Photo by designshard
This is not a picture of the fire near us, though it looked like this to me.
or, as Q prefers it, “Video Games Save Lives.”
David was up late playing some game on the Kindle and wondering about all the noise coming from a house nearby. He said it sounded like someone was dragging a bunch of chains around. Suddenly, some guy started pounding on the back door, yelling, “FIRE!” (or the Dutch equivalent thereof).
Turns out the building three doors away was burning down.
Luckily David had a) a phone and b) the presence of mind to know that “112” is the emergency number. He got on the phone, woke me up, and told me to get our important possessions together and to wake up Quinland.
The bungalows we are staying in right now are brick, with tile roofs, so the danger wouldn’t have seemed too great, except that it was SO CLOSE. There were all kinds of shards and embers falling in our yard, and the trees between the fire and our area seemed completely lit up with flames.
David kept an eye on the fire and waited for 112 to answer (they never did, but a fire engine finally appeared). I grabbed the important papers, our money belts, the computer, and all my medication, along with a random handful of clothes since I was in my pajamas. Quinland got Speshy and Lanky and her concert t-shirts, a fire-safety plan which she has had in place for a number of years. (I am not kidding, either.) She showed great presence of mind, but asked if we could please leave the area so she didn’t have to be so close to the fire.
We drove over to the reception building and parked facing away from the blaze until they got it under control. Then we went home and collapsed into nightmare-filled sleep until this morning.
Sometimes this European adventure is a little too adventurous for me…
miss fidgety 
O M double G!! I just saw that this happened via Facebook! I am so glad you are all okay. I hope no one else died in the fire!
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Glad that you are all safe. Sounds like it was a fairly frightening experience. Hope that nobody was seriously injured or died in the other homes. You won’t be able to complain about david playing games late at night, for the next twenty years :;
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That was supposed to be a wink at the end of the last sentence!
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I got it! 😉
As far as we know, there was no loss of life. (We’d be more certain if we actually spoke Dutch.) Apparently, the building was more of a storehouse than a home, thank goodness.
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