We didn't (intentionally) start the fire.

Tonight I got to yell, "FIRE!!!"

Except, the yell wasn't quite as loud as it would have been owing to the fact that I have a cold and have kind of lost my voice.

My appetite hasn't been what it usually is, but John was hungry tonight for dinner and I thought breakfast for dinner sounded pretty good. We had some leftover blueberry pancakes and all the ingredients for migas.

But it wasn't the migas or the pancakes that started the fire. No, the migas were about done.

What started it all? I was boiling some water in a tea kettle for a cup of tea.

That's when the smoke starting rising from the range under the tea kettle. A lot of it. It was thick.

I quickly removed the tea kettle to the front burner, and shooting up from the pan under the burner were nothing less than flames. Flames that quickly grew to about two feet high and came within inches of the microwave above the range.

Our kitchen fire extinguisher that has been gathering dust for eight and a half years finally came in handy. I grabbed it, yelled "FIRE!!!", pulled the pin out, and John was there instantaneously to extinguish the fire with one short burst from the extinguisher.

(I am a little embarrassed to admit I panicked a bit and after pulling out the pin stared at the extinguisher a second looking for a trigger, when really you PUSH DOWN on the top of the handle. When you're faced with a fire the last thing you're going to do is read instructions or look at pictures on the fire extinguisher. Although, I might be the only person dumb enough to not know how to use the thing. But, really, I have never in my life had to put out a fire. I thankfully handed the extinguisher over to John the second he sped into the kitchen.)

Disaster averted. Only to be met by the next disaster. Dinner was sitting, all cooked and ready to eat, on the stove. With fire extinguisher dust all over it. The cheese I had sitting out to grate over the migas was ruined as well.

Thankfully, the pancakes were safe.

Soooo, we dumped dinner in the trash, cleaned up the residue from...everything...and I started over with the migas. Am I a glutton for punishment or what?

John kindly ran to the store to buy more cheese...and a new fire extinguisher for the kitchen.

I think he was afraid to leave me unprotected from further fire for any length of time.

According to the back of a kitchen fire extinguisher box at the store, a household kitchen fire occurs every 83 seconds in our country.

So, really it's a miracle that this is the first we've had in eight and a half years of marriage.

It's also a miracle that our microwave light, which has been out for the past few years - only blinking on once in a blue moon, is now working! It's the happy ending to our tale of flames and woe.