filamental arithmetic

In the midst of life we are in death, sic transit gloria mundi, and all that sort of thing. I speak of course of none other than the fate of the final incandescent lightbulb in my kitchen ceiling lighting array, which has been blazing away in solitary glory for some months now, arguing by its very presence the case for white-hot threads of glowing metal as a means of generating light in the 21st century, but being ultimately comprehensively out-argued by the forces of entropy and having to concede defeat.

If you've been continuing to fill in your Bulbsplosion Bingo card then a) what the hell is wrong with you and b) you'll want to know that this was bulb number 11, whose main function is and always has been to illuminate the couple of giant foil roasting trays that we keep on top of the fridge. This has already been replaced once, way back in June 2014, an impressive 333 days ago. As I said last time, it's possible that being the only incandescent bulb in a sea of low-energy-demand LEDs may mean that the occasional random spikes could be accommodated more easily without tripping a circuit-breaker or frying the filament, but equally that could just be a plausible-sounding just-so story with no basis in actual physics.

But anyway, it's gone now. And since the failure rate on the LED ones, almost exactly a year after I installed the first one, stands at precisely zero, that may conclude this blog thread for the foreseeable future. The conclusion seems to be: yes, they're a bit more expensive, but it's well worth switching to LEDs if your spotlight wiring is a bit dicey. Buy a job lot from IKEA next time you're there; don't forget to stock up with meatballs as well.