So here's what happen..... the Man and Little Guy fell asleep really early last night. So the Buddy and I decided to stay up and watch a movie. It was around 10:30 PM and the movie was coming to a conclusion, when I noticed out of the corner of my eye, a light flashing in the sunroom. First, I thought it was just the tv reflection or something. Then I saw it again and looked that direction, and there was a light of some sort. So I tried to think of a toy or something that might be the source of this light, but couldn't think of anything, so I jumped up and ran down into the sunroom to see flames!!!!!!! FLAMES! A FIRE!!! OUR FENCE!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! OUR FENCE WAS ON FIRE!!!!!!!!!!!!!
With Buddy on my heels, I run down the hall trying not to panic telling the Man to get up get up the fence is on fire..... then I run outside and turned on the water hose, and start dragging it around the garage. I'm so grateful we have a super long hose. The Man joins the Buddy and I and takes over. There were flames extending from the ground to the top of the fence. No small fire.
As we or rather the Man is tending the waterhose (we are now on the other side of the fence) I've got a pitch fork trying to stir up any remaining sparks or coals as this is also our compost pile of dead leaves, grass, veggies, etc. And may I remind you its 10:30 PM and very dark. We have no outside light in the back, so it wasn't easy to see, as the flames are now gone and we are just being caution.
We try to explain to the Buddy (who is completely flipping out and is insisting we call 911) what spontaneous combustion is. This was actually funny. The Buddy, who could care less what the scientific explanation is, just wants to call the fire department and the fires already out.
As we stand there, adrenalin pumping through our veins, Buddy wanting to call 911, but won't leave my side to go to the phone, the Man realizes it was not spontaneous combustion that started this fire, which was all we could at first come up with. There was another perfectly good explanation, why our fence caught on fire. This is where the Man dumped the ashes from the catch pan of the grill. I had suggested that the catch pan under the grill be dumped because it was super full and about to spill out all over the garage (this happened once before and Little Guy played in the ashes and... its another story). So the Man decided to listen to M.E. and dump the pan. He nor I thought anything of it. It wasn't the coals, just the ashes from previous uses, neither of us thought it possible that there might still be a hot spot in the ashes. Well there was and now this is what our fence looks like.
OK, so maybe it doesn't look so bad from the front, but still our fence was on fire. FIRE!
See there's a small hole at the bottom now. Thankful, Grateful and Blessed that Buddy and I were still up to see the flames and get this little accident put out.
LESSONS LEARNED:
1)I think we will be moving the compost pile away from the house and into a bin.
2)No more dumping ashes unless they are watered down first
3) the Buddy knows about 911 and was ready to call if we needed him too. Excellent! Now he just needs to learn our address.
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