One winter night, Dec. 30, 2005, to be exact, a cold, Michigan-winter night. Our house was toasty warm thanks to the wood stove in the living room.
My night-owl daughters, Amanda and Angie, were up watching TV and playing on the computer. I was doing laundry and cleaning the house for the company we expected the following night for a New Years Eve party. My son, daughter Lisa and husband were sleeping cozily in their warm beds.
At 1 a.m. I decide to go to bed. As I reached the hallway outside the bedrooms and kitchen, Pickles the cat was laying lazily in the hall closet, (the chimney runs through the closet so she likes the warm it provides, as well as the close proximity of her food dish in case I should decide to bless her with a midnight snack) As I petted Pickles goodnight I smelled something odd. It was an unusual smell; not the kitchen garbage, not the kitchen sink, not the litter box in the hall closet. The hall is outside the master bedroom where my husband had been sleeping for the past few hours, the bedroom door open.
One of my daughters walked into the hall and smelled the smell also.
IN the few seconds her and I talked about this smell, my husband propped himself up in bed and said, "Call 911 it's a chimney fire." He got out of bed and walked to where my daughter and I were standing in the hall as I said, "It is not. What makes you think it's a chimney fire? We've never had a chimney fire and you've been sleeping for the past three hours."
He got dressed and went outside and yelled in the front door, "It's a chimney fire! Call 911!"
Needless to say, my husband was right. We had a chimney fire, with flames, the fire department, and all the works. The house was saved, as well as all it's occupants and belongings. Although my hubby didn't say "I told you so" he gave me the "look" that says "I told you so."