Suppose you had a small electrical fire and... a structural engineer [looked] at your home's wiring [and] reports that the wiring is "shot" and there is a 50% chance that your house would burn down in the next few years unless you replace all the wiring. The job will cost $20,000... so you get an independent assessment. The next engineer agrees with the first warning. You can either continue to shop for additional evaluations until you find the one engineer in 1,000 that is willing to give you the answer you want, "Your family is not in danger" or you can change the wiring.
I use a smoke alarm as a timer.
Being a parent is weird. It changes people in subtle and unsubtle ways. In my case, it awoke a kind of manic sentinel in my brain. Anything in the house that might be a threat to the kids or to my wife gets terminated - food, sharp edges, poor wiring.
They think that nothing will happen because they have closed their doors, and they do not know that it is in the soul that things always happen, and that the world does not end at their housedoor.
When there is an old maid in the house, a watchdog is unnecessary.
Hee that burnes his house warmes himselfe for once.
1.5 billion people lack proper access to electricity. Many buy kerosene, which can cost 30 percent of their income. It sends millions of metric tons of carbon dioxide into the atmosphere every year. And often the lamp will fall over and catch the house on fire. So mothers hate it, but it's their only option.
Tom Ridge now says we don't have to run out and put plastic sheets all over the house. Great, tell that to my dead parakeet.
As long as you're a tax deduction, you'll always be safe in my house.
I did research when I was pregnant with my first daughter and was horrified by the chemicals in products, even those meant for babies. I would have to go to 50 different places just to get my house and my kid clean.
If you have children, you don't want to have drugs and drinks in the house. It's just not good.
The smoke alarm went off in the hallway upstairs, either to let us know the battery had just died or because the house was on fire.
I know how to fake someone out, if they break into my house, into thinking there are other people there.
My father had a handgun on the bedside table, and we were all taught to handle firearms.
Everyone who owns a home recognizes the need for fire insurance. We hope and pray that there will never be a fire. Nevertheless, we pay for insurance to cover such a catastrophe, should it occur. We ought to do the same with reference to family welfare.
My mother would put me on a wooden box at the stove and tell me to call her if certain things would happen. Like if the steam turns blue, that is danger!
No sensible person ever opens the door of his house without knowing who is knocking.
Hey Dad, will you buy me a flame thrower? Of course not. Don't be silly. Even if I didn't use it in the house?
I grew up in a pretty economically safe, physically safe household, and, you know, now my life is defined by other people's trauma and by other people's emotional experience with it, and I think I'm richer for that, frankly.
I have slight attention-span issues, so I will often wander off, and then I will be alerted - in inverted commas - when the smoke alarm goes off. So that's how I work out if a bake is finished.
I never wanted to spend a month away from my life. One time I was out on the road for three weeks in a row and I when I came back someone had broken into my apartment and the water had evaporated from the toilet.
Several years ago my dear wife went to the hospital. She left a note behind for the children: "Dear children, do not let Daddy touch the microwave" - followed by a comma, "or the stove, or the dishwasher, or the dryer." I'm embarrassed to add any more to that list.
Your mom isn’t going to let me step foot inside this place. I’ve seen the gun she keeps on the top shelf of the pantry.
