This Fish Needs A Bicycle

waiting for con ed

Unlike Waiting for Guffman, Waiting to Exhale or even Waiting for Godot, waiting for Con Ed is not the least bit entertaining.

I woke up briefly at 5:40 this morning fighting nausea. I woke up an hour later, reeling. It took me a good three or four minutes to realize that I’d been woken up not by a turning stomach, but by the smell that caused it. Acrid, I think is the appropriate word. Alarmed into awakeness, I tumbled out of bed, threw on sweats and started following my sniffer. Stove? Nope. I’d have to actually use it, I think, to jostle anything loose and cause a gas leak. After opening all the windows, I wandered out into the hall, then did a quick pass around the entire apartment building. By the time I’d climbed the stairs back from the lobby, other sleepy folks were coming out of their apartments.

Skinny Married Guy with Big Dog (Like I know my neighbors' names -- this isn’t Kansas) followed me back to my apartment. He took one step over the threshold and stopped, “God! I thought it was bad in our place. Are you alright?” I shrugged and suggested we wake the Super. He didn’t answer his phone. So we went across the hall and knocked. His wife did answer the door -- sporting a hospital bracelet and proof of an IV in her left arm. Turns out, she’d been hospitalized the night before for severe headaches.

Uh, yeah.

The Super’s wife called the management company, I called Con Ed and then we waited. And waited. I got ready for the day with my front door thrown wide, the windows open and ceiling fans going. Sir Hal’s ears were like little Popsicles, but the alternative wasn’t at all appealing.

At one point, I lay down on the floor next to His Excellency. Those science teachers knew their shit when they talked about volume and mass and stuff rising. Funny that. While Hal played in my wet hair, I breathed chilly fresh air. It’s not weird at all that I felt significantly better just knowing my cat was toxin free, right? Whatever. Weird is the new interesting and cool.

Google told me that if it was a gas leak, I was not to play with electricity. What was off must remain off. What was on, should stay on, lest the flipping of a switch cause a spark. I don’t need to tell you that wet hair does not dry very quickly at 50 degrees. But I will anyway ‘cause I’m feeling a little bit complainy. I’m tired and wobbly. My tummy hurts and my head feels like it’s made of granite. And I’m sorta worried about Sir Hal. After waiting a few hours, I eventually had to turn over my keys to the Super’s wife and ask her to call me if His Excellency was in any danger. Then I headed to work.

If the Smell of Doom is not gone by the time I get back this evening, I’m packing Sir Hal up and finding a kitten-friendly location to crash. I can’t take the headache. In my best Arnold voice, I’ll joke that it’s “not a tumor” but if I spend much more time in toxic fumes, it just very well may be.

*** update ***

It's the boiler. And that's all I know.

Posted by This Fish at October 12, 2004 11:02 AM