A little bit of advice... When you live in tower apartments and set a snack on fire in the microwave at 1:30 in the morning, you DON'T open the door into the shared hallway to clear the smoke from your apartment for a couple of reasons. First, the smoke pouring into the shared hallway will sound the whole building evacuation alarm, and your sleepy eyed neighbors will have to evacuate the building. Secondly, and perhaps just as important, you will be responsible for the $900+ bill that the Fire Department sends the apartment building for responding to the "fire".
This is what happened last night:
I was very happily asleep in bed when the loudest, most obnoxious alarm sounded. I quickly grabbed for the sundress that I had thrown on floor when I got into bed a few hours before. I ran into the hallway where I met Ryan who was coming from the living room to get me. He grabbed his car keys and wallet, and I grabbed my purse before heading for the front door to make our way five stories down the stair well to the street. We've been evacuated a few times before, always at a reasonable hour. And Each time was a false alarm. So, you can imagine our surprise when the alarm sounded at 1:30 in the morning, and as we opened our front door smoke enveloped us. That was a little disconcerting. OMG, it's a REAL fire and it's on our level!!
We quickly joined our pajama wearing neighbors as we made our way down the stairs and filed out into the street. As we made our way onto the curb across the street, we listened as the Fire Truck's siren got closer. We didn't see any smoke or flames, when we looked back at the building. But, I knew that there had been a thick cloud of smoke on our level. So, seeing quick acting firemen jumping from their truck was a relief. Phew!
I am happy to report that this was ANOTHER false alarm. Someone decided to overcook a snack in the microwave, and they set it on fire. They then opened the door to the shared hallway hoping to clear the smoke from their apartment. The hallway quickly filled with smoke and set off the evacuation alarms. Ugh!! I'm happy it was a false alarm, but also annoyed that I was so rudely woken in the middle of the night with smoke and sirens.
