It all started with a beep.
At 3 AM in the morning.
Remember that episode of Friends where Phoebe’s fire alarm keeps beeping? She unplugs it, takes out its battery, beats it with a shoe, and then throws it in the trash, but it keeps beeping.
Yeah, it was like that.
Beep! Then blessed silence. Just as I start to doze off again, “Beep!” Like the flipping Roadrunner, but without Wile. E. Coyote and his army of ACME toys. (Roadrunners, btw, don’t beep; they don’t eat seed–they eat cute little bunnies; and coyotes don’t fuck with them because they’re mean.)
After about a half hour of this, my husband growls and staggers out of bed and into the living room. He returns a minute later and flops back in bed. On the floor, the greyhound stretches his long legs, claws scratching on the bed, sighs and goes back to sleep.
Beep!
“Fucking alarms,” says my husband after the fifth beep. He gets up again and turns on a fan to block the noise.
Beep!
“I hate the fucking fire alarms!” Angry spouse climbs out of bed and scratching noises from the living room follow as he yanks the offending alarm out of the ceiling. He returns to bed.
Beep!
Lather, rinse, repeat as my Dearly Beloved blisters the night air with curse words and removes the alarm’s batteries.
Beep!
Husband growls, gets up and I hear the sound of a door opening and closing as the alarm is sent out to commune with nature (roadrunners!). Greyhound’s tags jingle as he lifts his sleepy head, wondering what’s going on and if it involves feeding the hound.
Beep!
“Just close the door,” I suggest. He closes the bedroom door.
Beep!
Once more, husband goes into the fray, this time shutting off the fire alarm’s circuit.
Beep!
Horse is now neighing at the house, because, hey, we’re up, it must be time to feed the horse. Husband and I both try to ignore the noise, and start to doze off. We’re nearly asleep when the beep is accompanied by the sound of the clock radio’s alarm. We owe, we owe, it’s off to work we go.
Well, crap.
A while later, something is still beeping. A weird bit of inspiration strikes and I come out and eye the carbon monoxide detector that’s sitting by the fireplace.
Yeah…it was that damned thing. All along.
*Head desk*
I can relate to this!
Yeah, it seems like anyone who’s had a fire alarm has had to deal with late night alarm hijinks. Why do the stupid things always go nuts at night?