You know what?

I'm reeeeeeeaaaaaaalllllllyyyyyyy tired of summer.

Time seems to move so slowly during the summer. And it's so hot. And it never rains. We've been "promised" rain two weekends in a row and all that happens is the sky gets dark and two or three big drops fall, and then I have to go out and put the sprinkler on the lawn (and pull it back in at the end of the day, lest it get stolen).

And it seems to be the summer of Things Breaking: last night, my Antifoni lamp (the only Ikea product I have owned) broke. It was a Tensor-style lamp, and one of the arms just snapped. Apparently that was how electrictiy was conducted up to the bulb (the cord inserts down low on one arm and is not seen again). And I see that it was apparently made of pot-metal with a shiny outer coating.

Which is a metaphor for how everything is made these days, I've concluded: cruddy crappy cheap construction with a thin gloss of sophistication.

I'd be less upset about it but for two reasons: first, it was a gift to me, and I attach mythical proportions to gifts. If I break or lose something I've been given, I feel as if I have slapped the giver in the face.

And secondly - and more importantly - it was the PERFECT lamp for reading in bed. It had a small bulb (halogen) with a dark shade so that you could angle it exactly so light only hit the page of the book, without dazzling your eyes, without making the room too bright. Without keeping me awake for a long time after I'd turned out the light, because of excess light triggering my stay-awake centers.

I tried reading with the little bedside lamp I used to use and it didn't work so well. And I had a hard time getting to sleep because even with the lowest wattage bulb in the house, it was too bright. And the clip-on book light I owned - being the sort of "giftware" that many places sell - gave up the ghost a long time ago; its on-off switch broke and it won't turn on anymore, or if it turns on, it won't stay on. I've been through a progression of these; most of them being the less-than-$10 models that Hastings sold.

My first thought was to see if there was any way to fix the lamp, but I've concluded that there isn't - no kind of weld or gluing would hold on that pot-metal, and gluing probably wouldn't conduct electricity any way. And if, in fact, the electricity comes up through the arm that broke, it's probably unsafe now, as the thin veneer of brushed chrome has been breached.

I just hope that "bulky waste" is still picking up things other than yard waste.

So, I guess this afternoon is going to be the start of LampQuest 2006. My first thought was to go to the local Mart of Wal, mainly because they don't have the annoying unctuous salesmen that the local furniture store has, fellows that attach themselves to you like a burr and start suggesting other "options" and pointing out things that cost more than you want to spend. But then again - wal-mart is the main purveyor of cheap-jack junk that breaks in a year. And you know? I'm done with buying things that break in a year. I'd happily shell out $150 or more for a good reading lamp if I could have a reasonable guarantee it would last for ten or fifteen years. Especially if it was one of those LED models that you supposedly never need to change a bulb on.

Planned obsolescence is one of the things that angers me most about modern society. I realize it's what makes the capitalist wheels turn - that, and making people think they're desperately unhappy and unfulfilled with what they have now, and they can be one of the Cool Kids if they buy whatever tarted-up object is being pimped on the television. But I wonder if we haven't metaphorically (or maybe more than metaphorically) sold our souls for the wonders of finding a t-shirt that costs "only $5." Seems to me there are an awful lot of people who don't take care of the stuff they have, simply because it's so cheap to buy new. Or there are a lot of people who toss their entire wardrobes every couple years and buy new - not because they've changed size, not so much because styles have changed, but because they CAN.

So I don't know. My parents own lamps that they've had since before I was remembering lamps - so they must be over 30 years old. And they still work. Is that too much to ask? I guess it is. (And I'm leery of going the real antique route: I'd rather not risk burning down my house with one of those old fabric-wrapped cords with an ungrounded plug).

I suppose I could mail-order something. I could even probably mail order another Antifoni if I really wanted, except that my respect for Ikea went down about 100% when I saw that the inside of the lamp looked like it was forged out of old soft-drink cans. (Recycling has its place, but so does making stuff that you don't have to send to the landfill in 2 or 3 years).

So I guess I'm going to try the local furniture store again and see what they have, and tell the salesman to bug off if I have to. I've driven past there a few times at night (when the place is closed but of course all the lamps are on as an advertisement) and they did have a sort of cool-looking tree-shaped lamp. But I really want one that works well to read in bed, no matter how cool the tree lamp might be. (We don't have a lighting center, not that I know of, in this town. And I am not driving to Sherman for a stinking lamp. I'd mail-order first and gripe about not being able to read properly until it comes).