How many Triompos does it take to change a battery?

Just a story that I wanted to share with you....

We were sound asleep when we heard the ever so annoying chirp of the smoke detector. This set the nervous Golden Retriever into a tailspin of anxiety which gets the small dog upset. Thus begins another sleepless night. You may wonder, why did we not just get up and replace the battery? Well, because we are stubborn. Instead we cranked up the sound machine alarm clock. The sounds of the ocean were so loud it was as if I was a fish in the sea....but it was not match for the incessant beeping that seemed to get louder and louder.

Have you ever noticed that your batteries always go out in your smoke detector in the middle of the night?

Finally, when it seemed Mason might crawl under the bed, we waved the white flag. yelled "Uncle"....we gave up.

Get the ladder. Get the batteries. Get some patience.

As it turns out, our builder was apparently 10 feet tall and the maker of our smoke detector was an idiot.

The smoke detector was no lie about 14 feet high....really sir? Mr. Builder.....was none of these other walls and ceilings satisfactory enough for you? You had to actually choose the highest point in the house--that is some sense of humor.

So, here we are in our pajamas climbing up the ladder trying to open the Fort Knox of detectors. This is where NT had the revelation that he is scared of heights and has bad balance. Really?

Enter She-ra Summer (yep...by the power of gray skull). Using my pilates techniques for balance, I focused on one spot, tightened the core and headed on up to the top rung...which felt like the top of the Empire State Building. I teetered on top of that ladder for a mini lifetime trying to figure out the battery pack.

.....45 minutes later. (no really....that is not an exaggeration) We got it!

Battery is in and we have such a feeling of accomplishment.

Then.....beep.....beep....beep. What? The battery we put in was apparently bad.

Here is the crazy part. NT tells me to just unplug it. Excuse me? What did you say? You mean we could have just unplugged this little bugger? I slept in an ocean with a dog on my head and climbed up a 10 foot ladder in my pajamas and stood there with my core sucked in for an hour....and we could have just unplugged it?!? Geez.

I will point out that it is now FIXED. Which is good because in this house, it is important to have fire detectors. okay--next posting it about giving Hines a bath....is this too much excitement or what??