SMACK.
It sounded like someone slammed something hard into the back of the house. Thieves, I thought to myself. More optimistically, I considered that maybe my parents had dropped something. Or it's loud, inept thieves. I walked down the hall to my parents' room where they were both under the covers reading.
"Did you hear that?"
"Yes, it sounded like something hit the house," my mom said.
"So, it wasn't something in here?"
"No," mom confirmed.
"I thought it sounded like someone trying to break in," I continued.
"It's the nails," my dad offered authoritatively.
"What?" I asked, my left eyebrow raised skeptically.
"You know, the nails that come up from the deck..."
I'd hammered many of them back in over the years. "Yeah...?"
"That's the sound of them popping up," he concluded.
"What? They don't 'pop up.' That's not the sound a nail makes when you pull it out of wood," I countered.
"The pressure of the wood pops them out because of the low temperature," he explained.
"It's below zero," mom offered, adding, "I'm not going out to check it."
"Well, neither am I," I said, "but if we get murdered in our sleep, you can't say I didn't warn you."
Ooh, so what was it then? Was the house hit by an errant train, or was it actually just nails popping out?
ReplyDeleteI'm excited to find out...
Well, we're still all here, so I'm prepared to believe it was the nails.
ReplyDeleteActually, it kept doing it last night sporadically, but the subsequent slams weren't as loud, and some did have a more popping quality to their sound (or seemed to once I accepted the possibility ;)
How weird! Can you imagine if they popped out with ballistic force? I imagine some CSI episode with a homeowner accidentally impailed on angry, cold nails...
ReplyDeleteLOL. They don't actually pop up that much, only a cm or so. Just enough that it's easier to whack it back in then pull it out and replace it with a screw. It's still surprising loud for all that.
ReplyDeleteStill you never know... it could turn up and an upcoming episode of CSI: Anchorage.
We'd be shooting at each other over here if that happened! LOL great post!
ReplyDeleteGlad you enjoyed it, CS!
ReplyDelete