Ouch! Ouch! Ouch!

I work part time with a local electrical company. Part of my job is to answer the phone and set customers appointments. Today our temperatures in TN were high of 99 with heat index of 105, and low of 79. Needless to say in this humidity there is moisture popping up all over. Meaning that small bursts of pop up storms are scattered everywhere; so on a stretch of road there might be pouring rain in one area, and further down it will be dry. Crazy! With all that energy in the air, it has to go somewhere. That somewhere was into many fuse boxes across town. Breakers in our boxes are connecting the circuits in our homes which are wired to different outlets which in turn power our appliances. With no electricity, in time reduces us all down to the basics.

Back to the current situation! With the storm and electric out, folks started to worry when some of their lights would come back on and some other things didn’t have power. After going to the box and flipping switches this way and that, and pressing the GFCI (Ground Fault Circuit Interrupter) buttons to reset their plugs, if things weren’t working as they should, they called their local electric company or their electrician.

Here is where I come in. Several calls in, I get another call that I just must share with you. This precious lady was very confused with the situation at hand and didn’t understand why if you stick a butter knife or steak knife pointy side into a plug your arm tingles. She was trying to push her little reset button and thought that it would work quicker if she poked at it with a sharp object. Folks: Side note here..Please don’t stick anything into your wall plugs. If it is live, you will receive a shock (or severe tingle down the arm of the hand that is poking around electricity).

This lady was on the phone with me explaining which rooms in her home she had power in and I could hear her when she started clicking breakers back and forth in the panel in her garage. When she wasn’t getting the results she wanted by “showing” me how when she flipped a breaker that it still wasn’t working, she moved on to poking at this plug. Now remember, I can’t see her, but she seems to think I can. Bless her heart. She was so precious. She is telling me that she gets a sharp tingle in her arm when she touches her plug. She kept saying, “See? Ouch! Like that! Ouch! Ooohhh Ouch!” Not wanting to be disrespectful I asked her what she was doing. When she gave me a visual description, I begged her to stop. To top it off she then tells me that there are black marks coming out of her plug. Shaking my head, I ask her to please put down the knife and leave the plug alone. I get her address and phone number and assure her that since I have a technician in the area he will be at her house within the next 15 minutes. She then tells me that, “she hopes he comes soon, because her husband will be home in an hour and 45 minutes and while he thinks he can fix things, (then she whispers) …he really can’t.” I assure her he will be there soon, and she hangs up with me.

Later in the afternoon I asked the technician about this customer. He smiles and tells me that the plug had sparked for sure as there were burn marks all around it. (she even showed him the black tip on the end of the knife). He properly labeled her fuse box, replaced her plug which had been fried pretty good, and gave her a quick safety do and don’t list all before her helpful hubby came home. All in a days work!