You want me to dust what?

Today I had the day off...good right?  WRONG.  I woke up from my land of dreaming to 8 fire alarms going off saying, “Fire...Fire”.  I slowly get out of bed, the mutt at my heals, and fling open the door...half hoping to see some sort of something.  Of course I open the door to the wonderful land of nothing.  The alarms then stop.  Thank goodness!  I climb back in bed hoping to go back to sleep for another hour...it is only 8 am and this is my day to sleep in!  I pull the comforter over my head and close my eyes....

Instead of falling back into a dreamy world, I lay there and think of all the things I need to get done on my day off.  I had just figured out last night the oven quit working, so I knew I was going to need to make some phone calls about that.  I wanted to get a head start on the laundry, and I needed to clean the house.  I also thought about all the follow-up calls I needed to make for work...my ultimate goal of trying to trap people into signing a lease, to make a small bundle for myself...ahhhh, sales.  

I very dramatically fling back the covers, wishing the Chief was there to see how early I was getting up.  I stomp my way down the stairs, sill with no audience to witness my tantrum.  

I flip on the television, and head straight into the office to pull out the manual for the oven.  Since I got up, I might as well get started on my to-do list, right?

Side note-I am watching price is right...when the hell did Drew Carey lose 500 pounds?

Okay, back to my morning.  So I flip the manual to the  troubleshooting section....right, like I am going to really get lucky here.  I look at all the problems, and none of them is the problem I have.  I then look for a 1-800 number, which I find quickly.  I called that and talked to a kind woman that asked if I tried shutting it off yet.  I asked how I might go about doing that.  She informed me to shut it off from the breaker...wait 5 minutes...then turn it back on.  If that didn’t work, she wanted me to call her back and she would send a technician over.  Great right?  Now if I can just find where the breakers are.  I started with the basement..GOAL!  Okay, I stand there for twenty minutes and stare at this: 

Ummm, do I start at the bottom and work my way up?  I read all the labels and none say “oven”.  So I start with “microwave”..thinking because they were close in vicinity that maybe I would get lucky.  I turn it to off, and run upstairs.  Not lucky.  I go back down, flip that one back to its original position and try for another, “refrigerator”.  Eight trips later, I am staring at this stupid box trying to figure out why this has to be so tricky.  I notice one that says, “range”.  What the hell does that mean? I assumed it meant a series of things in a line (thank you online dictionary for putting the words I couldn’t think of together).  I thought maybe it was the orange room upstairs, because it is one long range (area).  I figured I had to try it, though, since the only things I had left were bathrooms and bedrooms (all upstairs).  Sure enough, it worked!  Then I realized I think an oven can also be called a range...yes guys, school teacher on board here.  So I sat down to wait my five minutes.  

As I am sitting down to enjoy a bowl of cereal, guess what jolts me up out of my seat?  The fire alarm.  As I am wiping up the cereal that went flying (due to my scare), I am cursing this state, this house, and myself for being so jumpy.  Then the alarm stops.  I decide this alarm thing won’t be able to be ignored.  I called The Dad, to get his advice.  After minutes of lecturing the obvious, “you have to get that fixed,” he suggest that I call the fire department.  Great...a plan.  Just as I am about to hang up I explain the oven issue I am having and how it took me forever to find the right breaker.  He says to me, “don’t you have one labeled 'range'?”  I politely said my goodbyes and then accidently dropped the phone on the ground and stepped on it...twice.  

My next task at hand... calling the fire department.  I looked up the number and called.  The man explained to me that I needed to call 911.  I told him it wasn’t an emergency and there wasn’t a fire, and he explained it was "protocol". I hung up with him to make the 911 call.  I explained the situation and was VERY clear it wasn’t an emergency.  He said, “no big deal, we won’t sound the alarms or anything, we will be there in a few to take a look.”  I hung up thinking, “maybe this is going to be easier than I thought!”  Oddly enough, I hear fire truck sirens in the distance, lightly laughing to myself about someone else having the same problem.  Three minutes later, those sirens from the fire trucks were parked outside my home.  Four LARGE trucks, blasting sirens like an apartment complex was blazing to the ground.  Excellent, I thought to myself.  

As I run outside explaining there was no emergency, they shut the alarms off explaining it was "protocol".  Whatever, I thought.  They came in and checked the house...I guess they thought I missed the angry flames, heat and smoke.  After determining there was no fire (glad I had them to point that out), they said it was probably dust.  They told me to open each detector and dust it with a paint brush.  Do you know how many fire alarms are in my house?  Eleven.  Do you know how long it took to dust eleven fire alarms?  45 minutes.  I finished dusting the alarms and went down to the basement to turn the breaker back on for the oven so I could test it.  I came upstairs, turned the oven on and sat down to do some follow-up work calls.  I grabbed the house phone and noticed it wasn’t working.  I went to the Chiefs office (where the base is) and noticed it was all off.  Luckily, I knew how to get to the breaker since we had already bonded.  I walk downstairs, wondering what crazy name they labeled the office with.  Luckily it was obvious “den”.  I flipped it the rest of the way off, and then flipped it back on.  Easy right?  Ha.  Nothing is easy today.

I immediately hear the familiar blast of the oh-so-dutiful fire alarm.  You have GOT to be kidding me.  I stomp back upstairs (I was in the basement), cursing the fire alarm, which led to the government, which led to the president.  All his fault!  I grabbed the phone, which was now working since the breaker did it’s job.  I stomped out on the back patio because at this point the alarm was constant.  I called 911 again, explained the situation, begged them NOT to turn on their sirens, and hung up the phone.  I sat on the porch for about 3 minutes as I listened to the “range” of fire truck sirens.  Can it get any better?  Oh, it does.  

They come back into the house, search it again for the imaginary fire that I keep missing out on, and notice my oven is on.  They asked if I was cooking something, and I said, “no, I am just testing it” (kicking myself for forgetting to turn it off before they came in).  Five men stand there staring back and forth at each other hoping someone speaks up saying, “yeah, my wife does that all the time.”  I explained that I was testing it because it wasn’t working and assured them the two things weren’t related.  They then determine that the alarm sounding is from a malfunction in the detector.  Really?  We pay for these geniuses?  My 95 pound mutt (who isn’t all that bright) could have told you there was a damn malfunction in the system! As I was explaining how the breaker set it off the third time, I walked over to show them which alarm was making a different sound.  As I did, something caught my eye behind the piano.  

Okay, despite what the Chief says, I can’t control my fear.  When something scares me or catches me off-guard, I scream and jump.  Call me a girl.  I know it is dead, but at first glance the only thing that goes through my mind is, “OMG, that is a mouse, a rodent, in my house, that could ultimately somehow manage to raise from the dead, and jump on my face.”  So naturally, I scream.  I wish it was as simple as a scream, but no, I like to do the full blown, death-feared, ear piercing scream.  They all look at me like I am completely psychotic...at this point I think I am too because I can still feel the mouse crawling on my skin.   I recover quickly flinging my arm toward the mouse explaining I thought it was alive (leaving out the part about it coming after me).  As I hear one of them mumble, “you don’t get more dead than that”, it took everything for me to not turn around and say, "is THAT protocol?"  Instead, I tried to quickly divert their attention away from the fact I had a mouse in my house (which is disgusting to me), and go back to explaining the weird sound coming from the alarm.  

They got the alarm to stop, and left my home with instructions to hire someone to fix the problem, “thanks dad,” I mumble as they all walk back down to their trucks.

That has been my morning, and it is still early.  I have informed the Chief there is a gift behind the piano for him when he comes home.  My oven is now working, and my alarms are no longer making a peep.  I hope I don’t have to add a part two to this blog.