow, now, I have to change the light bulb, and when I looked back to find my knowledge base to work from, I realised I didn't have any such experience. And, honestly, I'm a little scared. The light bulb has one of those weird, screw on shades over it, which I assume is also a natural habitat for a small family of spiders.
Still, although I've yet to tackle the light bulb situation, at least I no longer get 'Belfast' confused with 'Berlin', or think 'Seville' is an old people's home down south somewhere, or think the Cold War is called the Cold War because it involved Russia, and Russia can get really cold...
The gaps in my knowledge may be vast, but they are also ever decreasing. And that's why any advice book I write will be better off telling people how not to do things, or how to avoid the everyday chore or problem. Hence the title of this post, which may, one day, become a bestseller.
Maybe.
