So as many of you have figured out or been told explicitly, I've touched down in Montreal! There was a futz-up with my second flight- on paper, I had an hour to make the changeover. In reality, it became 40 minutes, and involved a terminal/carrier change. I actually made it to the gate in time to get a seat on the plane, but my ticket was a seat request ticket, and the plane was full. A friendly guy I'd run into at the gate ran into me after I'd gotten my ticket updated to a flight two hours later, and confessed that he hadn't made his flight either. He was a sky club member, so we headed up to the sky club lounge- somewhat crowded, but nothing compared to the terminal. He was a very nice guy, and it was a nice enough way to burn through two hours.
On arrival in Montreal I headed through Customs and Immigration, which was no hassle- everyone was quite nice, the standard greeting being either "Bonjour Hi" or "Parlez francais, speak english?" I caught a cab to La Cite, the apartments I'm staying at. The cab driver was from Lebanon, and had left when he was about my age because of all the war and instability in the region. He had a heavy arabic accent, and was as friendly as everyone else- by and large, it's a very friendly city.
Which brings me to my apartment, and today's TALE FROM THE BEYOND!
I don't think I noticed it at first, since it was so unobtrusive- but somewhere between the dream world and the real world, as I was sleeping off the four(ish) beers or so from my first night in town, something began intruding into my sleep; an occasional, high pitched beep, at infrequent intervals, occasionally followed by an odd clicking sound.
When I finally awoke in the morning, the culprit was plain; the fire alarm on the ceiling was clearly low on batteries. No problem, I figured; I'd just hop out and grab a 9v. But my tasks on that first full day in Canada did not, in fact, include a trip to the battery store. Instead I spent much of the day trying to get up with my coworkers and friends up here. During the course of said activity I noticed another disturbing oddity; my phone, when it rang, sounded exactly like the offending fire alarm! It rang in the exact frequency of the occasional beeps. This produced in me a strange fugue state of uncertainty. Is my phone trying to ring? Is my fire alarm trying to go off? OH GOD NOT A FIRE ALA- oh, that's just the phone.
Fine. I settled down to a second night's sleep, determined to fix the issue on the morrow. True to form, this morning I was up at the bright and early hour of 10:30, and by noon I was paying a visit to the underground grocery store for my weekly vittles and the saving grace of a 9 volt battery. I returned upstairs eager to perform the sanity-sustaining surgery.
Victoriously, I changed out the battery! Ha-ha, I thought, now I can sleep in peace, and I'll never see the beep-monster in my dreams again! "Beep," went the fire alarm. Incredulous, I looked at it askance! "NO! BAD FIRE ALARM," I exclaimed. "Beep," it replied. Fine, I thought, I can live with this. I don't like sleep anyway.
And then a tiny little light bulb went on over my head.
I bent down over the phone, conveniently situated directly beneath the offending implement. "Beep." I bent closer, and lifted up the phone. "Beep," whispered the phone.
I turned off the ringer. Blissful silence.
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