keith wrote in
news
One time back in the '60s (when I was a mere lad playing with
electronics) a friend and I were talking about these new-fangled LED
thingys. He said they were no big deal and had them for some time. He
then took a small-signal glass-encapsulated diode from his
pile-o-parts, bent the leads about 3/4" apart and grabbed it with
long-nosed pliers. He then shoved it into the mains outlet and sure
enough it lit up, and quite brightly too!

I once had a bizarre failure of a USR modem immediately after a
thunderstorm. You would think it would be a typical frying of the phone
circuits etc. When I checked it out, the relay coil was open circuit. This
of course is on the control cctry and not the telecom side. I replaced the
relay and it worked perfectly. Can only assume it was a coincidence since
if it was a voltage surge it should have taken out the semis on the relay
drive.