(Michael blogging...)A few nights ago, Laura and I decided to light-up the wood stove for the first time this fall. We had no kids this night and settled in for a movie (The Lost Boys) and some cozy warmth.
After the movie had ended, Laura and I were small-talking about the film and were about to go upstairs and to bed when Laura suddenly sat bolt upright on the couch, pointed her finger firmly across the room and announced, "FIRE!"
Sure enough - a decorative wicker basket full of
pinecones had been set atop the wood stove during the summer months and it didn't occur to either of us that just maybe, sorta, kinda, we
might want to move it elsewhere before using the stove. Nevertheless, flames were now licking their way up the basket and devouring the pinecones as well.
Laura quickly opened the door to the back patio and I (sans oven mitt) grabbed the half-gone basket and quickly chucked it out the door onto the concrete before the flames engulfed my hand. Wrong move....
Have you seen Iron Man? Remember the part at the very beginning where Tony Stark is demonstrating the Jericho missile? It was a missile that, after launched, broke apart into dozens of smaller missiles and then wreaked havoc. The
pinecones were just like those smaller missiles.
So, now I had a dozen little fire-balls all rolling around the back patio — all with the predictability of a loose, bouncing football and all heading for the fence. The
wood fence. So now the night has transformed from a calm, quite, romantic evening into an "I Love Lucy" skit.
Disaster was soon averted as I grabbed the nearby garden hose and sprayed them down quickly and left them all to smoulder in the cool night air. As we left the mess to be cleaned up the next day, we went to bed wondering if the neighbors were thinking, "What the hell are the
Richters barbecuing now?" Ah well -
Euell Gibbons would have been proud.
