I have a light outside the back door.

It is one of those motion sensitive LED yokes that lights up half the parish.

Originally there was a lamp with a little tubular bulb but that kept blowing and was a pain in the arse to fix as the bulbs were fiddly and the light happens to be in a very awkward spot where the step ladder isn’t quite high enough and my aluminum ladder is a bit too long. Anyhows, a few years back I replaced it with a LED one which was brilliant [literally].

A while back the light started doing its own thing which wasn’t quite the thing I wanted it to do. As darkness fell the garden became dark, as gardens tend to do after sunset. If anyone opened the back door the light would spring to life and that was grand. Except that it didn’t switch off again. The entire estate would be floodlit for the rest of the night. Come daylight, it would be off again having obviously decided it was redundant. This phase lasted a year or so.

The next phase I discovered during one of my strolls around the estate – the light was now on permanently. It was quite irritating as it would blind me when mowing the lawn. The neighbours must think I have shares in the leccy company [which I don’t]. This phase also lasted about a year.

The next phase brings us up to date. The light has taken to flashing. It randomly picks its own time and then switches on. But it is now flashing at the rate of two or three flashes per second. If nothing else, it is protecting us from any burglar who suffers from photosensitive epilepsy. I don’t mercifully suffer from that condition but still the flashing is very hard on my eyes.

I cannot work out a pattern. Sometimes it remains dark [after dark] and comes on when the door is opened. Sometimes it’s steady and other times it flashes. Or it may decide to have a spell of flashing during its “on” phase before randomly picking a time to behave itself.

It’s flashing now. Mid afternoon. I don’t know when it started or when it may finish. It is really fucking annoying.

I suppose I’ll have to replace the whole unit which is expensive and is a bugger to replace.

There are times when electronics really pisses me off.