I was a demented child...

When I was little, I always thought it would be cool to have the firemen come down our block. They did once at the duplexes. I think some old lady fell down the stairs or something. The whole time I was thinking, "this is cool". Now I realize how horrible that is. I see a firetruck and I hope it's going nowhere near me.

I had no such luck this morning. It all started...
Um, I'm not going to start my story that way. Try again.

Once upon a time...
No, no, NO! Don't even think about it! Anything but that!

It was the best of times it was...

Taken, though not a bad start. C'mon! You can do this! Something original and not lame!

Okay, okay. Sorry. Let me try again. Lets try this...



Sleep still clung to every crag in my brain. A thin mist that was now being punctured by sharp stabs to my sound receptors.

That's better. Go with that. See where it takes you.

**(Sorry everyone. My creative side has been working itself into a frenzy since I haven't taken the time to give it an outlet. Continuing with my tale of the mornings events)**

What was it? This persistent beeping that sounded as if it were coming from under water? I rolled over, trying to block it out and get back to sleeping. After two minutes of fruitless attempts I decided to give up. I needed to be awake anyway and get ready for class. Still, what was this noise? It sounded like a smoke alarm. In my drowsiness, my logic finally came through and I realized I should probably check the house. I listened and sniffed my way around my room. No funny smells and the sound got weaker as I moved away from the wall connecting my room to our neighbors. Hm...

I pressed my ear to the shared wall and there it was. The beeping coming from next door. Great. What do I do now?

I stepped out of my room just as Gloria was stepping out of hers. We were both in our p.j.'s. Me in boxers and a t-shirt Gloria in something similar. We looked at each other and bot shrugged.

"I think it's the smoke alarm," I offered.

We made our way down the stairs and outside. Gloria went to the neighbors door and knocked. No answer. she rang the doorbell. Still no answer. Beautiful. Their alarm was going off and they weren't home. There was no smoke and no heat coming from the front door. No visible sign of fire. We decided the best thing at the time was to call Chad, our landlord.

I didn't have his number. Did Holly? Nope. Did Gloria? Guess not. So we had to go wake up Jenna. She rolled out of her cocoon and gave us the number which I dialed from Glorias phone.

Voice mail. Sighing, I left a brief message giving my our address, the neighbors address and a brief description of the situation. And that was that. I decided to start getting ready for class. I needed to be gone by 8:30 and it was now 5 till. I went up the stairs. When I reached to top, there as Jenna in her pajamas clutching her chest and looking distressed. She called down to Holly.

"Can you take me to the doctor? I'm really hurting..."

Wonderful. Apparently Jenna has some sort of condition that causes her to have bad chest pains at times.

This was how the morning started and it was about to get better.

I began to smell smoke. Crap! Smoke meant fire and fire is never a good thing in a home. I was halfway undressed to shower. A little alarmed now, I went back to my room, hastily dressed and out my unwasher hair in a ponytail. I met Gloria at the bottom of the stairs. She plugged her nose in a gesture indicating that she smelled the smoke as well. We both went to the neighbors door then. There was still no visible flame. But there was no doubt that there was something going on inside that was not supposed to be. So, fir the first time in my life I called 911.

They answered with the typical "911 emergency" then proceeded to ask what my address was. I gave it to them along with my number and name. Then I told them "the nature of the emergency". Alarms were going off, we could smell smoke, no one was home and there was no visible flame. They assured me that the fire department was on it's way.

Good.

So we waited. 5 minuted later, the tenants of the duplex arrived. Somehow notified that their alarms were going off. They went in...something that probably wasn't the smartest thing and opened the garage and windows. Smoke poured out of the openings. By now, the smoke had also made it's way into our air conditioning and all over our apartment. Who DOESN'T love the smell of fire smoke in your living space? We all exited the duplex, by now wide awake and a little annoyed that this was happening. Soon we heard the sirens and not one, but two fire trucks made their way down our street.

To make a long story short (cue Mr. Green) they found a small fire in the bathroom that didn't do too much damage. They brought out the hose and put it out. They fanned out the place to get rid of all the smoke (not our place...I guess there wasn't enough.) Then packed up and left. The fire marshal stayed behind to survey the damage, take pictures and ask questions. He came over to our place and asked if I was the one who had called, got my name and number and thanked me for my call. It was all the thanks I got because our neighbors certainly weren't dishing it out.

So that was my heroic moment of the day. Our duplex no longer smells like smoke. We have no idea what started the fire though me and my roomies think it was either a careless cigarette or a curling iron.

Well, that wasn't that exciting but it made for an interesting Monday morning. I missed my first class because of it. Oh well. The professor understood.

Well folks, lets hope that survive my year at Bodie drive. Not that I fear for my life (though mom does).

Happy day after Monday!