thu 16 oct 2008 01:06:20 — hometown
fire dept visits
about an hour ago i was sitting here writing something when the power winked out, and a blazing fire alarm with strobe light started sounding in bursts of three. ehh, ehh, ehh. ehh, ehh, ehh. i found my pocket essentials (ID, keys and stuff) and went down the back stairs, taking care to leave my door unlocked (in case i had to get back in here before the power came back on).
three fire trucks and at least eight firefighters came to the hotel and walked around checking things. they said a smoke alarm had gone off in room 434, which is near my room. (i hadn't smelled any smoke on my way out.) other people were saying the fire alarm was triggered by the power failure, which happened to several other buildings in this area. a few minutes ago the firefighters left, but since the south side elevator isn't yet working i needed to get back to my room by the staircase.
i was a little worried about my 1 TB drive kicking down, since it's not on a battery, but that seems to be okay, and the internet connection is working again. too bad i was in the middle of a 300 MB FTP transfer when the power died. now i have to start over with that. but i suppose things could be worse, huh?