Fire and Ice: What’s up with the firetrucks at the IGA and a Saturday Scavenger Hunt

The Fire Part

Soooo . . . on Friday the volunteer fire department spent an hour over at the Eastport Market.  When the parking lot is full of fire trucks it tends to put people off coming in to shop, although in Torch Lake Township you never can tell.  For one thing, half of us are on the fire roster and can be expected to show up.  For another, all of us like to know what’s going on, and can be expected to show up too.  For the four or five people living here over the winter who must have been working in Traverse City or something and therefore do not already know—and for all of you who are in Florida or Hawaii or Costa Rica—here are the answers to questions you didn’t even know you had:

• Q: Why the fire trucks?  A: An electrical connection in one of the massive coolers in the back overheated and commenced to smolder, sending a fine haze of smoke throughout the building and setting off the alarm.  In short order the firefighters appeared, and eliminated the problem.  Then they checked the whole building with their handy-dandy infrared equipment just to make sure no other overheated wires were lurking in the ceiling.  Good job, guys.  
• Q: Is everybody OK?  A: Certainly.  
• Q: Anything else on the subject?  A:  Well, there was this.  The Antrim County health inspector was up at Friske’s when someone came in and announced that the Eastport Market was on fire.  Naturally the health inspector felt it was his duty to investigate, so he rolled in as the firetrucks were leaving.  Angela reassured him that the market was not, in fact, on fire, and he went off to Bellaire or wherever health inspectors go.  See why I say a person can’t get away with anything around here? 
• Q: Isn’t this the second time in a month that the market’s parking lot has been full of fire trucks?  A: Well, yes.  Maybe this summer we should schedule Firemen’s Field Day at the Eastport Market instead of at Barnes Park. 
• Q: So what’s the deal?  A:  Relax.  The other time the meat smoker in the deli overheated and set its contents on fire, which explains why there was no smoked brisket that night.  Lots of smoke in the store, though, and the alarm went off.  (See?  The alarm works really well.)  By the time the fire trucks pulled up, somebody had managed to douse the brisket.  The firefighters hooked up their enormous ventilating fans and in short order the Market was once more a smoke-free zone.  Here are some pictures of the Smoking Brisket Alarm.  (I don’t have any from the Smoldering Electrical Connection Alarm.)

Fire truck powering the ventilation fan

There is a difference between a fire engine and a fire truck but I can’t seem to hold it in my memory banks. I am absolutely certain that someone–probably Rob the Firefighter–will write in and tell me that I got it wrong.

The Ice Part

A couple days ago neighboring blogger dmarks, who occasionally drops in to see what’s going on over here, invited us to a Saturday Scavenger Hunt. (Someone picks a word and everyone else goes haring around the place looking for photos that relate to the word. Then we post ’em on our blogs and link to the other players and the next thing you know all kinds of people are wandering around this neck of the blogosphere wondering what the heck?) This week’s word is ice. Here are my entries.

Ice Cave

Rob the Firefighter took this with my camera while he and the Lady Alicia were up here visiting in January.

Frozen Explosion

I thought this looked like an icy meteor crash on the winter beach. 

I could add lots of other frosty photos—the Weather Widget is nagging in red again—but enough! If you follow the link to dmarks’s post, you can see more, including antique postcards of iceboats skimming along on Grand Traverse Bay.