• Menu
  • Skip to primary navigation
  • Skip to main content
  • Skip to primary sidebar

Before Header

  • About Us
  • Lexicon
  • Contact Us
  • Our Store
  • ↑
  • ↓
  • ←
  • →

Balloon Juice

Come for the politics, stay for the snark.

I did not have this on my fuck 2022 bingo card.

A sufficient plurality of insane, greedy people can tank any democratic system ever devised, apparently.

They are lying in pursuit of an agenda.

It’s easy to sit in safety and prescribe what other people should be doing.

Make the republican party small enough to drown in a bathtub.

I’d hate to be the candidate who lost to this guy.

I’d like to think you all would remain faithful to me if i ever tried to have some of you killed.

You cannot shame the shameless.

A snarling mass of vitriolic jackals

I like you, you’re my kind of trouble.

Battle won, war still ongoing.

If you tweet it in all caps, that makes it true!

You can’t love your country only when you win.

Take your GOP plan out of the witness protection program.

Damn right I heard that as a threat.

Come on, man.

Nancy smash is sick of your bullshit.

The GOP couldn’t organize an orgy in a whorehouse with a fist full of 50s.

Black Jesus loves a paper trail.

Not so fun when the rabbit gets the gun, is it?

Sadly, there is no cure for stupid.

A lot of Dems talk about what the media tells them to talk about. Not helpful.

After roe, women are no longer free.

Our job is not to persuade republicans but to defeat them.

Mobile Menu

  • Winnable House Races
  • Donate with Venmo, Zelle & PayPal
  • Site Feedback
  • War in Ukraine
  • Submit Photos to On the Road
  • Politics
  • On The Road
  • Open Threads
  • Topics
  • Balloon Juice 2023 Pet Calendar (coming soon)
  • COVID-19 Coronavirus
  • Authors
  • About Us
  • Contact Us
  • Lexicon
  • Our Store
  • Politics
  • Open Threads
  • War in Ukraine
  • Garden Chats
  • On The Road
  • 2021-22 Fundraising!
You are here: Home / PSA – Listen to Alarms

PSA – Listen to Alarms

by $8 blue check mistermix|  November 10, 201010:24 am| 99 Comments

This post is in: Fucked-up-edness, General Stupidity

FacebookTweetEmail

Some days I read shit I just cannot believe. Last night in a Rochester suburb, a man died of carbon monoxide poisoning in his sleep, but his teenage children luckily survived:

The teens also told authorities that the family had a fire in a fireplace the previous evening, he said. They also told deputies that two carbon monoxide detectors had sounded Monday evening, but that the family was not clear at the time why the detectors were sounding and removed them from the house, Helfer said.

If you don’t have a CO alarm, go buy and install one today, and listen to the fucking thing if it goes off.

FacebookTweetEmail
Previous Post: « Open Thread
Next Post: Clueless »

Reader Interactions

99Comments

  1. 1.

    Xboxershorts

    November 10, 2010 at 10:30 am

    Colorless and odorless, if that CO alarm goes off, open the windows and call 911 and leave the house.

  2. 2.

    BGinCHI

    November 10, 2010 at 10:30 am

    People have CO alarms and when they go off they unplug them. Then they die of CO poisoning.

    And we wonder why folks believe what’s on Fox News.

  3. 3.

    Bnut

    November 10, 2010 at 10:30 am

    I always thought the alarm meant to hit it with a broomstick till it stopped…..

  4. 4.

    Culture of Truth

    November 10, 2010 at 10:30 am

    Without criticizing this particular family, that’s the problem with so many security fixes, particularly ones dependent on elaborate technology – the human factor.

    An airport can have a sophisticated RFID ID system securing whole areas of the facility, but if it’s too annoying for the baggage handlers or the retail workers, they just prop a door open. I’m sure everyone knows of similar examples of human workarounds inconvenient barriers.

  5. 5.

    Tom Levenson

    November 10, 2010 at 10:33 am

    It makes me sick to my stomach to hear stories like this.

    Good morning, all.

  6. 6.

    twiffer

    November 10, 2010 at 10:34 am

    granted, CO poisoning does make you stupid. still, it’s best to listen to those things. and leave the damn flue open on the chimney.

  7. 7.

    Culture of Truth

    November 10, 2010 at 10:34 am

    Of course, the problem with some technologies is they over-alert and are therefore rightly ingnored. Car alarms, for example.

  8. 8.

    JCT

    November 10, 2010 at 10:35 am

    It was probably Obama’s fault.

  9. 9.

    stuckinred

    November 10, 2010 at 10:35 am

    I lived out in the country here in Georgia some years back. About 2 am on morning my neighbor was yelling from the yard “help, help, the house is on fire”. I threw on my clothes and ran over there. I could see the smoke coming out of the upstairs window. When I went in the door his wife and daughter were sitting there watching tv. I said, “where’s Joe”? They said, “oh he’s upstairs”! They were from Alabama. . .

  10. 10.

    PurpleGirl

    November 10, 2010 at 10:36 am

    I don’t have a CO2 alarm. My building has an exemption from the City because it doesn’t have a furnace in the building. In fact, 6 of the 7 buildings in the complex don’t have alarm devices. The apartments in the one building with a furnace do have alarms. (The complex has its own electrical power plant and our steam heat and hot water are co-generation products from the electrical production.)

  11. 11.

    gbear

    November 10, 2010 at 10:36 am

    They’re going to listen to their heart.
    It’s going to tell them what to do.

  12. 12.

    stuckinred

    November 10, 2010 at 10:37 am

    @gbear:
    She may need a lot of love
    but she don’t need you

  13. 13.

    BGinCHI

    November 10, 2010 at 10:38 am

    @stuckinred: In AL that’s called a “house candle.”

  14. 14.

    Rosalita

    November 10, 2010 at 10:39 am

    @stuckinred:

    are you shitting us?

  15. 15.

    Culture of Truth

    November 10, 2010 at 10:39 am

    Obama is in the pocket of Big CO. The Dems just want grant a monopoly to oxides!

  16. 16.

    A Duck

    November 10, 2010 at 10:40 am

    Yes, but did they have a legume detector?

    People ignore alarms, ore carriers sink, Canuckistani folksingers overstay their welcome, the sun rises . . .

    So it goes.

  17. 17.

    stuckinred

    November 10, 2010 at 10:41 am

    @Rosalita: Nope, ask BGinCHI, it was in Oconee County off Snow’s Mill Road. He knows the area even if he stayed the hell out of there!

  18. 18.

    BGinCHI

    November 10, 2010 at 10:43 am

    @stuckinred: stuck is correct. Even white people are scared of the white people there.

    Tip: “fire” rhymes with “bar.”

  19. 19.

    change

    November 10, 2010 at 10:45 am

    I present to you the “Religion of Peace!”

    Christian woman sentenced to death in Pakistan ‘for blasphemy’

    The court heard she had been working as a farmhand in fields with other women, when she was asked to fetch drinking water.

    Some of the other women – all Muslims – refused to drink the water as it had been brought by a Christian and was therefore “unclean”, according to Mrs Bibi’s evidence, sparking a row.

    The incident was forgotten until a few days later when Mrs Bibi said she was set upon by a mob.

    The police were called and took her to a police station for her own safety.

    Shahzad Kamran, of the Sharing Life Ministry Pakistan, said: “The police were under pressure from this Muslim mob, including clerics, asking for Asia to be killed because she had spoken ill of the Prophet Mohammed.

    “So after the police saved her life they then registered a blasphemy case against her.” He added that she had been held in isolation for more than a year before being sentenced to death on Monday.

    http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/newstopics/religion/8120142/Christian-woman-sentenced-to-death-in-Pakistan-for-blasphemy.html

  20. 20.

    sherifffruitfly

    November 10, 2010 at 10:48 am

    Wonder if they weren’t aware that carbon monoxide is odorless, so they were all like “wtf” when the alarm when off, and just got rid of it.

  21. 21.

    Culture of Truth

    November 10, 2010 at 10:52 am

    It’s also possible the kids did not know that devices were CO detectors.

    Also the detectors went off Monday but the news story is from today.

  22. 22.

    some other guy

    November 10, 2010 at 10:52 am

    @change:

    Why stop there? These people are brown, right? So, clearly, this is incontrovertible proof that all darkies are backwards savages.

  23. 23.

    scav

    November 10, 2010 at 10:52 am

    I don’t need lectures on peace from the crowd that sponsored Ireland.

  24. 24.

    cleek

    November 10, 2010 at 10:52 am

    @change:
    it’s a good thing for your point that no Christians have ever killed anyone!

  25. 25.

    Citizen_X

    November 10, 2010 at 10:57 am

    @change: Yet another good example of why religion should be kept as far as fucking possible from government, eh, changey?

  26. 26.

    BGinCHI

    November 10, 2010 at 10:59 am

    @change: You want some pics of Christians burning other Christians at the stake or blowing them up on Easter Sunday?

    Oh, I forgot, you’re an idiot. Never mind.

  27. 27.

    Felanius Kootea (formerly Salt and freshly ground black people)

    November 10, 2010 at 10:59 am

    @Culture of Truth:Let’s see, a (usually bright) colleague taping her super-ultra-complicated password that includes a mix of letters, numbers and symbols to her monitor. We’re looking into smart cards with dynamically changing passwords now. Of course, people will lose those.

    My heart goes out to this family. It may be that the CO2 monitor was in the house when they moved in and they didn’t know what it was for.

  28. 28.

    BGinCHI

    November 10, 2010 at 11:01 am

    Now I can’t decide whether to make fun of AL and Georgia crackers or changey.

    Where’s Neil Young when you need him?

  29. 29.

    change

    November 10, 2010 at 11:01 am

    @some other guy:

    You know who was “brown”? The woman who was killed for “disrespecting” Muhammad.

  30. 30.

    change

    November 10, 2010 at 11:02 am

    @BGinCHI:

    Your point is…?

  31. 31.

    BGinCHI

    November 10, 2010 at 11:03 am

    @change: Lost on fools.

  32. 32.

    gene108

    November 10, 2010 at 11:03 am

    CO detectors go nuts for two reasons that I can think of (1) there’s CO building up and (2) the batteries are running low and need to be replaced.

    Had a CO detector go nuts and I was trying to figure out why. Finally, decided to read the manual and changed the batteries.

    That got things back to normal.

  33. 33.

    Napoleon

    November 10, 2010 at 11:04 am

    @BGinCHI:

    Or murdering them in a church because they are a gynecologist who is willing to perform abortions.

  34. 34.

    change

    November 10, 2010 at 11:04 am

    Leave it to liberals to conflate race with religion.

    Adam Ghadan, the Tokyo Rose of Al Qaeda is a white boy from California, it doesn’t make him any less Muslim.

    Not to mention Arabs, Turks, Iranians are all pretty white.

  35. 35.

    gwangung

    November 10, 2010 at 11:06 am

    @change: Uganda.

  36. 36.

    change

    November 10, 2010 at 11:06 am

    Liberals: for women’s liberation and freedom unless you’re from the Third World, then you can beat your wife and rape her as a “cultural difference”.

    They’re for secularism and free speech, unless the religion is Islam, either because they hate the west even more or because they’re scared shitless of offending Muslims. I’m not sure which.

  37. 37.

    Alex S.

    November 10, 2010 at 11:06 am

    If they had had multiple alarms the competition between them would have saved their lives.

  38. 38.

    change

    November 10, 2010 at 11:07 am

    @gwangung:

    Obviously you just hate “brown people”.

  39. 39.

    cckids

    November 10, 2010 at 11:07 am

    Darwin award finalist. That is all.

  40. 40.

    p.a.

    November 10, 2010 at 11:08 am

    @change: Welcome. It’s always good to have another atheist go public on the stupidity of religion.

  41. 41.

    some other guy

    November 10, 2010 at 11:09 am

    @change:

    So they’ll even turn on their own kind. Just further proof that the inferior savages can’t be trusted!

  42. 42.

    change

    November 10, 2010 at 11:10 am

    @p.a.:

    Yes, all religions are stupid, but some are much more dangerous than others.

    Those that think evangelical Christians are just as dangerous as Islamists need to wake the fuck up to reality.

    And hey, Evangelical Christians are more dangerous than Quakers or Buddhists.

  43. 43.

    Joshua

    November 10, 2010 at 11:11 am

    change, for women’s liberation and freedom for the third world because he can use it as a bludgeon to attack the fake liberals in his head.

    This woman’s case is unfortunate. I hope she gets some semblance of justice. I hope all people do. But I’m not going to use anecdotes like that as masturbatory fantasies for endless war and the “Middle East as a parking lot.” We’ve been down that road, no good can come of it.

  44. 44.

    Thoroughly Pizzled

    November 10, 2010 at 11:13 am

    @p.a.: He’s just a Republican troll, and probably Christian. Don’t be fooled.

  45. 45.

    Culture of Truth

    November 10, 2010 at 11:13 am

    Those villagers condemned that woman based solely on her religion? Indeed that is terrible.

  46. 46.

    Rosalita

    November 10, 2010 at 11:14 am

    @stuckinred:

    guess I’m glad I never ventured too far out of Dunwoody

  47. 47.

    Mentalfugue

    November 10, 2010 at 11:14 am

    Would be interesting to hear what prompted the 18 year old son and 16 year old daughter to check on their father at 3:40am.

  48. 48.

    New Yorker

    November 10, 2010 at 11:15 am

    @change:

    All the more reason to become an atheist. Also, all the more reason this country should stop pretending Pakistan is an “ally”.

  49. 49.

    some other guy

    November 10, 2010 at 11:15 am

    @change:

    Wait just a minute there. Are you suggesting we can’t make slanderous assumptions about all members of a certain group based on a tiny sample of that group?

    Sounds like someone has their head buried in the sand with regard to the True Nature of our mortal enemies.

  50. 50.

    Culture of Truth

    November 10, 2010 at 11:15 am

    I present to you the “Religion of Peace!”

    Is that you talking or the people doing the stoning? It’s hard to tell.

  51. 51.

    change

    November 10, 2010 at 11:17 am

    @Joshua:

    Is that why leftists in Europe are now saying that being against FGM and wife beating is “racism” or “Islamophobia” if the person doing it is Muslim?

    Again, it’s difficult to tell if this is because the left has no real principles besides being against western civilization, or if because they’re scared stiff of Islamist reaction.

  52. 52.

    change

    November 10, 2010 at 11:18 am

    @New Yorker:

    Pakistan is an enemy.

  53. 53.

    Ash Can

    November 10, 2010 at 11:18 am

    @change: Wow! I’m impressed! You sure know your Muslims!

  54. 54.

    MattR

    November 10, 2010 at 11:22 am

    @change:

    Those that think evangelical Christians are just as dangerous as Islamists need to wake the fuck up to reality.

    The question is dangerous to whom? If not for our military actions, 95% of this country would not be influenced in any way by Islamists. The same cannot be said for evangelical Christians. (BTW, I bring up the military because those who are fighting in Iraq and Afghanistan will obviously come into contact with Islamists and their friends and families back here will be affected.)

  55. 55.

    chopper

    November 10, 2010 at 11:23 am

    @Culture of Truth:

    or smoke alarms. my smoke alarm goes off half the time i’m cooking. if the CO alarm goes off, i have to fight the urge to think ‘well shit, it’s just oversensitive’.

  56. 56.

    sherifffruitfly

    November 10, 2010 at 11:23 am

    @cckids:

    You’re not eligible for a Darwin Award if you have kids. That kinda like… defeats the purpose of the award.

  57. 57.

    change

    November 10, 2010 at 11:24 am

    @MattR:

    What military actions were we undertaking on September 11th, 2001?

    What military actions did Denmark and Sweden undertake that led to the burning of their embassies and kidnap their tourists?

    Why, those genocidal, imperialist, militarist Scandinavians! I guess they had it coming!

  58. 58.

    scav

    November 10, 2010 at 11:27 am

    small change does tend to rattle a lot, no?

  59. 59.

    change

    November 10, 2010 at 11:28 am

    And the Dutch. We all know the Dutch are just out to conquer the world and rule an empire, of course they deserve to have members of Parliament assassinated!

  60. 60.

    cckids

    November 10, 2010 at 11:31 am

    @sherifffruitfly: Ya, forgot that one. Maybe some sort of Hon. Mention?

  61. 61.

    MattR

    November 10, 2010 at 11:34 am

    @change:

    What military actions were we undertaking on September 11th, 2001?

    And what percent of our population was actually impacted by the events of 9/11 (freaking out about it does not count)? I strongly doubt it was more than the 5% (15 million people) I indicated.

  62. 62.

    change

    November 10, 2010 at 11:35 am

    @MattR:

    I wonder what percentage of our population would be effected if they got a nuclear bomb and detonated it in, say, I don’t know–San Francisco?

  63. 63.

    scav

    November 10, 2010 at 11:36 am

    jingle jingle jingle

  64. 64.

    MattR

    November 10, 2010 at 11:37 am

    @change: And I wonder what percent would be affected if the evangelical Christians got their way and passed the laws they want.

    Or if you want to go all the way: I wonder what percent will be affected by climate change after the evangelical Christians block all efforts to mitigate it?

  65. 65.

    change

    November 10, 2010 at 11:39 am

    @MattR:

    Um, abortion would be outlawed and we’d have mandatory prayer in school?

    That’s surely just as bad as passing laws making women wear burkas, legalizing polygamy, legalizing FGM, wife beating, having laws that state a woman is worth 1/2 of a man and killing people for “blasphemy”, right?

  66. 66.

    change

    November 10, 2010 at 11:42 am

    See, these people are just anti-colonial freedom fighters responding to racism, and globalizing hamburger cowboy blah blah blah leftist trope blah blah global south:

    http://tinyurl.com/29pqtg2

  67. 67.

    MattR

    November 10, 2010 at 11:43 am

    @change: Considering none of those other things are even close to occurring in the United States I will say outlawing abortion is much worse. (remember, we are talking about the affect of Islamists on Americans here)

    And that assumes that your list of two things is anywhere near complete (which is completely laughable).

  68. 68.

    Chyron HR

    November 10, 2010 at 11:46 am

    @change:

    Liberalism go to Hell

    Looks like they’re your kind of people, change.

    I wonder what percentage of our population would be affected if one of the many Timothy McVeigh worshippers in the Tea Party got a nuclear bomb?

  69. 69.

    some other guy

    November 10, 2010 at 11:48 am

    @change:

    And what if they detonated 100 nuclear bombs?! Or a MILLION!!!

    We must exterminate the brutes to prevent this doomsday scenario from occurring!

  70. 70.

    wenchacha

    November 10, 2010 at 11:48 am

    Getting back to the original post before it was douche-jacked, CO can make your thinking foggy. If they thought the detector was a smoke alarm reacting to the fireplace, that might explain the tragedy. Maybe a better alarm system would also have a voice message reminding you that the danger is from CO, not smoke or fire. In addition to the loud alarm sound.

  71. 71.

    change

    November 10, 2010 at 11:48 am

    @Chyron HR:

    They’re talking about classical, European liberalism which we call libertarianism in the US, not American liberalism which is known as Socialism in Europe.

    They like Socialists, because Socialists believe they’re just misunderstood freedom fighters fighting white colonial oppression.

  72. 72.

    change

    November 10, 2010 at 11:49 am

    @Chyron HR:

    They’re not talking about American liberalism, but European Classical Liberalism which is known as libertarianism in the US.

  73. 73.

    Cackalacka

    November 10, 2010 at 11:52 am

    If I may interrupt this helpful on-topic discussion with our new house troll, Change, this topic is actually fairly, well topical for myself.

    Yesterday evening, my father shared a story regarding two of my parents friends.

    Until last week, they drove a Lexus hybrid, one with a remote starter.

    About that ‘until last week’ part: they parked the vehicle in the garage; somehow the car accidentally started (or perhaps they neglected to hit the ‘On/Off’ button after arriving.’ Car was running idle for at least 16 hours, unattended.

    Apparently the master bedroom is above the garage. Their family and/or friends did not hear from them the next day. Someone went over there, the wife is dead of monoxide poisoning, and the husband is in critical condition in an oxygen chamber, and the prognosis is grim.

    You should already have a monoxide sensor installed. They’re like, what $20 at Home Depot?

    If you have a hybrid and a garage, you should probably have more than one monoxide sensor.

    Anyway, you are now free to entertain your ongoing productive conversations with change. Who knows, perhaps we can all help this change guy grow a soul?

  74. 74.

    Chyron HR

    November 10, 2010 at 11:53 am

    @change:

    Or maybe they were all just plants!

    You know, like the people at the Tea Party rallies with the “KILL NIGGERBONGO” signs?

  75. 75.

    MattR

    November 10, 2010 at 11:54 am

    To get back on topic: I have seen quite a few CO detector commercials featuring NY Yankees broadcaster Michael Kay who talks about initially ignoring his detector and almost dying as a result. I believe these commercials started airing in conjunction with the New York state law requiring CO detectors that went into affect earlier this year.

  76. 76.

    Tim I

    November 10, 2010 at 11:55 am

    @stuckinred:

    Oh you ‘Bama’ basher, you!

  77. 77.

    Jeff R.

    November 10, 2010 at 11:57 am

    @gene108:

    3rd reason: they’re defective. I had one that was about 3 months old and went off (it was hardwired). I got everyone out of the house and called 911. The fireman went through the house with their sniffers and found nothing. When I called the detector manufacturer to get a replacement, they asked me what I did when it went off. I said I called 911, which was the right answer.

  78. 78.

    MattR

    November 10, 2010 at 12:04 pm

    @Jeff R.: Better that way than the opposite. When I did my condo inspection before closing, I was advised to replace my entire circuit breaker box because that particular company’s products had an issue where they worked fine initially but once you tripped and reset a breaker it would not necessarily retrip properly when there was a legitimate problem.

  79. 79.

    jrg

    November 10, 2010 at 12:10 pm

    This exact thing happened in Raleigh a couple of days ago. Killed the wife, the husband’s in critical condition.

    They had one of those “keyless start” cars. It somehow got started in the garage, they went to sleep in their bedroom in another part of the house, and one of them never woke up.

    We just bought a Carbon Monoxide detector yesterday.

  80. 80.

    Lit3Bolt

    November 10, 2010 at 12:23 pm

    @jrg: Sounds like someone accidentally and fatally hit the button on their keychain remote. Technology! making it easier to kill yourself since 1876.

  81. 81.

    MattR

    November 10, 2010 at 12:31 pm

    @Lit3Bolt: Hopefully the car manufacturers will learn from this and put a kill switch on the cars to automatically turn the engine off after an hour or so if the car if is just idling (ie. nobody put the car into gear, turned lights on or off, or even played with the radio). You can even add a button inside the car that can be pressed to override this (in case there is a legitimate need)

  82. 82.

    Cackalacka

    November 10, 2010 at 12:44 pm

    @Lit3Bolt:

    Yeah, one of the speculations is, it may have been started via remote, but it may have been a lack of turning the ‘off’ button.

    It is easy to leave a car idling if it is a silent hybrid. As everyone who has ever left a car with the lights on will tell you, it is pretty easy to leave a car making a beeping sound without noticing.

    As handy as a keyless start car is, nothing is more practical than the fail-safe of a physical key, attached to other keys you will need to unlock the house door. All the computational over-rides are rendered moot with a thin piece of metal.

  83. 83.

    New Yorker

    November 10, 2010 at 12:48 pm

    change reminds of my crazy wingnut uncle who attacks me for various things that I don’t believe because Rush Limbaugh told him that’s what lib’ruls believe.

    change, can you point out where someone on this blog celebrates radical Islam as some sort of misunderstood liberation struggle against white oppression?

  84. 84.

    RalfW

    November 10, 2010 at 12:48 pm

    @BGinCHI: I’m not going to check every comment in the thread, but if this hasn’t been said yet, here’s the deal. CO poisoning really, really f*cks with your ability to reason. Lots of people die in homes with otherwise working CO detectors that the user disabled, probably after the CO poisoning started.

  85. 85.

    change

    November 10, 2010 at 12:57 pm

    @New Yorker:

    Michael Moore compared the Baathist and Islamic thugs in Iraq to the minutemen.

  86. 86.

    change

    November 10, 2010 at 12:59 pm

    Ward Churchill said he wishes for “1,000 Mogadishus, 1,000 Fallujahs”.

  87. 87.

    WereBear

    November 10, 2010 at 12:59 pm

    I remember a terrible accident on Long Island on winter; the husband started the car in the _closed_ garage, went back in the house, fell asleep on the couch.

    Later that morning, when no one had shown up anywhere, they found them where they slept; husband, wife, 3 kids and the dog. Wiped out.

    By all means get one and listen to it!

  88. 88.

    Zuzu's Petals

    November 10, 2010 at 1:01 pm

    Just checked the battery on mine. Whew.

  89. 89.

    New Yorker

    November 10, 2010 at 1:06 pm

    @change:
    @change:

    Wow, Michael Moore and Ward Churchill post at Balloon Juice? I didn’t know that. Let me guess: “DougJ” is actually Churchill and “Tim F” is really Moore.

  90. 90.

    change

    November 10, 2010 at 1:08 pm

    @New Yorker:

    They’re “progressives”, aren’t they?

  91. 91.

    chopper

    November 10, 2010 at 1:13 pm

    @change:

    reagan called the mujahadeen “freedom fighters”.

  92. 92.

    New Yorker

    November 10, 2010 at 1:15 pm

    @change:

    What does that have to do with anything? I asked you to point out someone, even a commenter, at Balloon Juice who has some sort of romantic notion of what radical Islam represents and you counter with…..Ward Churchill. I’m not following you here any more than I was following you with your whole “religion of peace” rant.

  93. 93.

    Sab

    November 10, 2010 at 1:27 pm

    Getting back on the whole alarm topic, here’s a personal experience that still worries me. I grew up in the 80s and home fire safety (smoke detectors, escape plans, etc.) was a topic that was covered fairly thoroughly in gradeschool classes on a regular basis. When I moved in with my girlfriend (now wife) about a year ago, she and her mom (who lived with her) both complained of a strange beeping noise coming from one of the rooms. I investigated, and found out it was a previously installed smoke detector that her mom had removed because she had no idea what it was.

    Her mom was from rural Brazil (i.e., a hillbilly) and just didn’t know any better. My girlfriend had a Catholic school education in Philly, so she learned more about praying than practical knowledge about reality. This general ignorance of something that seems so obvious and simple to me was quite worrying to me, because it made me realize there are probably many others ignorant of such a basic home safety measure.

    Anyhow, since then I have installed combo smoke/CO detectors in the house (one on each floor) to get it up to “common sense” code.

  94. 94.

    twiffer

    November 10, 2010 at 1:41 pm

    @Lit3Bolt: i’ll bet it was the cat.

  95. 95.

    Felonious Wench

    November 10, 2010 at 1:46 pm

    @New Yorker:

    What does that have to do with anything? I asked you to point out someone, even a commenter, at Balloon Juice who has some sort of romantic notion of what radical Islam represents and you counter with…..Ward Churchill.

    It’s not capable of a response.

    I’ll give you a hint, Change. The closest we’ve had is a kid named Matoko Chan (right, guys? That’s the name?) And he got eviscerated regularly, until we got so sick of him he faded into this bleating voice in the wilderness of Balloon Juice, sad, repetitive, yet somehow, part of the scenery. There’s comfort in the familiar.

    You’re new, and particularly annoying, so people haven’t settled into their ignoring you pattern yet. Give it time. For now, enjoy your stirrin’ up the libruls fun until the immune system adapts itself to you.

  96. 96.

    Cackalacka

    November 10, 2010 at 2:21 pm

    The topic of this thread is carbon monoxide poisoning.

    This is a subject that has killed friends of my family- THIS FUCKING WEAK.

    And yet we’ve got a banal dickless bitch troll derail it.

    And y’all are feeding him.

    If any of y’all think a pathetic character conflating Ward Churchill with your point of view is worth discussing anything with, allow me to remind you this is a thread authored to discuss important safety tips. Tips that might save your life or lives of your loved ones.

    Please remember that when you decide whether or not this individual is worth any response, both here and in the future.

  97. 97.

    Cackalacka

    November 10, 2010 at 2:39 pm

    Ha!

    Typo (week/weak). Still works.

  98. 98.

    asiangrrlMN

    November 10, 2010 at 4:36 pm

    I had my own scare last weekend. I used almost a whole can of hairspray for my Halloween costume. I shut the bathroom door when I left because I didn’t want the cats breathing the stuff. When I got home, I opened the door and turned on the fan. My CO detector started beeping yellow (meaning, alert. Not, get the hell out of the house), so I opened all the windows and kept the fan running. Yes, I pulled out the detector but only because I wasn’t going to bed any time soon, and it was scaring my cats. An hour later, I plugged the monitor back in, and everything was fine.

    So, yes. CO detectors are important.

  99. 99.

    Larkspur

    November 10, 2010 at 8:25 pm

    I live in an apartment complex. A couple of years ago, I heard a sound that might have been an alarm – frankly, I wasn’t sure. It wasn’t in my apartment, and it wasn’t stopping. So I went walking around to investigate, and encountered a couple of neighbors who were wondering what that weird sound was. No smoke, no flames, just this insistent alarm. I kept following it till it got louder and eventually I ran into another neighbor who was carrying a smoldering wastebasket out to extinguish it. His roommate had been smoking.

    The point is that not one single one of us called the fire department, and I was the only one who kept looking till I found out what was going on. You get lulled into some kind of “so far, so good” attitude. Boy, would our faces have been red if our neighbor had died of smoke inhalation or something.

    ‘Course, then there was the house-sitting/critter-sitting job I had over one Christmas. Terrible wind and rain storms, trees down, power outages, and at one point the smoke alarm went on, for like 10 minutes at a time, then it would stop, then go on again. (No fire, no smoke.) It wasn’t one of the battery operated kind, either. The dogs and cats and I would cower, it was so freakin loud. Finally I had to bash it out of the ceiling till it stopped. But I was very very careful about the stove and candles and stuff for the rest of my stay.

Comments are closed.

Primary Sidebar

Fundraising 2023-24

Wis*Dems Supreme Court + SD-8

Recent Comments

  • WaterGirl on Walter’s Fund – Calendars – Pet Postcards (Open Thread) (Mar 26, 2023 @ 2:35pm)
  • FastEdD on What Happens Next? What Does the Future Hold? (Mar 26, 2023 @ 2:35pm)
  • WaterGirl on Walter’s Fund – Calendars – Pet Postcards (Open Thread) (Mar 26, 2023 @ 2:33pm)
  • Alison Rose on Walter’s Fund – Calendars – Pet Postcards (Open Thread) (Mar 26, 2023 @ 2:32pm)
  • WaterGirl on Walter’s Fund – Calendars – Pet Postcards (Open Thread) (Mar 26, 2023 @ 2:30pm)

🎈Keep Balloon Juice Ad Free

Become a Balloon Juice Patreon
Donate with Venmo, Zelle or PayPal

Balloon Juice Posts

View by Topic
View by Author
View by Month & Year
View by Past Author

Featuring

Medium Cool
Artists in Our Midst
Authors in Our Midst
We All Need A Little Kindness
Classified Documents: A Primer
State & Local Elections Discussion

Calling All Jackals

Site Feedback
Nominate a Rotating Tag
Submit Photos to On the Road
Balloon Juice Mailing List Signup
Balloon Juice Anniversary (All Links)
Balloon Juice Anniversary (All Posts)

Twitter / Spoutible

Balloon Juice (Spoutible)
WaterGirl (Spoutible)
TaMara (Spoutible)
John Cole
DougJ (aka NYT Pitchbot)
Betty Cracker
Tom Levenson
TaMara
David Anderson
Major Major Major Major
ActualCitizensUnited

Join the Fight!

Join the Fight Signup Form
All Join the Fight Posts

Balloon Juice Events

5/14  The Apocalypse
5/20  Home Away from Home
5/29  We’re Back, Baby
7/21  Merging!

Balloon Juice for Ukraine

Donate

Site Footer

Come for the politics, stay for the snark.

  • Facebook
  • RSS
  • Twitter
  • YouTube
  • Comment Policy
  • Our Authors
  • Blogroll
  • Our Artists
  • Privacy Policy

Copyright © 2023 Dev Balloon Juice · All Rights Reserved · Powered by BizBudding Inc

Share this ArticleLike this article? Email it to a friend!

Email sent!