Fire Chaos

NO FIRE ~ but a great deal of chaos.

I slammed in a pair of Morrison's own quarter pounder beefburgers in the middle shelf under high heat fan oven-grill combi with drip-tray to catch the slimy expectorations.

Within three minutes so much smoke was seeping from the sides of the door you'd think my own secret Bonfire Night was smouldering away in there. A minute later, predictably, the smoke alarm went off, but I was ready underneath with a broomhandle to poke it quiet.

This technique was successful for a while, but five minutes and a couple more pokes later so much smoke was pouring into the room that the alarm in the hall went off to earsplitting, lights flashing, bellringing psychotronic hullabaloo. Basically my "fire" had set the house's compulsory Health & Safety state-of-the-art alarm system into the biggest techno-tizz I've ever experienced.

I nearly fell down the stairs trying to get the control box to quell this unearthly commotion. Even then it took two minutes of random key-stabbing till I eventually hit on the right sequence of key-turning and button-pressing to restore peace and sanity.

Thankfully all my housemates seemed to be out ~ or hiding behind their doors.

I barely had time for ten seconds' leaning against the front door panting with exhaustion and to clamber up the stairs to try and air the intractable grey fumes via my tiny casement windows. The oven was off and extractor hood on full blast already. And a woman blaring in Japanese about her trip to London. I always try to combine cookery with education when possible.

But I'd barely a second to notice any of this when the main alarm was off again ~ like a sonic drill to both ears. I charged downstairs. Key-turn. Press press press. The red light signifying a blaze in "zone two" vanished. Peace again.

I had barely got upstairs when the alarm went off yet again. By this time I was panicking that the neighbours ~ or worse the alarm box itself ~ would send the emergency services piling round.

Back upstairs I wiped by glasses, convinced the fog I witnessed everywhere was down to burger-greasy lenses. But no amount of spectacle-buffing would clear it.

The terrible racket went off again and again and again. By the fifth time I knew the silencing procedure by heart. But the control box was mains-powered with battery backup. There was no way of just switching the whole thing off until the smoke cleared. And with my tiny windows (the big ones painted shut long ago ~ thanks landlord) this was going to take a long, long time. I was on the verge of despair.

The cause of all the trouble, so it transpired, was a red-glowing water-filter-shaped gizmo I hadn't even noticed before on the ceiling by my door ~ quite separate from and independent of the poke-outable smoke detector in the next room. No amount of determined broom action would silence this baby.

Eventually with a prayer to God our ridiculously over-zealous alarm system did chill out and shut up for good but not before my nerves were totally frazzled.

No smoke without fire?!?
Not on your nellie!

All that and my burgers were still only half cooked through ~ I had to finish them off in a frying pan!

AND HOW WAS YOUR WEEKEND..??!!?!