Writing on the Wall

(Ok I know this post was written on Wednesday but if you hop over to http://www.mycup2yours.com/ and read the comment I left on her post last night, you will understand why I am pretending it was written on Thursday.) 

When you don't know what to write, I've been told that you should just start typing and let whatever you want to fall onto the page.  So that's what I'm doing right now.  Nothing of much interest has happened in the last few days. Nothing that I would find interesting enough to write a whole blog post about at least.  So now I am just writing and trying to find something interesting as I go.  It's not working.  Not so far. 

An apartment condo caught fire the other day.  The same day that I finally made it to the Passport office to apply for passports for Julianne and myself.  I was sitting in the lobby of the office and several fire trucks went flying by.  As is the norm, I figured it was nothing.  However, when I came out of the building nearly a half hour later I see thick black smoke and flames billowing from a building not too far away.

I took a little drive by to get a closer look as we do have some family that lives in that area.  Thankfully it was actually across the street from where they live.  However, what was happening was still not exactly the best sight to see.
There is something strange about fire.  Whenever I see it, I get mildly excited.  It's not that there is extreme destruction going on at that particular time but there is something oddly beautiful about thick billowing smoke.  I remember when I was kid, there was a hotel that caught on fire and I was completely in awe of the way the smoke looked, like fluffy dark clouds flying into the sky.
This condo complex was just built a couple of years ago.  Now over 300 people are homeless and they're saying that there is so much damage to the building that it will have to be demolished.  I couldn't imagine how it feels to lose everything you own.  And for what?  Because someone didn't extinguish a cigarette properly.  Can you believe it?  I can I guess.  It's the first thing I thought when I saw the fire. It's always blamed on a smoker.  But the fact remains that it usually has something to do with the careless extinguishing of cigarette butts.  Amazing how expensive one little mistake can become.
It took firefighters nearly 24 hours to get the last of the hot spots.  But they got it under control.  There are actually two other buildings in this complex and it didn't look like they got touched so for that they have to be somewhat thankful.  I don't know if I would want to stay there though.
It was also one of the windiest days this month.  No wonder the fire spread as fast as it did. 

These were the best pictures I could find online. They are not my photos so I cannot take credit for any of them.  I do wish I had my camera with me when I saw it though.  If only...