We had a fire in the garage yesterday in the late evening. The old fake christmas tree caught fire from a spark (from a fire in the fireplace that burned out hours and hours earlier) that fell through the ever-so-slightly-ajar ashpit cover. Our fire alarms didn't go off at all until way after the firemen arrived (we called 911), so we need to get new ones; the alarm in my room (which is on the same floor as the garage) didn't even go off after all the other alarms went off. And we need to invest in a fire extinguisher. So, yeah, pretty scary stuff. It got really smokey in the house, even after my dad dragged the burning material out of the garage and to the outside. I took my dogs and myself out of the house and away from the smoke (had to bundle up, it was wicked cold), I didn't want them inhaling the smoke, it smelled so bad (burning plastic christmas tree).
No one is hurt, the house is okay (thought still a bit smelly). Scary event, though.
So, yeah, that's about as much excitement as I ever want to have for the year. We've never had an uncontrolled fire before, so this not-a-drill experience was new for me. I kept my cool, though... probably 'cause I knew the fire wasn't going to spread into the house.
Oh I've had fire accidents before. One time it was because my dad was using a frying pan on a BBQ grill to make pancakes. The frying pan of course, got some of the charcoal on it and the next day when we were using the pan to make meatballs the charcoal ignited. Some panicked, others, like me, tried to put it out through suffocation. It was successful.
The other time it was when the air in the chimney flowed back down, which made the fire in the fireplace to suffocate (or so we thought) and plumes of smoke rosed from the fireplace in to the house. We went to figure out why it was doing it so we opened the door to the fireplace and the wood (in the fireplace) was set ablaze again. It took some time, but we managed to stop it. Aftereffects included a smokey smell which stayed for two weeks and our once-so-white chimney now have a brownish/blackish discoloration.
In other news, today was the start of the exam week for the third term. Good ol' mathematical logic and number theory was first on the cram-till-death list. I was so expecting a really crunchy exam and it turned out to be a watery mush. I pretty much finished in less than 105 minutes. Now I just have to cram for the derivatives exam and a small bit of Finnish during the weekend, and hope to get some time over for video games and lurking. And hope that my parents can come to their senses and stop arguing with each other. Seriously, it's getting annoying to listen to them and it makes a bad study atmosphere.