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What NOT to do at 3am
Oct. 30th, 2008 03:43 amDecide to toast pumpkin seeds without first checking the bottom of the oven for any burnt food chunks from the previous use that might start smoking and cause the smoke detectors to go off. Oops.
In typical nocturnal fashion, I started working on my pumpkin in the middle of the night. I cut it open, cleaned out the guts, then thought hmmm, toasted pumpkin seeds would be nice. I got them all prepared, popped them in the oven and took a little timer out to the couch to watch TV and mark my template out on said pumpkin. 15 minutes later, the smoke detectors went off. And of course, these are our brand new smoker detectors that have battery back-ups in them, so I couldn't just run down to the basement and flip off the circuit breaker. They'll just keep sounding.
The only way to shut them up is to turn off the circuit breaker and hit the "it's not a freaking fire!" button on one of the detectors (which only stops them for 30 seconds unless you've also cut the power). To do that, I have to stand on a chair and poke it with a stick. But by the time I could even think get chair and stick, the man was awake asking for the stick (he doesn't need the chair). And he was neither alarmed nor grumpy about being awoken by a smoke alarm in the middle of the night. I guess he's used to my late-night shenanigans.
Just so you know, it's not like the house was filling with smoke and I was oblivious to it. Even standing right in front of the oven I couldn't see or smell any smoke. Those smoke detectors are just really sensitive.
The pumpkin seeds turned out perfectly golden brown. Yum.
In typical nocturnal fashion, I started working on my pumpkin in the middle of the night. I cut it open, cleaned out the guts, then thought hmmm, toasted pumpkin seeds would be nice. I got them all prepared, popped them in the oven and took a little timer out to the couch to watch TV and mark my template out on said pumpkin. 15 minutes later, the smoke detectors went off. And of course, these are our brand new smoker detectors that have battery back-ups in them, so I couldn't just run down to the basement and flip off the circuit breaker. They'll just keep sounding.
The only way to shut them up is to turn off the circuit breaker and hit the "it's not a freaking fire!" button on one of the detectors (which only stops them for 30 seconds unless you've also cut the power). To do that, I have to stand on a chair and poke it with a stick. But by the time I could even think get chair and stick, the man was awake asking for the stick (he doesn't need the chair). And he was neither alarmed nor grumpy about being awoken by a smoke alarm in the middle of the night. I guess he's used to my late-night shenanigans.
Just so you know, it's not like the house was filling with smoke and I was oblivious to it. Even standing right in front of the oven I couldn't see or smell any smoke. Those smoke detectors are just really sensitive.
The pumpkin seeds turned out perfectly golden brown. Yum.
