Thoughts

Things to do before I die:
Publish a novel
Eat crawfish the "real" way
Get evacuated from my condo
Finish law school
Date a stripper

If you have never been evacuated from your home, I think you should look into it. The way I figure, everyone will be doing it in 2006.

Last night I may have burnt my dinner...but only a little. I turned on the ceiling fan in my living room to get the air moving some in hopes of having the stale smell dissipate. It was almost immediately that I noticed the rotation of my ceiling fan sounds like a fighter plane engine. Now I do not really use my fan all that often, but that was out of the ordinary. Ok, so that noise cannot be my fan. I turn it off. Is it my furnace? I put my hand in front of a register...no, not the furnace. What is that sound? Is it pouring rain outside? I open the doorwall to my porch and hear what sounds like an entire squadron of fighter jets flying over my neighborhood. Are the Canadians finally invading?

I IM some friends in the area; one close says she hears it. One further away (Jill) says she does not. I call my brother to see if he can hear this incredible noise in the background, somehow he says he cannot. I begin to get nervous.

My neighbor calls. He asks if I have any information on what is going on. I tell him I do not. He says it sounds like F-16s flying overhead and he claims he can even smell the jet fuel. My congestion kept me from being able to do the same.

Cue the phone call from Jill. She has found out for me what my noise is and why she cannot hear it. Apparently there was a gas main eruption. I pass the news on to my neighbor...he calls me back a few minutes later to tell me he called 911 and they are evacuating our area (a 1 mile radius from the site of the eruption).

WALK to the high school they say. It was only 2.5 miles, but that is daunting to many people and an inconvenience to everyone. There were cars everywhere, though. When in Rome...

The "incident" occurred at about 10:15pm and as I sat and watched the news on both channels 4 and 7 (or 11 and 8 respectively since cable can do whatever it wants) from my parents' house they gave the all clear to return to the area at 11:45pm. At that point there was no reason for me to head back home as I had brought everything I needed with me. I went to bed at about 1am with this new experience under my belt.

Allegedly no one was hurt.