When I was four or five or thereabouts, I remember being at home with Dad - Mom was off somewhere - when a fire was called. We got in the car and went to the firestation and got into the firetruck and went off to the house that was on fire. And Dad LOCKED US IN THE TRUCK!! I remember very clearly the injustice of this. I wanted to get out and go around to the other side of the house and see what the fire looked like from there. I knew that it was important to stay far away and not get in the way of the firefighters, and I would have! I was big! I could be very good! Hmph.

So tonight, I got half of my ancient desire granted. We were just done having pizza when Dawn got up and put the paper plates on the fire. A few minutes later, she glanced up and saw fire flickering up where the pipe went into the chimney. And as she said this, we heard it start to roar. So we shut all the dampers, called the fire dept, and went outside to gawk. It was a chimney fire, no question. Flames coming about 2 feet out the top, and black black smoke. So we stayed out and watched the firemen come, and climb up to the roof and dump stuff down. And squat and watch it for a while, and dump more stuff down. And wander around inside looking for hotspots. And watch it a while longer, and dump some more stuff down... Most excitement we've had since we went to the horse races! (that's another post - I should have made it before this one.) But all ended well. It was a ceramic-lined chimney, and they managed to keep it from getting too hot. All the Dumping Down of Stuff was to keep from using water so as not to crack it and make it unusable.