The day you move, I'm probably going to explode.

When the Great North American Smoke Detector nears the end of its life, it alerts the other forest creatures of its impending demise by letting out a piercing, intermittent chirp. And so the circle of life found it's way into Lisa's home last weekend. At 6:15 am.

I was deliciously rolling from a dream about Hayden Panettiere into a dream about Emile De Ravin (mere seconds from potential Claire on Claire action) when a loud, insistent chirping jolted me awake.

“TWEEEEEP!”

Somewhere within the house, a detector was dying. I shut my eyes tightly, in the hope of grabbing hold of my dreams again, in the hope of fending off the sad wail, but it's impossible. In the wake of Lisa's dad staying at HIS girlfriends house that night, I was forced into being man of the house. Sadly, I grab my glasses and trudge into the dark bedroom abyss.

“TWEEEEEP!”

I walk to the end of the hallway outside of the bedroom and jerk the alarm from the wall. Its umbilical cord is still trailing behind, attached to the motherly security system. I yank the cord with a mild grunt, detaching the dying animal.

Satisfaction.

I throw the detector on the hall table and make my way back to bed. Before I get to the bedroom door…

“TWEEEEEP!”

Oh right. The battery. Duh.

I grab the contraption off of the table and tear the 9-volt out of its tiny compartment. One must rip the heart from the beast in order to end the misery.

“TWEEEEEP!”

Hmmm. What's all this about? My hands appear to be clenching. I wonder how many pieces this thing will shatter into, were I to throw it through the drywall?

Perhaps I need to replace the battery. Yes, that must be it. It has no heart, but it still has a soul. And the soul still yearns to detect.

This means I need to go downstairs and find a battery, however. Claire and Claire are, at this point, smoking a post-freaky cigarette.

Their kitchen drawer holds all manner of battery– AA, AAA, AAAA, C, D, Car…

“HEY, WHERE ARE THE GODDAMNED 9-VOLT BATTERIES?!?!”

This is a conversation that we’ve had a million times at 6:15 in the morning.

“I use them for the battery pack at work – they’re up here in my bag.”

Sure you do. Sure they are.

Up the stairs I go. Literally the most exercise I’ve gotten this year.

She hands a whole sleeve of batteries to me, blindly, in some sort of bad recreation of an Olympic relay. The transition is flawless.

I replace the battery, but before I can close the battery holder door…

“TWEEEEEP!”

You. Mother. Fucker.

In my sleepy haziness, I may have grabbed the wrong detector. They squeal and echo so loudly, it’s difficult to detect the source of the shriek.

Shut up, you don't know.

I grab a different detector, from the kitchen, tear it from the wall, slam out the battery and replace it…

Wait for it…

“TWEEEEEP!”

Whore!

Now I’m turning on lights all over the house. The reason I don’t carry large caliber weaponry, say a bazooka, is because of circumstances just like this. I would blow holes through walls in a subtle effort to hunt down a rogue plastic device.

I not-so-briefly contemplate burning the house down, just to teach the detectors a lesson. "Tweeeep" all you want bitch, I’M in charge here.

I have this same reaction when a flight gets stuck in a holding pattern or something when I’m (rarely) traveling. I silently say a prayer asking that the plane slam into the ground at Mach 10, JUST SO WE’LL BE ON THE GROUND.

So clearly I have issues.

I’ve digressed.

Back upstairs now, ten goddamned feet down the hall from the first detector, they have another detector. Just how localized do they expect the fire in this place to be, exactly? Jesus.

I perform the same tear down, slam out, replace procedure.

And...

Silence.

I waddle back to the bedroom and roll into bed.

“Is it fixed?” Lisa whispers into the darkness.

“It sure as shit better be. I will burn this motherfu…” I begin.

“Uh-huh, okay. Back to sleep now,” she says.

“You heard how it was taunting me, right?” I ask.

“The world is against you, yes,” she responds.

See? She knows.