THE GREAT TWIGSVILLE NEW YEARS FIRE OF 2003
Well, hell...It's not like we did it on purpose.
Our early attempts were rather pathetic and in retrospect would seem amusing if not for the very real fact that we did have a chimney fire and could lose the whole building. We had no idea how long the fire department was going to take, so we did what seemed appropriate: Tossed little pots and pans of water on the walls. Then came the earnest roof climbing. Two people fell off.

It was going to be a very long night.

January 1 - 2003...about 2AM

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And so it began...		 975938-R1-20_1 975938-R1-21_1
Nope. That shouldn't be doing that. 		975938-R1-22_1
Nope. They shouldn't be doing that either...but it seemed like a good idea at the time.
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Wa, Ray and Dougie on fire hose duty		 975938-R1-24 975938-R1-25_1
I can't tell who this is, but it was about 30 degrees and everyone on hose duty ended up getting soaked. 		975938-R1-26A
yes, that's Tat Matt with an axe.
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Tat Matt does the first reasonable thing all evening and hacks a hole into the side of the chimney so we could direct the water into the walls.		 975938-R1-32_1
I discover that being completely soaked keeps you warmer. 		975938-R1-35_1
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It was about this time that my wet flash started getting persnicketty and decided that it was going to work only when it damn well wanted to.		 975939-R1-13A 975939-R1-14A 975939-R1-15A
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Finally dry... 		975939-R1-1A 975939-R1-2A
Finally...Fire. Enough of this smoke BS we finally had something to watch. 		975939-R1-3A
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Sodium: "Why don't you put some water on that thing?"
Heh heh...Jackass... 		975939-R1-5A
Our only casualty. We forgot DJ Buddhaful in our rush.
We'll miss him very very much...		 975939-R1-6A 975939-R1-9
After numerous requests and failed attempts with a bitterly wet and cranky flash I got a photo of the only firewoman. There, you happy now?
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Ok, so what do we do now?

It was now about 4AM...I could be wrong. I asked the fire crew if our amateur attempts had done any good. They said definitely. Then one of the workers (Jiggy John's doppleganger) excalimed that everyone had saved the building and that we weren't responsible. It was the first time that being called "not responsible" was taken as a good thing. And so was born Twigsville's slogan for the week.
"Not Our Fault!"

Tell your children. Leave them this lesson: Know your fire. Don't be responsible. Dress weird. It'll all turn out fine.

The fire crew must have worked till dawn. Most of us lost steam by them and the jokes about being able to smoke inside were now getting stale. The only answer was a final beer and sleep. By dawn the fire was out, massive holes had been cut out of the lodge walls and then everyone found out what really caused the fire...

Oh really? Gosh I hadn't heard.....Let's find out the nutty truth on WEDNESDAY.
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