Monday, December 18, 2006

Putting Out Kitchen Fires

My roommate and i were looking forward to a mellow Sat. evening enjoying her boyfriend's gourmet cooking. We sipped wine and traded gossip as he diligently carved out bell peppers. M and i were on the far side of the house when he yelled at her to come. She lazily replied: "yaaa coming." he yelled again: "come NOW.. it's kind of an emergency." i didn't like the tone so i went along, too. there, in the kitchen oven was a fire burning and it wasn't about to cook our food. he had set it to 400 degrees and started smelling something weird and when he opened the oven, there were flames dancing around. As he used the fire extinguisher, smoke and the yellow powdery stuff enveloped us. I decided to call 911. It was my first 911 call and I tried to be calm but when the guy told me to "get out of there now" i was pretty freaked out. we ran out of the house and within minutes there were 3 fire trucks racing down the street. I tried calling my landlord next but got his answering machine.
The firefighters went running in with hoses and a smoke blower. A ladder went up somewhere. My roomie was nervously asking if we should tell the pros it was an electric fire. I nervously giggled in my tweety bird slippers (it was the only pair i could slip into quickly) and her friend nervously lit up a cigarette. was this an appropriate time to light another fire? Meanwhile, some neighbors had come out and i told them what happened. I looked at a couple from next door - they seemed vaguely familiar - but shook my head and thought it was a bad time to socialize. Soon, one of the firefighters called us upstairs and said the fire could have been caused due to leftover grease. I went back down and said hi to Angie and Jake, whom i had met at my former roommate's wedding last year. Surreal, but true.
Back at home, the kitchen was a mess and the oven is still out of commission. The landlord has promised to get us a new one but till then microwave meals will have to do! I also have a newfound respect for firefighters but i have to admit, there is a reason why they have so many sexual innuendos associated with them :)

6 comments:

Anonymous said...

Wow... scary!

Interesting what you say about firefighters, though. ;-) I did wonder...

Anonymous said...

"tweety bird slippers"...?

Anonymous said...

Adventures of crisis is right

Anonymous said...

So who paid for damages?

Anonymous said...

payal: oh! joys of the world ;)
kanika: yes, u read right.
monica: haha
alpana: insurance i'm hoping!

mommyof2 said...

Im glad u guys are all right..