Sometimes I feel like my life imitates an episode of Friends. One of my favorite episodes is in Season 7 where they're up all night. Joey and Ross get stuck on the roof, Chandler and Monica either read or clean and Rachel and Tag go to the office to find some contracts.
The second best part of that episode is Phoebe. Her smoke detector keeps beeping and she destroys it. Only to discover that it keeps beeping or screaming at her, no matter what she does to it.
The look of anguish and frustration on her face is priceless.
Fast forward to this morning. It's 4:00 am, I'm peacefully sleeping. N is in the kitchen getting ready for work. Zoe is asleep in her room. Everything is as it should be.
Then I heard it. Faintly in my dreams at first. Then it slowly brought me to reality. A beeping that I couldn't identify. It wasn't anything in my bedroom, so I opened the hall door.
N was standing in the hall staring up. At the smoke detector.
It's been beeping once a minute since 4:00 am to let us know that the battery back-up is dying. My mom graciously brought over a 9-volt battery at 4:30 am since we have none on hand. I put the new power into the alarm and started walking back to my room.
Then it beeped again. And again. AND AGAIN.
I've tried everything. Reset buttons. Taking the battery out and putting it back in.
I even called N to see if he could offer anything. He knows nothing about the smoke detector world.
I pulled up the manual on-line to see if maybe I was missing something. Nope. This low, once-a-minute chirping indicates a low-battery. These alarms require hardwiring and batteries to work effectively. If it detects a weak link anywhere, it will beep constantly. For-ever.
This battery is weak. Not weak enough to stop a once-a-minute chirping sound. Oh no. It's like the Clark Kent of the comic world. All the power of Superman, but hidden behind the glasses. Or you know, hardwired power.
Zoe is totally unawares of all this. She's sleeping like a baby.
I'm off to make an entire pot of coffee.
1 comment:
OMG, I'm going to check our smoke detectors today to make sure that doesn't happen. I don't think I could handle a crying baby AND that dreaded beeping!
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