I had an interesting experience tonight. My apartment has been sorta/kinda smelling like gas for the last few days. I haven’t really been here that much, but my roommate said that it was bad while I was in New Mexico for Thanksgiving (making pie and riding horses, see 12/03 post). It just so happened that the radiator valve broke at the same time and was emitting a large cloud of steam. So the gas thing was kind of forgotten about and I guess we assumed that they were related. Well, tonight, I was innocently trying to make myself a cup of tea when I realized that the stove wouldn’t turn on…so I opened it up and noticed that the pilot light was off! So what do I do? What any self respecting New Yorker would do. I called my mom. But she didn’t answer. So then I called Danny. But I couldn’t hear him. So then I called 311. When they asked me if my apartment smelled like gas, and I said yes, they connected me to 911, who connected me to the fire department, and before I knew, a fire truck and five fire fighters in full gear with AXES were in my apartment. As this was happening, I was thinking, among other things, “I really wish I had taken my super’s number the other night when my roommate offered it to me.” So the firefighters came in and checked the gas and called in a “Code One” (at this point I’m actually getting scared) and turned off the gas. Then Con Edison showed up, turned the gas on, checked for leaks, actually found two, and turned it back off. Now my stove is turned off until my super fixes the leaks, marked with bright red “warning” tag. 

Despite the fact that I’m really pissed off because I really just want a cup of tea (and I HATE microwaved tea) I must say the fire department was impressively fast in getting here. Seriously – they got here in the time it took me to walk down the stairs. Alright…here I go to microwave some water and call it tea.