This weekend I ventured to the wilds of South Dakota with my BFK to her family’s cabin in Redfield, SD or near it. I made a big deal about the weekend-trip and the lack of Internet, because I’m pretty sure I haven’t gotten internetless for 72-hours since the first time I ever had Internet.

In hindsight, the claim of “no Internet” was a bit bold and I probably should have clarified with “no WiFi” as witnessed by my beloved niece roasting me on Instagram.

So the weekend was lovely and relaxing and had very little screen time at all, which is what I needed. There was much laughing and lots of things that will turn into inside jokes and a near-death experience.

Yeah, I almost totally could have maybe died in my head.

See, Saturday evening while making dinner Kari set off the cabin’s smoke alarms. Who hasn’t done that while cooking? I can’t make a pizza at Supergenius HQ without the things beeping. So, whatever, right?

We carried on with our meal and the night and settled into our separate bedrooms around 1:30 in the morning. I noted before falling into a too-many-brats-induced coma that the smoke detector in my room would blink red about every 45 seconds or so and then go back to green. I didn’t think too much about it and promptly got to sawing logs.

Then, at exactly 4:47 a.m. all the smoke detectors in the joint screeched for about 15 seconds and then fell silent. I heard Kari get up and shuffle around the house. She turned on a fan and then let the dogs out. Since I was exhausted I didn’t feel the need to get up and have a conversation about it. I didn’t want to make either of us more awake than we already were.

However, in my head I decided that the smoke detectors were also carbon monoxide detectors and that we were surely going to die. Did I scream for Kari to pack up the dogs and flee the house?

Nope.

Did I lay in bed in a half-sleep/dreamlike state wondering how long it would take our families to notice we had never returned from this cabin in South Dakota?

Yep.

I also reasoned that if it were an actual emergency the detector would beep continuously until the situation was cleared up. Right? Smoke detectors don’t just clang once to notify you of the smoke and then fall silent.

Then in my sleepy fog I decided that “just to be safe” I should open the curtains wide and the windows as wide as they would go. My sleepy fog was not at all about leaving the house like you’re supposed to do. Apparently my anxiety about my impending death did not keep me up, because I fell back to sleep until 7:30 a.m.

Upon waking I asked Kari what the hell? And she shrugged.

“Were you convinced it was the carbon monoxide detector going off?”
She nodded
“And that we were probably gonna die?”
She nodded again.
“And that well, we had a good run, but damn it’s 4:47 a.m. and I’m tired?”
“YES!” She screeched. “But I also decided that the dogs would die first because they’re smaller and closer to the ground. So I just turned on the fan above the stove and opened the windows in my bedroom.”

We spent the morning before packing up to go home laughing about our inherent laziness and the similar logical rodeos we ran in our heads to justify that laziness regarding our own impending deaths.

This is probably why she’s my best friend.