My Clark Griswold Moment

Christmas Vacation is one of our favorite Christmas movies. Who could forget the scene where "Clark" (Chevy Chase) is on the roof checking each of the several hundred lights that he'd strung on the roof. While I don't have quite as many lights on our house, I still found myself having my own "Clark Griswold Moment" the other night.

We live in a two-story townhouse. We have a garage attached to the front and a modest front entry porch off to the side creating plenty of places to hang Christmas lights. We have two 9' strands of snowball lights that I wanted to hang under the front porch patio covering to create the illusion of snow falling. When I'd plugged them in inside the house prior to hanging them, they all worked (you can see where I'm going with this). I took them outside, and thinking I was clever, I used "U" shaped nails (the kind the cable company uses to tack down cable line) to attach them to the wood covering. After I'd finished hammering in the last nail, I realized I hadn't thought my plan through very well. The plug was on the farthest end and the lights were un-even. So, I carefully removed each nail, and this time, I made sure I laid out a better plan for their disbursement. I carefully re-hung the lights, stepped back and admired my work. Then I plugged them in.

One strand light up beautifully, but the second strand was dark as could be. I carefully removed the snowball shaped, fuzzy covering from one by one from several of the lights, but couldn’t see any obvious signs of burnt out blubs. I decided to wait and let my husband check them since he has more patiences then me for such things, but since he works almost 70 hours a week, they still aren’t fixed.

The next day, I decided to hang a strand of facetted bulbs across the front of the garage. We had two strands and each was long enough to stretch across the entire length of the front of our house. Armed with a plan to hang one across the front of each story, I plugged the strands in to check them and only one worked. While my husband was carefully checking the one that didn’t work, I proceeded out front determined to get some lights shining out front by nightfall. I took the gutter clips (since the “U” shaped nails ended up being more difficult to remove than I’d thought) and with the help of two of my boys, carefully clipped one around the base of light. Up on the ladder I went. About ¾ across I heard a distinct “POP!” as one end of the strand bounced against the ground and a bulb popped into a million pieces. After changing the broken blub with a replacement one of the boys had grabbed, I finished hanging the strand across the garage and stopped to admire how evenly strung the lights were. I couldn’t wait for it to get dark enough to turn them on!

Dusk came, and I went out to the garage to plug in the extension cord. I eagerly followed my boys outside to see the lights and…NOTHING! Not a single light lit! I couldn’t believe it! I went back into the garage and checked each end of the extension cord unplugging and re-plugging each connection to make sure it was snug. I went back outside and still NOTHING!

Frustrated, I went back into the house to help my husband get ready for work. After he’d left, I marched back outside, ladder in hand, to see if I could locate the problem. By now it was very dark, and beginning to rain. Up on the ladder I went and armed with my cell phone for a light, I began checking each light bulb. After replacing 2 more burned out blubs I marched back inside and tried the plugs again. Still nothing! Back up the ladder and one more pass of each bulb I paused as I thought what I sight I must be! There I was, up on a ladder, bulb by bulb, holding my cell phone behind each one using the light from it to see through to the filament inside checking for faulty light bulbs, in the pouring rain! I had to laugh at myself and thought “This really is my Clark Griswold moment!”

Today I’m off to the store to buy new lights.