By Alex, Durham, NC

One of my friends had just finished remodeling one of his bathrooms, which included new sink and tub fixtures, new lighting, and a new floor. Once he finished all of that, and moved on to repainting and re-wallpapering the cabinetry and walls. After a week's worth of pretty hard work, and being down a bathroom in his house (which did not make his wife happy at all) he was done, and the place really did look quite fantastic.

His wife was all set to take the inaugural shower, and as she was adjusting the temperature of the water before pulling up the little knob to make the water switch from the bath spigot to the shower head, she noticed a little tingle. No, this was not the sexual excitement I suspect some women experience when they see a really well-decorated bathroom, but an electrical tingle. It seems as though whenever one had a hand in the stream of water and the other hand was contacting the metal spigot knob, you inadvertently found yourself being electrocuted. Not severely, mind you, but electrocuted nonetheless. This of course led to my friend having to tear up a great deal of a wall that he had just finished hanging wallpaper on, and generally making a large mess of the place, again, to find the missing grounding straps. It's all fixed now, and the bathroom is once again freshly wallpapered and painted, but his enthusiasm for the job suffered on the second swing through, and I don't think the bathroom looks as good now as it did the first time it was "finished"...