Seeing these candlesticks and wineglasses reminds me of the only disaster that happened yesterday. I was removing some heavy candlesticks from the back corner of a shelf in my china cabinet and suddenly the whole shelf tilted forward and everything on it (mostly crystal wineglasses and a crystal pitcher) started sliding off! I very quickly blocked everything I could from sliding off the shelf with my body but I could hear things falling to the floor and exploding. Offline Chuck was behind me and quickly diagnosed the problem: the tiny bracket which held the shelf up was missing from the front right corner of it. Fortunately, I only lost three wineglasses, two of which were not important (not family heirlooms).
Well, isn't that a GDB-etc.?

Sorry to hear about this, FRiend. Reminds of the time I had a cupboard shelf collapse just like that when I was storing some new flea market glassware finds. Sure did make me mad, I can tell you.

Maybe we should have a thread on holiday disasters?