Well, actually it was more like one or two alarms. About three minutes after I posted the previous dispatch, a buzzer began to go off out in the hallway, signifying that the hotel we're in — Carolyn and I are here for the Calgary Comic & Entertainment Expo, remember — might be on fire or something of the sort. I grabbed up the tangible necessity of my life (this computer) and with Carolyn following, joined the throng of hotel guests walking down the stairwell. We're on the eighth floor so it wasn't that bad a jaunt. There were folks in their jammies and there were dealers from the con lugging down boxes of what I assume were their rarest comics.
At the ground floor, we were directed to wait across the street, which meant dodging and weaving around about a half-dozen fire trucks which had by then arrived. Immediately, people began to ask me, "You're gonna blog about this, right?" So I'm writing this in part so I don't disappoint anyone.
Word on the street was that there was a fire on the second floor. That's where I thought I smelled smoke in passing, and Sergio says he saw smoke there as he made his way down the steps. After about twenty minutes, the firemen emerged and signalled we could go back in. A mob crushed back into the lobby where we were informed that the elevators hadn't yet been reset so we had to either wait a bit to use them or take to the stairwells again. We elected to hike…and that's all I know about it. We're back in the room, everything's fine and it looks like a dandy time to go beddy-bye. Good night.