Last night as I was sitting on my couch in my jammies reading Looking For Alaska and watching Walker, Texas Ranger (I lead a sad life, I know) when the fire alarm in my building went off. Now I like to think of myself as a good person who generally does the right thing, but I really didn't want to go outside. I was all comfy and warm, plus I knew that there was a 98% chance that the building wasn't on fire. More than likely someone accidentally pulled the alarm (It I does happen. I accidentally pulled my school's fire alarm in the third grade and still consider myself scarred for life from the experience.) or someone set it off by burning something in their microwave. After a few minutes had passed the 2% chance I was wrong started to bother me, so I pulled some jeans on over my jammies and went outside.

The parking lot was full, it was after midnight, many lights were on in the three story building, and yet I found myself standing in the parking lot alone. There were many pairs of eyes peeking out at me from behind curtains, but I was the only person standing in the parking lot until the firefighters showed up. If this was a one time occurrence I could maybe brush it off, but in the four years I've lived in the LG we've had several fire alarms and I'm always standing in the parking lot by myself. Why is that? Is it a cultural thing found only in the LG? Or maybe it is a societal thing? I've noticed that when our alarms go off in the library no one makes a move to leave. Heck, most don't even look up from their computer. And that has me worried. You just know that someday I'll be the senior ranking person in the building entrusted with the responsibility of getting our patrons to safety, but because I couldn't get anyone to believe that the alarm was for real my patrons will all get burned to a crisp. Of course I won't get burned because my happy butt will be standing in the parking lot, alone like always.

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