Here it is early in the morning, so what am I doing up? Usually we are up early, but cripes, it seems like the sun just went down. There is something about the smoke alarm going off, that will get you wide awake, no matter what the time is (unless you are WS, in which case you sleep right through it).
I woke up about 30 minutes ago because the smoke alarm let out 3 beeps. I don't know what that was all about, but everything seems to be in order, so I was awakened for nothing. The Wonderful Spouse is still snoring away - I don't know whether that is a good thing (his getting uninterrupted sleep), or a scary thing.
See, the neighbor must have been testing their smoke alarm the other day (by the popular overcooking method or by design I'm not sure). We were sitting on the deck watching the hummingbirds and all of a sudden I heard loud beeping from the house behind us. It stopped after 3 or 4 beeps, but did it again a couple of minutes later. I said something to WS about them testing their system (after looking over there to see if there was smoke pouring out of the house - there wasn't). WS had no idea what I was talking about. Another couple of minutes went by, and the beeping started again. I told WS to listen - he shook his head and said he didn't hear anything.
Mind you, the weather has been cool, so they had their windows open and I could hear the beeping plain as day. No straining to hear it, no mistaking what it was. In fact it was loud enough that I could even hear the slight echo off the trees. A fourth, and last time, the beeping went off and once again I pointed it out to WS - nope, nothing. I know he doesn't have as good a hearing as I do, but mine certainly isn't anything special. I wouldn't worry about it if the sound had been faint, but it wasn't.
Now he didn't even hear our detector go off - and believe me, that sucker is loud (it is right outside the bedroom door too). I knew his hearing was going and that he couldn't hear high-pitched sounds, but that is ridiculous!
Hey, I was thinking of testing the smoke detectors the other day, after hearing the neighbor's go off, now I don't have to hu? And I don't think that is the only testing that needs to be done!
Really. HAve WS's hearing checked. He may have a "blind" spot in the range of the detector. I know I've developed spots in ranges over the years. It's weird, "the sound is there, it's gone, no, it's back", kind of thing.
Worth checking out. They make detectors in different ranges because of this.
Posted by: Wichi Dude | July 29, 2004 at 04:44 AM
Some of them beep when the battery is getting low, so yours may need replacing.
Posted by: Rita | July 29, 2004 at 07:22 AM
Bogie, our detectors (as Rita noted) beep when they think they need new batteries. All of that work around steel works and heavy equipment has probably given WS a notch. Your dad has one (probably from jet engines) and I have a lesser one (probably from flying crop duster aircraft without ear plugs). Unfortunately, I can still hear HH's snoring (which is eminating from his recliner just now!)
Posted by: Cop Car | July 29, 2004 at 05:19 PM
I would think it was the batteries, except these are hooked into the electrical system (have to be by building code). Although they do have battery backups, these detectors and batteries have only been up since April, when WS replaced the old ones.
I've been thinking that a bug crawled into one of them and blocked the sensor (all 3 are tied together so if one goes off, they all go off). I will be checking them out today.
WS had his hearing checked a couple of years ago and he is definitely losing his hearing. I didn't know that they made detectors in different ranges, I'll have to see if I can find some with a different tone (and make WS's day by making him put new ones in again).
Posted by: bogie | July 30, 2004 at 06:58 AM
Our detectors, too, are tied into the electrical system; but, they still let us know about the battery state. Once while HH was doing his Red Cross thing out of town, the detector chirped, so I removed the battery to shut it up until HH got back (replacing batteries is his "thing"). An hour later, it chirped, again. Oops! I'd removed the battery from the wrong one. I removed the battery from the 2nd detector. An hour later, we go through the same thing. With 4 detectors in the house, I have no problem hearing them, but my direction finding equipment is apparently faulty because I have a hard time figuring out which is chirping (especially since the chirping is intermittent). At any rate, the chirping detectors are less annoying than our battery backup sump pump. Whenever the power goes off (and sometimes for no apparent reason what soever), the battery backup system screeches in a high pitch that exactly matches the frequency of my tinnitus. After the first 30 milliseconds, I can no longer tell whether the sump pump system is screeching or not--and it is really piercing!
Posted by: Cop Car | July 30, 2004 at 12:32 PM