If you want to try out the forthcoming Minecraft patch a little earlier than everyone else, this is your chance. You can grab the pre-release .jar file from Mojang’s site here and never again have to worry about your torches jumping from wall to wall.
Mojang have resolved an awful lot of issues since the Pretty Scary Update, though there’s still a few more to be dealt with. You can keep an eye on their bug tracker here and see that, while an awful lot of problems have been reported, a fair few have also been seen to.
Don’t forget that we have our own guide to help players who are trying out snapshots and pre-releases of the game.