head-wall, head-wall, head-wall...
So we just had a stupid firedrill. Fire drills are annoying in general, and particularly so in the US. In Cambridge at the Chem dept. we had a nice polite recorded British voice telling us to evacuate over the intercome instead of the god-awful ringing. But anyhow, this was a particularly
We were only out for about 15 minutes and then they told us it was all clear and we could come back in. Which we did. And because Daniel and I were lazy, we piled into the first elevator going up with the rest of the crowd even though we just live on the fourth floor. Somebody started joking about how ironic it'd be if the elevator stalled just then with all of us in it b/c of the firedrill. So guess what it did.
Yeah. We got to the 4th floor, and instead of the doors opening it decided to start jiggling up and down and sliding down towards the basement. And then it sat there, for about half an hour, while we rang the alarm and talked to whoever-the-heck responds to elevator alarm buttons. Once she finally figured out where we were she called the police to call the fire department to get us out. We tried to explain that the fire department was right frigging outside because we'd just had a fire drill. No, that's not part of their bureacratic procedure, they had to call *another* fire truck out. Also, apparently part of the procedure is to keep talking to us to make sure we're still alive. And to play elevator music at us to keep us calm. I'm serious - they turned on stereotypical elevator music. Thank goodness we live about two blocks from a fire station. Also, thankfully, we all had little pot-holders from the fire department as their 'thank you for participating in the fire drill' present. So we could all fan ourselves with those 'cause it was frigging HOT in there.
But, uh, yeah, that was our amusing stuck-in-the-elevator experience for the day. Next time we're taking the stairs.
We were only out for about 15 minutes and then they told us it was all clear and we could come back in. Which we did. And because Daniel and I were lazy, we piled into the first elevator going up with the rest of the crowd even though we just live on the fourth floor. Somebody started joking about how ironic it'd be if the elevator stalled just then with all of us in it b/c of the firedrill. So guess what it did.
Yeah. We got to the 4th floor, and instead of the doors opening it decided to start jiggling up and down and sliding down towards the basement. And then it sat there, for about half an hour, while we rang the alarm and talked to whoever-the-heck responds to elevator alarm buttons. Once she finally figured out where we were she called the police to call the fire department to get us out. We tried to explain that the fire department was right frigging outside because we'd just had a fire drill. No, that's not part of their bureacratic procedure, they had to call *another* fire truck out. Also, apparently part of the procedure is to keep talking to us to make sure we're still alive. And to play elevator music at us to keep us calm. I'm serious - they turned on stereotypical elevator music. Thank goodness we live about two blocks from a fire station. Also, thankfully, we all had little pot-holders from the fire department as their 'thank you for participating in the fire drill' present. So we could all fan ourselves with those 'cause it was frigging HOT in there.
But, uh, yeah, that was our amusing stuck-in-the-elevator experience for the day. Next time we're taking the stairs.