Carbon Monoxide!?

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Weird. The smoke alarm went off, not incredibly odd when I am using the fireplace, but it wasn't the smoke detector. It was the CO alarm. I was totally surprised. It had never gone off as long as I have had one, over many many years. Yep, after resetting it a few times. It was getting a reading over 200 ppm CO. When I took it downstairs I got a reading near 300 ppm. I started getting light headed at this point. After thinking maybe the furnace heat exchanger failed and puzzling around a bit I figured out what happened. As part of the huge winter storm that recently covered almost half of the US, we lost our electricity. So, being well prepared, I rolled out the generator and started doing what I normally do. The generator (although it was completely outside) was creating CO to get in the house. Using the fireplace draft (and possibly other leaks) the whole house created a vacuum around the seal of the basement garage door. After the CO got into the house the forced air heat...

I am in Christchurch New Zealand. It takes a while to get here and since I crossed the dateline I have to figure out what day it is. The flights were pretty good, only one real delay in LA for an hour or so.

I am working at a hotel lobby computer since I don't seem to have access in my room. The hotel is presumably family owned, small, simple and clean. I ran a couple miles around sunrise this morning around downtown Christchurch. That was very enjoyable. It is warm (maybe 62F this AM) and the air is very clear and clean. The birds really give off stong calls like you would imagine they would in the jungle.

Today I have to get over to the USAP center and get issued my Extreme Cold Weather gear and then tommorow I have my ice-flight. I have met some scientists and some other technical folks along the way, so that is good. I can see McMurdo in the first person at this point even though I have not been there yet.

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