Kage Baker had a horror of house fires. It was rather odd, considering she loved fire, pyrotechnics, cannonry and anything else involving a creative use of fire and smoke – but she  was really always afraid of a fire in the house.

Of course, we lived most of our lives in old frame houses. The portions spent, instead, in trailers, tents and pseudo-Tudor buildings (complete with thatch!) weren’t exactly conducive to leaving one feeling fire-proof, either. Then there was the rate at which Kage produced, and accumulated,  piles of paper: inhuman, is what that was. At any rate, she always, logically, sensibly, insisted on smoke alarms, fire extinguishers and other such safety gear around the house.

But, you know what? Those things won’t prevent a chimney fire. Which we did not have today, but thought we did for about an hour; the house, the closets and everyone’s nerves are therefore in shambles. I shall explain tomorrow, when some of the undeniably amusing aspects will have appeared, like risable cream, on the surface of my scrambled brain.

Now I’m gonna go sit on the front porch. The living room still smells unnervingly of barbecue …