X is for Xibalba

Xibalba according to Wikipedia is:

In Maya mythology, Xibalba (pronounced /ʃɨˈbɒlbə/), roughly translated as "place of fear", is the name of the underworld, ruled by Maya Death Gods and their helpers. In Yucatec, it was known as Metnal. In the 16th-century Verapaz, the entrance to Xibalba was traditionally held to be a cave in the vicinity of Cobán, Guatemala. According to some of the K'iche' Maya presently living in the vicinity, the area is still associated with death. Cave systems in nearby Belize have also been referred to as the entrance to Xibalba.

We experienced a level of Xibalba the other night.

We have the smoke detectors from hell wired into our house. Or they are possessed by some Xibalba native.

I want to do bodily harm to whoever wired our smoke detectors.

A little back story. These things are uber sensitive. Good thing, mostly. They go off whenever I clean the oven, annoying but I can live with it. I'd rather having working smoke detectors. They go off whenever I need to cook above 375 in the oven. Extremely annoying, but again, I'd rather having working smoke detectors.

And it's not just us. We hear neighbors' smoke detectors going off all the time, too.

So, on the night in question, the smoke detector went off around 12:30 in the morning. Hubby and I jerk wake, he does a walk through to make sure it's a false alarm, and he shuts it off. End of story? Not a chance. The darn things went off again. Three more times in that first hour (after which we closed all the windows thinking maybe it was dust coming in with the breeze setting it off) then every 30 to 45 minutes till 6 am. Needless to say, hubby and I wore toothpicks in our eyes all day.

Did you know it's a good idea to blow air (like the compressed air you use on computers) into your smoke detectors when you change the batteries (y'all know when you Spring Forward and Fall Back)?

Here's the scary.

It's a little like The Boy Who Cried Wolf. Our first response is no longer, "OMG we need to get out of the house."

Here's the terrifying.

The boys slept through it all! Not a single one woke up, got out of bed, or groggily said, "What up with the alarms last night?"

There have been studies about kids not waking up to smoke detectors. We even tested the boys when we lived in Oregon. But this was truly terrifying because it went on so long. And it was loud! Every smoke detector upstairs going off at once. Not a moan or groan from the boys.



I can't tag this one Blog Fun even though it fits the challenge, it's just too serious.