Sunday morning, I woke up to this high pitched chirping noise. Once I was actually awake, I established that it was not a dead or dying bird present from the cat, but a smoke detector.
It's the one in the stairs. When Steady finally woke up, he was all "Why didn't you take out the battery?" And then he walked down to the landing and realized there was simply no way that we could get to it. Not even if I stood on his shoulders would be able to reach it.
Can you see it way up there?
So, I called the office and they said they'd send someone over. We cleaned up a bit at my insistence. I suggested we just push all the clothes out of the view of the steps and then put my trunk of sweaters in front of it. Much like the books, I failed to remember until told that the trunk is covered in "radical" bumper stickers.
"I don't think this is the effect you're really going for." "Can you still see the clothes?" "No. It just looks like a very strange woman lives here." "Why--OH!"
This is the view from the landing...
We left the trunk there anyway and went out and then I went to shop but instead spent five hours just driving because I was having such a nice chat with Ellie that I didn't want it to end. And when I came back there was no beeping. Steady reported that there was no note or work order or any indication that the maintenance people had been by, but there was no beeping.
This morning there was beeping. I didn't call to check the status on it, because, I mean, obviously a chirpy beep every sixty seconds was not an emergency, but still a priority and clearly they'd get to it at some point on Monday.
That was not the case. I came home and still beeping. I called the office. It was ten minutes before they were to close. I explained the situation to the nice woman who answered the phone. She seemed at a loss. The maintenance people had already gone home and she didn't have any batteries. Nor would she be able to provide me with a ladder so I could do it my damned self.
We have been promised that she will follow up on it first thing tomorrow morning.
There is no escaping the beeping. We live in an apartment with very few doors. Steady's put on his headphones and is attempting to drown out the beeping. The plan right now is to sleep on the futon in the one room with a door and hope that we can drown it out when it beeps every sixty seconds.
