I just had a pool renovation completed by Poolside Plastering in Spring City, PA and am very happy with their work. New tile and pebblesheen, they are doing the decking next year.

I think it's very good for a 1964 job - I live in a similar neighborhood, and its a sight better than a lot of the hack jobs that were inflicted in that decade on some of the late 19th century townhouses here, when the then-run down neighborhood was being reclaimed by the young, the artistic, and the socially pioneering. The open bath isn't so great, but I love allocating the first floor to the kitchen and dining room, and putting the sitter upstairs. I would rework the stair to open it visually as much as possible, and use the front cubbyhole on the ground floor as an office rather than trying to make it a sitting area. I agree with you, Pal, about the cobbled bedroom. It would make a nice project room with some rejiggering. And the back garden has great potential. It looks very like the back of the row house in a beautiful Regency crescent around a pocket park off the Brompton Road in London where, too briefly, I shared the half basement with two other girls for one summer in the late 60's. The garden wasn't used by the family, so we had the use of it for ourselves and our friends. A time dear in my memory.

It's more ROCKET SCIENCE than you appear to be want to give it now. Your questions were so inanely basic, that you obviously haven't even begun to do the research that you need to do this job SAFELY and LEGALLY. I can't explain to you the entire ARTICLE 680 (and by reference 250 and 300) in a few news postings. If you can't be bothered to actually do what I suggested and go read and learn Article 680 (and the prerequisite sections of the code) and you are too pigheaded to get a professional in there, GOD HAVE MERCY ON YOUR POOR FAMILY. As I mentioned earlier, we LOSE people in pool wiring screw ups several times a year. This is no place for cocky know it alls.

I would try one more thing before replacing the entire fixture..... There is a type of grease ( that can be purchased in small packets at the auto parts store) that is intended for use in electrical sockets. Load the socket with the grease and install a new bulb. Make sure you don't get the grease or for that matter, the oil from your fingers on the new bulb. Hope this works....