totient | shoot first, ask questions later

Tonight was the second time I've had to use the fire extinguisher in my car.

The first time was about two and a half years ago when I used it to put out someone's truck on I-93. It wasn't really quite big enough, so when I replaced it I got a somewhat larger one.

Tonight, at the very end of a trip caroling around the neighborhood, one of the candle lanterns we'd been using somehow caught fire -- we weren't really sure how it managed to do that, since it's made of glass and metal and it hadn't got nearly hot enough to light metal on fire. But rather than argue about how this thing smoldering on the asphalt driveway could possibly be on fire, I opened up the car door, grabbed the extinguisher, and emptied it all over the lantern. Enough of the powder made it inside to put the fire out, and we decided that even if we could clean it off lanterns with a tendency to catch fire are trash. So I still don't know how it managed to burn. If I'm very curious, though, I suppose I can go downstairs and haul it out of the garbage to take a look.