i've got a headache. and while that in and of itself hardly warrants a dedicated blog entry, the events that followed, i feel, are worth sharing.
the lights in my space are all controlled on one switch. turning them all off darkens the whole lobby, but having them all on - especially the obnoxiously pink ones - was contributing to my throbbing temple. mentioning this in passing to my mother, she suggested we unscrew the bulbs from the lamps that were bothering me and asked for a papertowel to protect her fingers. dubious, i followed suit, using a paper towel to unclip the halogen directly above my desk. it plopped out of it's casing, and hung from the cable. it was definitely warm.
i craned my neck around, hoping to determine how we might disconnect the bulb from the socket, and it was then that i noticed my right hand feeling awfully warm...
the paper towel, clutched in my fist, was on fire. i panicked, promptly forgot all of the "fire safety" lessons from my gradeschool years, yelped and waved the paper towel around in the air, somehow assuming that enough of a breeze might extinguish the flames. (flawed, i know.) the flames engulfed the paper towel, and bits of ash floated through the air.
but it's not enough that i did this in front of my mother. my other boss entered the room just in time to see the flames, and (thank goodness) provide some real instruction for stamping them out. and even better, the rest of the team was coming back from lunch - walking through the front door just in time to see me stamping (and no doubt, yelping) like a mad woman. by the time the fire was extinguished, about half of our staff was lingering nearby.
so, needless to say - we were unsuccessful in disconnecting the bulbs. the switch is now flipped to the "off" position, and the lobby is dark. and that's fine with me, because it sure beats the heck out of explaining the fire to the first fire team on the scene...
can't you see the headlines? foolish woman burns down 12-story office building with paper towel...
2 comments:
Reminds me of when I empted out the Silverdale Group Health Clinic on my 40th birthday when someone gave me a candle that would not go out. It was terrible.......even the fire trucks arrived. We had patients out in the parking lot wrapped in paper gowns...........
Your Grandma, Linda
This made me laugh... I can totally envision the scene in my head.
Stupid lights. We always had them off in the old office!
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