I’m pretty sure that from the time I could hear (maybe about the time I was born or so) there has been this super loud noise. Because of this super loud noise, I have survived for 39 years.  It is also a fairytale and because of the fairytale I am bitter.

I am of course talking about the Fire alarm.  The loud, ear-splitting screech that shatters the eardrums and gets oh so close to taking away the hearing aspect of your ears that you work so hard to protect.  I like to protect my hearing by only having my Ipod in my ears 7-10 hours a day instead of the 24 that is possible every day.  So by only having my ears exposed to super loud music 40% of the day.  And I only go to the airport every once in a while to listen to planes land and take off.  My favorite is to go to construction sights and listen to the jackhammer without ear protection, but its okay because I only listen to them for hour an at a time.  So when the fire alarm is checked at my place of work only every six months, the eardrum shattering is fine.  That isn’t a bitter thing at all.

 

He looks so relaxed with the soothing sounds of the fire alarm.

 

What really makes me bitter about the fire alarms is the fact that they are like the fairytale of the Boy who Cried Wolf.  In that fairytale, a boy claims over and over again that there was a wolf coming only to then laugh at everyone for believing him.  Then just when the town started ignoring the stupid kid for lying to them over and over again, the wolf actually appeared and killed the kid and his sheep.  So these fire alarms who apparantly don’t get enough attention, decide that they need to shock and amaze us into an almost heart attack like state, just like the boy who cried wolf.  They are supposed to be the surprising sound that shocks us into action and move out of the building without grabbing all the valuable possesions we have, like our paperclips that we were going to use to clip together our very important papers and that new set of sticky notes that we were just about to use to put innane notes that we would ignore and leave them behind.

But the fire alarm decides to cry wolf over and over and over again as a test(because when you see a fire you are not going to possibly know how to get outside without practicing).  I’m tired of the Fire alarm getting us all fired up(get it, fired up) to have some fire in our building and then letting us down over and over again.  They make me so bitter.  How about for once you warn me when there is an actual fire, fire alarms.  Stop tricking me and making me thing that your scary noise is real!

Arrrggghhhh

Bitter Ben