I was out with my friends Nate and Ryan doing some dinner in Morris. (Side note: Morris is really much further away than I thought. I should look at Google Maps to determine the delay to food entering my belly.)
As I came home, I could hear the smoke detectors blaring as I'm walking up to the front door. I'm fully expecting to see my grandfather and his friend to be sprawled out somewhere. I enter the house and it's filled with smoke. I am having a hard time seeing, breathing, and naturally... hearing. They're both watching TV with the loudness cranked up. My grandfather mentions he was about to call me for assistance. One of the smoke detectors actually broke since it was sounding off for so long.
Looking around the house for the cause, I notice the fireplace. it is billowing smoke. I don't know if he forgot to open the chimney valve, or didn't warm up the chimney. Either way, the house was completely filled with smoke. In my infinite wisdom, I immediately open windows. I turn on the whole house fan upstairs. As I come down to family room again, the fire is roaring since the fan is actually sucking air back down the chimney.... The room fills back up with smoke. I close the chimney valve. Since I just stoked the fire up, they're actively billowing smoke again. I have to now remove them outside.
Designating a spot on the sidewalk for them to burn out, I create a pile. Once again, I notice that the room is filling back up with smoke. The logs are still smoldering outside and the smoke is being sucked back into the house through a nearby doorway. I shut the door. I then remember that my father had a cover for the fireplace. Using him as my lifeline, he reminds me where he hid it.
Now that I have the a constant stream of fresh air coming into the house, I relax. The woman must have a 6th sense to realize the best time to screw with me. She mentions something about how it is cold outside, and how she is cold now. I had no patience for this and wasn't going to sugarcoat it. I told her something along the lines of,"Too bad, you need to breath".
My room and a few others were protected from the smoke since the doors were closed. But, since the temperature of the house definitely did drop, the heat kicked in and cycled that air all over the house. I can still smell it downstairs.