Fire in the Bistro
Oli woke me up a little earlier than usual this morning because the house was on fire. Well, almost. The communal hall was filled with a strong, almost chemical smell of burning. It smelt like something electrical, like when you leave a welding iron or set of curling tongs on a plastic surface top. I sleepily got dressed and we went to investigate.
Despite initially suspecting the restaurant below, the smell was strongest outside the front door of the first floor flat.
So we did what all sensible English people would. We went for breakfast. I should explain that it was still around seven thirty in the morning and the people who live on the first floor flat only use it as a pied a tierre, so we didn’t want to disturb them. After all, there was no smoke and the smell didn’t seem to be getting worse.
We agreed we’d grab a quick breakfast and if the smell was still there we’d do something about it.
It was still there. Because it was early, we tried ringing the buzzer of the first floor flat. Our logic was if they were asleep they wouldn’t have to get dressed to open the door. There was no answer, so we knocked on their front door. Still silent. I went and talked to the American girl renting the flat between ours and the first floor people. She had no idea what was going on either so we called the landlord and then the fire brigade.
I didn’t dial 999, just the number of the local fire brigade. I explained the situation, including the fact that I felt like a doofus. Two fire trucks came, and then out jumped a team of fire-fighters who went about examining the building (including a women, who I have to admit looked far too tasty to be a fireman). Oli and I swapped ideas of how to tell our new neighbours we’d had the fire brigade round to bust their front door down because of a weird smell.
After a lot of action, including setting up a crane to check out the roof and the flat next door, the firemen all shot into the basement of the restaurant and found the problem. A massive pan had been left on all night, the broth had evaporated over the hours and the contents - a veal bone and some mush was burning away.
Smoke billowed out everywhere as the team pulled the industrial sized pan out. They then shot some water on it, took some pictures and went about their way. I called the restaurant a few minutes ago, to talk over what happened. The manager was pretty defensive and a bit rude, but then I’d probably be in a crappy mood if one of my staff had left a hob on all night too.
If only there was this kind of drama every morning, I’d have a chance of regularly eating breakfast.
17 Responses
barryd says...
Hmmm uniforms. Are you going shopping for an outfit for Oli at the weekend?
Although with the exploding smoothie, and now a fire down below I’m very wary of visiting. It’s darned lucky it didn’t take. You’d think they’d have fire detection they turn on out of hours.
Kim says...
Very true, why don’t they have it? Maybe all the mice ate through the electricals.
I think the most important lesson here is that veal is not meant to be eaten, or cooked for over 12 hours.
barryd says...
No no the lesson is veal should be covered in bread crumbs and served with salad and a lemon wedge. Not left overnight
Kim says...
I\’ll serve you with a wedge of lemon if you keep on with that talk.
barryd says...
Are you objecting to eating veal, or the suggestion of uniforms? :p
Kim says...
Veal you fool, but veal in uniform is particularly sick.
Oli says...
I like the idea of emergencies in the morning as a way of waking up on time. Maybe an alarm clock that triggers a temporary flood, or automating the toaster to burn some toast.
Kim says...
I like the sound of that. I’ll set the toaster to five and you leave the bath running.
Embedded Stream » Blog Archive » Wake Up and Smell the Smoke says...
[…] We had to call the fire brigade out this morning, due to a fool in the basement restaurant leaving a big aluminium pot burning all night. I won’t seek out the limelight, but let you read about it here instead. […]
barryd says...
Surely waking up next to Oli would be emergency enough to get you out of bed …
Kim says...
I rather like it actually.
Mike says...
I do to.
Mike says...
Hooray - my first post on a professional writer’s blog, and I make a typo. Perfect.
Is it too late to add an ‘o’ to the too?
Yep. Oh, well.
Kim says...
How about: Mike Says… Oooh
Is that what you were looking for?
Mike says...
Yes, that’s it - in a completely Kenneth Williams way, of course!
But seriously, I don’t know if I’ve said it before, but I really like your writing style and am still looking forward to reading the rest of jtc!
Oli says...
Seriously, I don’t know if I’ve said it before but I love how everyone likes waking up next to me.
Kim says...
It’s the way you agree to make the tea.