fierced02

A good example would be lights turning off when you get close to them? Well, I have a really interesting story. It was about four years ago when I was sitting in my room at my computer. Anyways, my mother walked in and we both reached for something on the desk at the same time and our hands touched. We felt somewhat of a shock and at that exact moment all the lights and electronics in the room dimmed and returned to normal as soon as we jumped back. Have any of you had similar experiences at all?

ManWithAPlan

it's called static electricity....

and if objects are not insulated properly then you can surge them.

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fierced02

Everything in a room including the lights of the room itself? Well darn, thats a pretty powerful static charge!

Sp0rAdiC

Whenever I go grocery shopping and use a cart, I get an insane amount of static electricity. I reach for food and always get shocked. It's great when I go with friends and keep shocking them

Glava

Right after turning off a TV or computer monitor, I place my hand on the screen, and feel my arm hairs standing up due to static electricity. It's pretty cool, actually.

ManWithAPlan

it doesn't have to be a lot, but if it hits a bare wire it causes a surge in your whole circuitry... most houses run on parallel circuits, so every room is not dependant on the others (more or less). Technically you could have blown out a fuse.

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dawiz73

If you ever have a BUNCH of money and are bored, go to Fairbanks, Alaska in the middle of winter (Jan/Feb). When the temp is at 50 or 60 below zero all moisture in the air is frozen. I did this one year and had to touch the door handle to the hotel room with my keys before touching it because of the 2 inch visible static electricity arc that REALLY hurts if you use your hand. For some reason I was the one who was the most affected when we were there. Everyone elses arcs were much smaller. I also used to arc to everything in the office that was metal;chairs, cabinets, computer keyboards??, etc. Not so much since I moved to FLORIDA

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gobble

try touching one of the spark plug leads on your car while it is running

that is an electric shock you will not forget

Karby

whenever i rub my feet on the carpet and i have socks on...

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noblejr

Maybe your AC or a big appliance turned on which can dim lights for a second. Perhaps you don't usually notice it but since it was timed so well with a static shock you took unusual notice of it.

MSD

Try pulling a wire with a hand on the block while it's running. six inch arc to hand, out through other hand (grounded.) Not as much fun as a a 300kv stungun, though.

gobble

hahah i was touching the coil lead so it was anywhere between 20,000 to 40,000 volts.

I dont really want to try 300,000volts

todd

9 volts is my highest Battery to tongue.

I zap people with this de-static-arizing gun for records.

Rekna

In my old house we decided to play a prank on the dean of our college. We blew up 1000 balloons for his birthday and put them in his office during the night. Anyway since my house was half a block from his office we blew them up for days in my house and left them in our living room. They created so much static electricity that they would randomly pop during the night. Anyway for the next 6 months you couldn't touch a lightswitch in that room without getting a painfull shock..... There were many cuss words let out in that room.

StephenSa

I seem to generate a lot of static electricity. I don't think I've ever turned lights off with it or anything but MAN does it Hurt! I've had to stop my grocery shopping before because everytime I reached for something I'd get a big arc and electric shock. People at the store must have thought I was nuts because I'd keep jumping back and cursing whenever I'd go near metal. Around my office If I'm walking around much I try to ground myself every few feet so I don't build a big charge. Lots of tiny shocks are better than one BIG one. During the wintger I even shock myself getting out of my car. Its a drag.

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ManWithAPlan

6 months?:-/

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Rekna

yeah the whole winter. We had to wait till it warmed up to get rid of it.

ManWithAPlan

i don't think that oculd have been just the balloons, it's hard to imagine that balloons would charge a ROOM up so much... you'd think it would maybe spread to the house or just discharge slowly...

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Rekna

I'm sure there were lots of factors involved but the baloons raised the static electricity up within the house. This house had no grounds built into outlets. It was the middle of the winter. And that room had tuns of windows. All of that could contribute to it.

ManWithAPlan

wow, that's interesting.

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Squishor

I've never understood how this could be possible, but I had a boyfriend who would get shocks from outlets and such that were turned off. The most extreme example was once when we were at a friend's house that was being remodled. My boyfriend touched an electrical box and got a shock that threw him back about 10 feet. The guy who owned the house walked over to the circuit breaker saying, "This should have been turned off" but then found that it was turned off. Very strange - I never figured that one out. Maybe I just need to know more about how electricity works.

ManWithAPlan

built up charge?

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peokuk

Something that happens to me from time to time is that when I'm walking past some street lights at night, they go out when I get near them and then come back on after I've walked past them. It's the strangest thing and I've only ever noticed it with the orange street lights. Has this happened to anyone else?

Squishor

I think somewhere on the internet I've seen entire web sites dedicated to discussing the streetlight phenomenon, complete with naysayers and true believers.

warrrreagl

This happens to my wife all the time, but it only involves streetlights. We can either be driving or walking, but streetlights simply go out when my wife passes under them. Certainly not every time, but enough times to notice. We never see them go out in front of her or behind her; it's always the one directly over her.

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dieseldog

He's a good actor.

Willravel

My brother and I used to run every morning around the corner at a middle school. It had a decent track, and we were honestly trying to stay in shape. One cool morning, we were running. He was about 6 feet in front of me and I was only half looking at where I was going. We ran like this for about 20 minutes, until we had reached the 3 mile mark. We usually stop at this mark. I stopped breathing hard and noticed he was still running. I called out to him. "Hey we reached the mark. Lets go home." His run was uneffected by my call. I ran over to him and as I was about to grab his shoulder, my hand seemes to breech some kind of static (?) barrier. I heard a strange popping sound. My brother stopped running. He was breathing as if he was sitting down. I was still breathing hard, so I found this to be almost as strange as the barrier. My brother looked at me funny for a second, and said, "Three miles already?" I was a little shocked. As we were walking home he stopped and looked at me again and asked, "Did you feel something before you grabbed my shoulder?" "YES!" Neither one of us could explain what had happen. He mentioned that he felt like his body was operating by itself and his mind was in another place altogether. He said he wasn't thinking about it at the time, but it seemed peculiur when he thought back on it. I still am not sure what happened, but I swear I am not lying or changing any pert of this story. It is completly true.

Any thoughts?