::NO ALARMS AND NO SURPRISES PLEASE::

Fire alarms are invading my life with (alarming!) frequency lately.

Last night, as I prepared to brown some onions for some black bean soup for friends coming over, I noticed some grey, billowing smoke coming from the oil in my cheap non-stick pasta pot. Here's what I did.

.:Step 1: Turn on the range fan for immediate smoke-sucking action.
.:Step 2: Pick up the pot and let the smoking turn immediately into foot-high flames.
.:Step 3: Blow on the flames. *
.:Step 4: Open the kitchen door to allow smoke to dissipate.
.:Step 5: Continue to hold the flaming pot in hands.*
.:Step 6: Run outside with the pot, giving the fire more Oxygen.*
.:Step 7: Realize that's not working and go back inside.
.:Step 8: Put pot in sink and turn on cold water.
.:Step 9: Watch as flames grow to 3-foot heights as the oil spatters, sooting up the underside of the cabinets over the sink.*
.:Step 10: Let water and thermodynamics work their magic, keeping the combustion reaction from getting enough activation energy, thus putting out the fire.
.:Step 11: Open and close the kitchen door, wafting smoke out as much as possible.
.:Step 12: Realize the fire alarm's going off and use a rag to swish smoke away from it until it stops.
.:Step 13: Repeat Step 11 ad infinitum.

*I don't know why I did this.

(I realize now that the previous fire alarm incident I had this week could almost be told with this exact progression of steps, changing the definition of just one word.)

The only casualty of this fire was my nonstick pot; the cheap coating bubbled up and flaked/melted off, and it continued to flake off when I re-commenced onion-frying. So I changed pots and ditched the now-ruined one. There's some mild sooting on the walls and cabinet above the sink, but nothing a good go with Fantastik won't cure.

I am unsinged.