On Tue, 23 Dec 2014 08:15:21 -0500, "Jim Wilkins"
wrote:

"Tom Gardner" wrote in message
...
On 12/23/2014 1:12 AM, Don Foreman wrote:

I keep spray bottles filled with water in the kitchen and basement,
nominally to clean up spills and dewrinkle line-dried laundry. The
other day one was handy when ashes dumped on the compost pile began to
smoulder.

My quick-reaction outdoor fire extinguishers in warmer weather are
garden pump sprayers with the hose and nozzle replaced with sink
sprays, meant for showering with kettle-heated water. 3/8" copper
tubing replaces the skinny dip tube. A little leakage at the gland nut
isn't a problem, it's only water.

Previously I had old department-store pressurized water extinguishers
scattered around. The one time I needed them the old man across the
street started a brush fire cutting up scrap metal and fell when he
jumped back. He had no running water, but I heard him yell, saw him
lying next to the flames, raced over with water extinguishers and put
it out. Their narrow high-pressure stream isn't as efficient on
burning leaves as the wider, less wasteful sink spray pattern, and the
garden sprayer can be left unpressurized so it won't leak empty.

I don't understand why so many people freeze into shocked inaction

When -anything- happens at all! Car wreck, tree branch fall, finger
amputation or cut, fire, burst water line, gas leak, you name it.
I think it somehow ties to their lack of knowledge about how things
work; being bereft of any inkling of physics.


when a fire breaks out unexpectedly. I've grabbed a kid's Coke bottle,
held it upside down and controlled the spray with my thumb to put out
a small wall fire over a stove pipe while the rest of the group stood
like statues.

I think the group here, as a whole, is made up of troubleshooters and
problem solvers. We would, as a default, diagnose the problem and
then instantly begin to solve it. Like the kid whose shoulder I put
back into the socket: I had never done that before but the first thing
that came to my mind was to help him out of severe pain. My left arm
was the fulcrum and his right arm the lever. I "pried" just high
enough to slide the ball back into the socket and he was instantly out
of 90% of the pain. He said he'd never use a doctor to put it back
again because they caused a whole lot more damage/pain.

I've successfully used my (flammable) Sunday paper to put out a grease
fire in a pan which I forgot on the stove. blush Plop, and it's
out, with no mess to clean up other than the pan. I love my bacon
burnt, but that lot was a bit too far gone, if you can imagine.



Then the kid was mad about his Coke, nevermind that I
saved his cabin.

Relative worth to a kid defies logic.

--
With every experience, you alone are painting your
own canvas, thought by thought, choice by choice.
-- Oprah Winfrey