due to technical difficulties: this entry was lifted directly out of an e-mail I sent to a friend.

The events of the past few days just go to bolster the arguement: Ken has the worst luck in the world. I'll sum it up in "Cliff's Notes" fashion.

The Kid's were on Spring Break last week and I finally weasled my way into a day off on Friday. So Thursday night was a night to rent movies and stay up late. Calvin, Katie and I were watching Space Jam (Shelby was spending the night at her cousin's house.) Monica was preparing to go to a very late night meeting at the church, and was procrastinating by doing laundry, and sorting items of little consequence.

The kids and I were fast asleep in front of the TV soon after the credits rolled. From my very deep sleep I heard a sort of yowling sound over the Television sounds of Bugs Bunny and Michael Jordan.
The Yowl came again....
then again with more defintion.

KEN! FIRE!

I jumped off the couch clutching Katie. Handed her to Monica as she screamed that the Dryer was burning. I grabbed the fire extinguisher and let the contents fly in a furious 15 second burst of dry chemical flame retardant. The flames weren't even phased.

The dark laundry room was pretty surreal. The THUMP-THUMP-THUMP! of the washer (or was it my heart) combined with the eerie orange shadows cast my foot high flames and hot choking smoke to create a facsimile of hell right in my house!

Monica was outside with the kids frantically calling 911 while I gave up the futile task of beating back the growing flames with a "Barney Beach Towel". As I ran out the front door grabbing jackets, car keys, shoes and wallet... I heard the back window shatter from the heat.

After the fire: The Fire Marshall took us through the house. The smell of burned paint, insulation and varnish permeated everything. there were huge holes in the cieling where the firefighters had to check the condition of my attic space. And where my laundry room used to be... was a charred black hole.

Long story short:

All of our clothes are ruined (smoke Damage), everything within 18" of the ceiling throughout the house is burnt or melted...the house is not inhabitable for 2 months while it is rebuilt.

I'm living at my mother-in-laws house til then. As you can see, the comuter survived...and so did we thanks to Monica's procrastination!

"The most unlucky guy alive."