My illegal following of the A to Z Challenge went off the rails yesterday when I missed the letter “U.” May as well handcuff me and drag me off to blogger jail, because I’m back with “U” and “V” combined today. And I’m a bit of a grumpy camper, so make sure those cuffs are good and tight.

And could we PLEEAASE make blogger jail my room? Where my bed is? ‘Coz I’m sleep-deprived.

You see, last night at (hang on, what does it say on my Fitbit?) 1:29am, my eldest son came into my room and told me I had to get up. Confused, I dragged myself down the stairs trying to make sense of why he was saying he wanted to call 911. Turns out he’d preheated the oven not realizing that he’d spilled butter in it the last time he used it.

There was smoke. There was so much smoke that even with three windows and a door open in the kitchen, my eyes were still watering and my throat still hurt. The oven was off but smoke still billowed out of the vent while it cooled down.

According to my trusty Fitbit, I didn’t get back to bed until 2:11. Where I lay and contemplated the fact that my son woke me up, not my fire alarm.

My best friend, John, came over this morning and changed the batteries in the three (count ’em–THREE) alarms that didn’t work last night, but I haven’t started up the oven to check and see if they’re any better at detecting smoke …

My throat hasn’t recovered yet.

I should probably do that tomorrow. When I HOPE the word of the day won’t be “water.”