My parents came over last night. My dad helped me hook up the new VCR/DVD recorder--or maybe I should say that he was trying to figure out the instructions while I hooked everything up without reading them. What can I say? The quick connect procedures were only sent in Spanish--a language neither of us is familiar with--so rather than look at the big instruction book, I examined the back and started connecting cords. So far, everything is working just fine--I tried a tape and a disk--but since I don't have any recordable DVDs, we weren't able to test that function.
This isn't the joy part yet. After we finished, I went into the master bathroom and stepped on something. It wasn't very big, so I figured it was just a piece of grit or whatever. After all, I've had all these people tromping through my home. Then I look at the counter and see a big hunk of glass. I'm like, where'd that come from? I look at the lights mounted above the mirror, but the glass pieces are all still there. I look back at the counter and then saw all the glass in the sink. Further examination of my light fixture revealed there's an inner sleeve of glass as well as the outer tube.
Immediately, I called for my dad and he checked it out, came to the same conclusion I did about it being the inner piece and helped me clean up the glass. It wasn't an easy clean up either because when it hit the counter/sink, some of the glass disintegrated into pieces as small as a grain of sand. Some are even small enough to be almost powder! It's a good thing he'd brought the vacuum cleaner over the day before when we were arranging my office because we needed it. This was some weird fluke, but we'd get a new glass sleeve, reinstall the inner piece and everything would be okay.
We just finish cleaning that up, he put the vacuum cleaner back in my office and then went downstairs. I went and got something out of my closet and I'm standing at the foot of the bed when I hear a crash!
I knew what had happened without even looking. Yep, another inner glass sleeve had crashed down to the counter.
Now the speculation began. My dad's theory is that it's a design flaw in the fixture and that the heat of the halogen bulbs caused the glass of the inner sleeve to contract and expand (as the lights were either on or off) and gradually, over time, they worked themselves loose from their attachments. I'm now forbidden from using the light over the mirror. :-( That's not convenient, but it's doable. Thank goodness I have lights over my tub and shower.
No doubt this means more strangers in my house because this light fixture is either going to need to be fixed or replaced. At this point, I'm voting for replaced because I can't live with the suspense of when the glass will come down again. I'm still finding itty bitty grains of glass on my counter this morning!
Edited to add: I just found a big hunk of glass in my bathtub. It's on the opposite side of the room from the lights. I'm so lucky I wasn't in there (or anyone else) when the crashes occurred otherwise someone could have really been hurt.
