Evil Smoke Alarm

August 9, 2009

Since moving into my Syracuse, N.Y. apartment about a month ago, my smoke alarm has gone off at least once a day.

At first it only happened while cooking. Being from the South, cooking with butter and oil has been ingrained in me; but after the extraordinarily loud smoke alarm would go off as soon as the butter or oil hit the skillet, I quit using it. This means my food doesn’t taste as good, but at least there isn’t crazy beeping. Or so I thought.

Now the smoke alarm will just randomly go off. Middle of the day, stove turned off, all windows down so that there’s no way smoke is coming in from outside, it will beep. And beep. And beep. LOUDLY.

The only way to stop the beeping is to suffocate the vent by wrapping a thick hand towel around it. And even that takes awhile to actually work.

When the random setting off of the smoke alarm began last week, I started wracking my brain for possible reasons why this is happening. And then it hit me.

My smoke alarm is haunted.

So, if anyone knows how to extricate a ghost from a smoke alarm, let me know. Until then, I’m going to put a piece of duct tape over the vent.