There’s a fire station near my apartment complex in Los Angeles, and while most folks tend to roll their eyes when they hear the sirens go off – I think of it as a reminder that we’ve got some well trained emergency personnel in our neighborhood. That’s a comfort that subsumes any annoyance of the 3AM call blaring me awake at night as they speed by my apartment. And likewise, I’ve probably driven past the station house hundreds of times en route to various places without giving it so much as a second thought. So I can’t say that I’ve stopped long enough to see what kind of anti-fire promo that might be in front of the garage. I would imagine it would be something like Smokey the Bear along with an admonition to *not* start a forest fire. But in the South things are – well – different.
I’m spending a few days with family in The City of Oaks – Raleigh, North Carolina. On the way to meet a friend for coffee I happened across this sign at a local fire station, and it made me laugh out loud.
The Deep Fried South - put a lid on grease fires
I suppose there’s a statistic out there that showed them if they could get a folks to deal with a food prep mishap using a bit of quick thinking and an appropriately-sized lid, it would save them a lot of calls (as well as lives and property). But I can’t help but chuckle at the unintentional humor in tacitly admitting that southerners are at greatest risk from their (our) penchant to deep-fry *everything*.
