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A Senior moment, or just plain daft?

(41 Posts)
Shanma Tue 01-Nov-16 20:21:42

Today, just after breakfast I could hear an alarm sounding, very loud, very irritating and ongoing. After about 15 minutes of this I thought perhaps I ought to telephone the Police, and report it. I rang the local Police, went through all the questions, and told them that it seemed to be coming from the new housing estate at the back of us.
I explained that I had not seen anything suspicious as it was not possible to see anything there from where I live, and that I was not about to go there to investigate, they lgged it, gave me a reference number , and that was that.

Another ten minutes or so passed, the noise was terrible. I decided to go to the bottom of the garden and have a peep through the hedge to see if that would enlighten me. As I walked past the side of our Garage and further down the garden I realised that the sound became less noisy as I moved away from the garage!!.

Retracing my steps( Dressed by the way on my nightclothes, old clogs and a dog walking anorak, looking every inch the Lady in the Van). I entered the garage, and yes it was in OUR garage! What the heck could it be, we have no alarm in there...was it the car?? I had my ear to the bonnet in case something untoward was happening underneath it, although quite what that may be I could not imagine.

I went into the house, and told Hubby what I had discovered. " Oh hell", he said " I know exactly what that is!!"

About six or so months ago our carbon monoxide detector broke( or so we thought). we bought a new one, and put the old one in the garage until we could get around to recycling it. We then promptly forgot all about it. This morning Hubby started the car up to check the battery was ok as it has been a bit iffy of late..he did not open the garage doors first, and so the detector proved it has not been broken after all, and did it's job, warning the whole neighborhood grin.

Sheepishly I called the Police again, and apologised profusely. The girl thought it was hilarious, but told me not to worry, and thanked me for being kind enough to call them back.

Anyone else had a silly thing like this at some stage??

merlotgran Tue 01-Nov-16 20:34:34

I suppose the moral to this story is, never, ever start a car in a garage with the doors closed.

What if he passed out and the car kept running without you knowing what was going on?

grannylyn65 Tue 01-Nov-16 20:34:40

gringrin?

Ana Tue 01-Nov-16 20:37:20

Must have been running for quite a while to set off the detector...!!

Anya Tue 01-Nov-16 21:10:19

These alarms, smoke detectors, CO detectors, etc really make a din when they go off and they just go on and on.

You made me smile Shanma so thanks for that smile

Shanma Tue 01-Nov-16 21:19:04

No the car was hardly running at all. Nice to see you looking on the bright side, Merlotgran, keep up cracking that enamel

merlotgran Tue 01-Nov-16 21:24:09

hmm

Anya Tue 01-Nov-16 21:25:40

Not heard that expression 'cracking the enamel' what does it mean?

merlotgran Tue 01-Nov-16 21:51:46

I googled it, Anya but all I could come up with was, 'Cracking the enigma code'

Not that clever. grin

Anya Tue 01-Nov-16 21:54:07

Very enigmatic grin

Auntieflo Tue 01-Nov-16 22:28:01

Smiling?

callgirl1 Tue 01-Nov-16 22:53:47

A good few years ago, my daughter and I heard a buzzing sound coming from the cupboard under the stairs, which is where the electric meter is, and that was where the sound seemed to be coming from. I rang the electricity board, was told that someone would come to check it. A bit later, 2 men arrived, spent about 20 minutes in the cupboard, then one came out carrying a brown paper bag, which was buzzing. Inside it was a toy car of my grandson`s, that ran around the outside of a tin, rather like a drinks can, and the car had somehow switched on and was making the buzzing noise! I felt a bit daft, but then again, it DID take them 20 minutes to find it!

rosesarered Tue 01-Nov-16 23:10:18

I have two stories ( much worse than yours Shan ) blush cannot possibly divulge them though.I bet we all have them.

Shanma Tue 01-Nov-16 23:37:35

yes Auntieflo , to crack the enamel means to smile. I like your story Callgirl, but Rosesarered, that is so mean to tell us you have two stories, and then to keep them a secret!!

rosesarered Tue 01-Nov-16 23:52:41

I could tell you, but the I would have to........grin moon

rosesarered Tue 01-Nov-16 23:53:13

No, I just can't tell you, soz.

downtoearth Wed 02-Nov-16 07:13:10

Do you keep it it the cupboard under the stairs Roses...grin

NfkDumpling Wed 02-Nov-16 07:22:03

My father (in his seventies) was talked into buying a really snazzy - and expensive - fire and monoxide alarm at a show by an attractive young lady. Mum was furious that he'd been taken in by a pretty face and they nearly came to blows over it. The offending alarm was thrown into an old chest in the corner and forgotten. She refused to have it on the wall. It took them a couple of days and near divorce to find what the beeping was when the battery ran down many moons later and the whole silly argument started up again. My mum was a very jealous woman!

downtoearth Wed 02-Nov-16 07:44:34

One Christmas we where sent a Christmas card with a recording of we wish you a merry Christmas that activated when the card opened .Only problem was that it got stuck and kept playing.My Godmother had sent the card and would have been upset if we had taken down, my husband was so sick of it he ripped the little box out and threw into the garden,unfortunately it landed on the conservatory roof of a very curmudgeonly neighbour next door,followed by a heavy snowfall,the b****y thing still kept playing .We could see and hear our neighbour looking for the source which must have driven him mad as it finally wound down after three weeks, he had a 6ft fence so we never saw him in the garden,we kept quiet ,we where too scared to own up he was such a miserable old bugger..well he was old to us he was in his 50's and we in our 30's blush sorry George

AlieOxon Wed 02-Nov-16 08:04:19

We were sent one of those cards and it dropped down behind a fitted cupboard in the kitchen! Aghhhh.

(tip off post - they are supposed to be good to put in mole runs.....)

mischief Wed 02-Nov-16 09:26:01

I am about to admit to something I have never divulged before. My partner and I were in transit in the middle of a two week holiday and stayed overnight in this hotel. We were really tired and went to bed early. At about 2 in the morning an alarm sounded very loudly IN OUR ROOM. We both lept out of bed, still half asleep, grabbed a towel each and started wafting the alarm (like I would if the alarm went off at home because of burnt toast) hoping to stop it before it woke the rest of the hotel - it being our fault...somehow. Then there was a knock on the room door asking us to go downstairs and meet in the lobby. Ahah a fire drill. Pity nobody thought to tell us. confused

Flowerofthewest Wed 02-Nov-16 09:38:56

How funny. We were in the garden one day and heard our neighbours smoke alarm. She was away so my husband peeked through her window. All seemed to be in order. We were about to call fire brigade when he followed to sound to her wheelie bin. She had replaced her alarm (because it didn't work!)

Flowerofthewest Wed 02-Nov-16 09:44:49

On a more personal note....This morning I needed to loo. Our downstairs loo has an automatic extractor, quite noisy. As I sat trying to 'go' each time I managed there was a humming noise. This happened each time. I was worried that it could be blood pressure or some other problem. As I finally left the cloakroom my DH called down 'I've just vacuumed the landing!'

Neversaydie Wed 02-Nov-16 10:01:11

Our garage is attached to the house with a door via a passageway into the kitchen. I once reversed the car into the garage as I was loading something heavy into the boot to take to work The exhaust fumes must have triggered the carbon monoxide alarm in the kitchen but I didnt put two and two together and rushed off to work instructing DH, who was still at home, to sort it out (I was doing a big presentation at work and was very stressed )He called out British Gas to look at the boiler ...fortunately we had a service contract .They of course found no problem and were mystified .It was only later we worked out what had happended ...

Mary59nana Wed 02-Nov-16 10:20:21

While on the subject of alarms I wonder if this is a common problem, My fire alarm was beeping so I opened up the casing to change the battery and it had written on the inside renew before 2017 ... I put new battery in and now it constantly alarms .... now I have removed battery and need to buy a new alarm, I did not realise that there was a " use by date on them" so please check yours in case of a emergency