Um, Okay

So, yesterday we had something unexpected happen.  The light in our office/schoolroom got blown right off of the ceiling after the wires sort of exploded.  Let me start from the beginning...

The past couple of days Jamie and I had both noticed the light making a strange sound - sort of like a buzzing you'd hear when a fly is trapped by a lightbulb - every time we turned this particular light on.  It would always stop in a few seconds though. 

Yesterday morning, after Jamie had gone to work, I went in the schoolroom to prepare to start school.  I turned the light on and heard the buzzing.  This time though, it struck me just how electrical the buzz sounded.  I left the room, but remember making a decisive decision to leave the light on.  At first I thought I ought to turn it off because I remember being afraid it might catch on fire.  But, I then thought, no, I'll leave it on to see what happens.  I believe that was the Lord.  I am SO thankful it happened during the day while we were home, but not in the room.  I keep thinking what could have happened if this had occurred during the night or while we were away.  God is so good at protecting us.

So... I leave the light on and leave the room.  Not too long after, from the living room, I heard a really loud pop and all the lights went out in the house (or so it seemed.  It was actually just the lights that shared this fixtures' circuit - which almost our whole house is on.)   I knew immediately it was coming from the light.  This is what I found:

Yikes!  You can see in the below picture how the ceiling and bottom of the light fixture is burnt.

Oh, look, the ceiling used to be gold-flecked before someone painted it white!  Interesting discovery to make amidst all of this.  :)

Some of the debris on the floor.  Burnt pieces of ceiling and who knows what else were scattered all over the room.

Jamie was already at work when this happened.  I was afraid to go near the light not knowing what dangers might lie in wait.  So, he was able to come home and take his lunch break (which included no break and no lunch...) at 9 in the morning.  He was able to cut the wires safely and remove the fixture.  He discovered that the two big wires coming out of the ceiling connecting to the light were bare copper.  I guess that is bad news, electrically speaking, and he thinks they touched and caused all of this.  Delightful!

These are the burnt wires on the light fixture once it was removed.

Hey, look - he even cleans!  :)  I love my hubby.

So, we are thankful beyond belief for how all of this went down.  We'll be having an electrician friend come by to look at the hole in our ceiling.  I'll let you know what he finds.  :)