That can't be safe!

Two weeks ago one of our smoke detectors starting chirping. We changed the battery, and I suggested to the king that we change them all out. There are 9 in our house, and we've not changed them in 4 years of living here. Now, they are electric, w/a batter back-up, so they aren't apt to need to be changed yearly, but if one's going, it seems maybe we should change them all. The king, being much like me, decided to procrastinate that idea. So Saturday night, at 4AM, the one in the living room--the really HIGH one--started screaming, not chirping. The good news is it woke all of us up, even the princess downstairs, and after a few minutes, it sort of quit. Clearly we were meant to change them all out. But the king didn't know how he would reach the high one. I suggested he borrow the neighbor's ladder. He decided to create his own ladder.

Say it with me: KNUCKLEHEAD!!

The "ladder" held, and he was just tall enough to reach the very high detector. Alas, even with the new battery, it chirped. So he cut the power. Did a little of this. Did a little of that. And eventually figured out that the batter was in backward. He couldn't see it when he was pushing it in there because he was literally on tiptoe and extending his arms as far as they would go to reach it. Eventually it was all fixed up, and we are hopeful we're good for another 4 years.

That's the smoke detector...on the ceiling...so you can see how far he had to stretch.

One sad note: on his way down from the ladder (the second to last time), he stepped funny and tweaked his back. It is slowly healing, but he is going in today to have it looked at. I guess I'm going to have to buy the man a ladder.