Isn't this just how it goes?

I just had my best game ever on VND. 2500+ games over the past five or so years of ownership, and I just was able to start and complete Alien Abduction (the mode that there is basically no information on anywhere!), end my first ball with more than 150,000,000 (top score before this, 168 mil and change) and an extra ball ready to go. Second ball wasn't great, but I managed to start two modes so I was looking like I might get to the Wizard mode too. Ball three was horrible, but that's all right, I can put the extra ball to work!

Managed to restart multiball, and right when I do one of the spotlight bulbs from the playfield comes out of the spotlight and I can see it rolling around on the playfield. DANG IT! Play on, we'll fix it after this! Managed to hit a couple jackpots and the bulb rolls amazingly into the left outlane, looks like this will work fine...

...and then I manage to drain both balls at the same time. VND pops up the center post to give me the ball back if I do that, but the ball doesn't fire back into play - the bulb fell into the trough and blocked it... until the game did a ball search, found it in the trough and ended the ball. Two shots away from Wizard mode, about 10 miles away from setting a distance record, and with a 212,373,380 final score that really could have been so much more.

Stupid bulb.

Yeah, we took them out of the one that we had at the arcade I worked at for that exact reason. I got a UV LED and had it in there, and it hadn't fell out in ages, but you know, when you're doing great is the perfect time for it to fall out.

After I wrote this, I put one game on Metallica before heading to bed, and I managed to pop off a rubber ring. Doubly annoying, as my son took the keys out of Metallica to play with and I don't know where they went (he's four, and I found them in his room but didn't realize what they were, and I put them somewhere that is a mystery since then...)