dawn

This was pretty stunning.

I'd love to say that I was up early going for a walk, or gardening, or even admiring the extraordinary sky.  In fact, I was waiting for a fire engine to arrive - I'd been rudely woken by the main fire alarm going off in the house (screeching manically; saying "fire fire"; terrifying the cats).  It was pretty obvious that there was no fire, but scaling a step ladder and removing the battery and re-setting it made absolutely no difference, and who was to know that carbon monoxide wasn't seeping in from somewhere.  Alice (at the other end of the phone at JFK) and the internal instructions in the ******* smoke alarm told me to call 911, so I did, and four burly, charming, smoke-smelling firemen turned up in a very large fire engine, and sorted it all out.  For all I know they were unvaccinated hold-outs (a scary number of the LAFD are) - but they couldn't have been more courteous and helpful.

By the time they'd left, the sky was back to normal, and the cats needed a lot of love (and breakfast).