Where there's smoke...
...there's me lighting my kitchen on fire. Well, not really on fire, because it was all smoke and no flame. I don't have a toaster, so I was toasting a bagel on the electric stove top, and I really didn't look away for more than a couple of minutes, but by the time I looked back they were black and pouring out smoke. I caught it in time to actually watch as the smoke wafted toward the ceiling, hit critical mass, and launched the smoke alarm. Several days earlier I had watched the building managers attempt clumsily to turn off a false alarm at the transformer box in the entrance way after someone smoked up the communal kitchen in the basement. I assumed that the alarm was a centralized event, so I got everything off the stove and started down the stairs to locate the managers and let them know it was under control. Half-way down, I realized that the sound was coming only from my room only, so I turned and ran back up to see if I could shut it off at the source. I pushed some things that looked like appropriate buttons, accidentally yanking it off the ceiling in the process, and finally it went quiet. Meanwhile, the room was filled with smoke, and I can see from taking a couple of breaths too deep why they say that smoke does more damage than fire. But, one good thing came out of it: I know the smoke alarm works. At least, it did until I knocked it off the ceiling.
As it turns out, fire alarms are sort of a social event around here. I met the French guy from down the hall when the building alarm went off last week, and the same evening after mine went off, someone upstairs set theirs off. The collective residents of my hallways (about half a dozen doors, only half of which are occupied) poked their heads out, and after determining that it was under control, we all introduced ourselves. The guy across the hallway said he was a little worried because that was the second time in one day that he'd heard the alarm. I rolled my eyes and told him the first was not to worry about - that little trick was my doing.
Which all brings me to this morning, which reads like a practical joke: unnerving at the time, amusing later on. I joined the gym in the University of London student union building, which is at the far end of the same block as the main LSHTM building. I did the work-out thing, hopped in and out of the shower, and was standing in front of a row of lockers wearing nothing but a towel when an alarm went off, alternating with an electronic voice telling everyone to exit the building immediately. Half a dozen other women were in roughly the same state of undress as myself, and we all kind of looked at each other, wondering who was going to be first to bolt to the rainy outside in a towel. We all probably thought that if given a moment or two, someone would come over the intercom to say it was a false alarm. That didn't happen. Instead, an employee came through the door in a hurry and told everyone in no uncertain terms to leave, now, no matter what they were wearing - just grab a towel and go. Fortunately, by that time I had dawdled my way back into my sweat pants and a sweat shirt, and I had the foresight to shove everything else into my duffel bag. At the nearest emergency exit, someone was pushing ineffectually on the door, so I went ahead and shoved through it. I was still fairly sure that it was either a false alarm or a minor problem, but still, I have no intention of dying in the locker room of a gym. As I was walking toward the school to find a bathroom where I could finish changing, a fire truck roared up, lights flashing. But by the time I came back down the street to the building where class is held, the truck was gone and the gathered crowd had apparently gone back in. False alarm, I suppose, despite the stern warning of the employee who told us to leave in our towels.
And that all brings me back around to one night, last week, when I opened the dumpster on the street to throw in some garbage. There inside the dumpster was a suitcase. One of those rolling things, about a reasonable carry-on size. It didn't look to be particularly old or beat-up, and it appeared to have stuff in it still, kind of spilling out the pockets. Hmm, I wondered, is this what they mean when they say, "Be on the look-out for suspicious packages"? Who throws a suitcase in dumpster? I mulled over the options: call the cops and be embarrassed when it turns out that one of my neighbors admits they just threw out some old luggage, or not call the cops and be even more embarrassed when the thing blows half the building apart (not my half - I'm at the other end, with a fire exit conveniently located at the end the stairs). The latter was not likely (especially since, though this is very close to where the bombing happened in July, it's actually a very quiet little neighborhood to the side of the main drag). More likely is that some tourist got their luggage ripped off and this was the skeletal remainder of their belongings.
In any case, I didn't call the police. The suitcase was gone the next time I looked in there, but so was all the garbage - whatever it was is now in the local repository for London refuse.
As it turns out, fire alarms are sort of a social event around here. I met the French guy from down the hall when the building alarm went off last week, and the same evening after mine went off, someone upstairs set theirs off. The collective residents of my hallways (about half a dozen doors, only half of which are occupied) poked their heads out, and after determining that it was under control, we all introduced ourselves. The guy across the hallway said he was a little worried because that was the second time in one day that he'd heard the alarm. I rolled my eyes and told him the first was not to worry about - that little trick was my doing.
Which all brings me to this morning, which reads like a practical joke: unnerving at the time, amusing later on. I joined the gym in the University of London student union building, which is at the far end of the same block as the main LSHTM building. I did the work-out thing, hopped in and out of the shower, and was standing in front of a row of lockers wearing nothing but a towel when an alarm went off, alternating with an electronic voice telling everyone to exit the building immediately. Half a dozen other women were in roughly the same state of undress as myself, and we all kind of looked at each other, wondering who was going to be first to bolt to the rainy outside in a towel. We all probably thought that if given a moment or two, someone would come over the intercom to say it was a false alarm. That didn't happen. Instead, an employee came through the door in a hurry and told everyone in no uncertain terms to leave, now, no matter what they were wearing - just grab a towel and go. Fortunately, by that time I had dawdled my way back into my sweat pants and a sweat shirt, and I had the foresight to shove everything else into my duffel bag. At the nearest emergency exit, someone was pushing ineffectually on the door, so I went ahead and shoved through it. I was still fairly sure that it was either a false alarm or a minor problem, but still, I have no intention of dying in the locker room of a gym. As I was walking toward the school to find a bathroom where I could finish changing, a fire truck roared up, lights flashing. But by the time I came back down the street to the building where class is held, the truck was gone and the gathered crowd had apparently gone back in. False alarm, I suppose, despite the stern warning of the employee who told us to leave in our towels.
And that all brings me back around to one night, last week, when I opened the dumpster on the street to throw in some garbage. There inside the dumpster was a suitcase. One of those rolling things, about a reasonable carry-on size. It didn't look to be particularly old or beat-up, and it appeared to have stuff in it still, kind of spilling out the pockets. Hmm, I wondered, is this what they mean when they say, "Be on the look-out for suspicious packages"? Who throws a suitcase in dumpster? I mulled over the options: call the cops and be embarrassed when it turns out that one of my neighbors admits they just threw out some old luggage, or not call the cops and be even more embarrassed when the thing blows half the building apart (not my half - I'm at the other end, with a fire exit conveniently located at the end the stairs). The latter was not likely (especially since, though this is very close to where the bombing happened in July, it's actually a very quiet little neighborhood to the side of the main drag). More likely is that some tourist got their luggage ripped off and this was the skeletal remainder of their belongings.
In any case, I didn't call the police. The suitcase was gone the next time I looked in there, but so was all the garbage - whatever it was is now in the local repository for London refuse.
posted by skylanda at 1:11 PM
1 Comments:
Oops, I didn't realize I had it set for registered posters only...sorry about that! (Though now that you are registered, you should start posting stuff so we can all keep up on your adventures too!) I sent you an email this afternoon - hope you get it, 'cause I wasn't sure if I had the right address!
-JC
Post a Comment
<< Home