A hot and humid eastern Iowa Sunday was a good day for 77 y.o. neighbor Will to clean and straighten up his two car garage.

As the attic exhaust fan kicked on Will noticed that it sounded different , not quite right.

So he closes the garage door and pulls the 14 foot ladder off the wall and pushes it up through the attic access hole in the 12 foot ceiling.

As Will gets one leg off the ladder the ladder slips on the garage floor and falls away leaving Will hanging .

he gets an ankle up over the edge and then a leg and does make it up in too the attic albeit exhausted.

After six minutes of catching his breath he starts hollering for his wife , at the other end of the house reading a book in the bed room.

with out his phone or the fancy schmancy wrist communicator he's pretty much shit out of luck,

the attic temp. is now over 105 degrees and its been 35 minutes of hollering and screaming

no windows to open to perhaps alert a neighbor or passer by. He's contemplating panic .

Wills wife might be two or three hours before she starts to look for him. by then it might be too late.

40 minutes in to this mess of a situation it dawns on him.
He has an Alexa Mic. / speaker in the garage to listen to pod casts and music while he works.

Alexa intercom
what room?
master bed room
ok
his wife talks to him as if they are in the same room..

wife calls the neighbor kid to come set up the ladder and in under an hour Will is drinking ice water in the kitchen .

He's fine thanks to his computer .

Make a nice commercial for ALexa. I personally dislike the intrusion but it is great for people who are blind and need devices turned off and on.

Glad it turned out well for him. I can pix him drinking ice water and holding the glass to the side of his head.

So, was the fan in fact broken/failing?

Finish the story man!

Lol

My neighbor fell down the basement steps while working on the door. His wife, who was working in her sewing room on the second floor, found him about 2 1/2 hours later. He died later that evening in the hospital.

A farmer friend of mine was working by himself in a field when some fencing sections fell onto him from his truck. Luckily, he had his phone on him and called his brother. His leg was crushed and I see him hobbling around on crutches three years later.

"Open the attic bay door HAL"

quote:

Originally posted by cas:
"Open the attic bay door HAL"

"I'm sorry, I can't do that, Will."

Seriously, glad it turned out OK. Tech can be great.

quote:

Originally posted by Patriot:
So, was the fan in fact broken/failing?

Finish the story man!

Lol

just spoke with him
he listened for it for three days and could not hear a problem , so he's done with the attic fan.

his arms were very sore for three days .

Technology is always a tradeoff. He was on the good side of it this tieme.

I was reading this and flashes from my dad came up. He was doing the same thing in the garage. He had just turned 70 and was healthy his entire life. I remember him being in the hospital one time from a car crash that created a large hematoma on his leg.

Anyhow he decides to get up in the rafters of his garage despite my brother living 5 houses from him. The ladder goes flying and he’s hanging from the rafters. He could only hang on for a minute until he came crashing down landing on the lawnmower and trash cans.

Unfortunately that started a downward spiral of his health because he needed several back surgeries that left him in agonizing pain. Like the pain where you can never get comfortable and it shows up as sweat on your forehead. This probably took 8-10 years off his life while making his last 8 fairly miserable.

After this happened I’ve heard of so many people who have had serious injuries from ladder. I hate to preach but this really hit home for me so please be extra careful using a ladder. Preferably swallow your pride and get someone younger to do it. All my dad had to do was call my brother and he could have walked there in 5 minutes.

Wow ... good to hear he is okay. I have the Amazon Echos and only pull them out at Christmas time for the music when we can sit back and just ask Alexa to play something. Other than that, we do not care for the listening in ... until now when I read this story.

I am creeping up on 70 and think it would be a good idea to have something like this around for both my wife and I.

Guy next street over fell from his ladder while working outside on his house. Hit his head and died within minutes.

Next door neighbor, a dentist, fell from a ladder while replacing porch light on tall entrance to his house. Injured. Cracked ribs.

Coworker accountant injured doing the same thing.

These folks were all bright fellows.


Just turned 74 myself. I frequently worked at the top of ladders when I was in my late teens/ early 20s.

I don’t anymore.

Kind of sad how a guy could go missing all day without it being noticed on Father's Day.... Glad it worked out for him.

My wife and I have an agreement-I don't get on any ladders if there is not someone else there with me. I don't cheat much. But when I do get on a ladder I remind her, "Now remember, the number is 9-1-1"

quote:

Just turned 74 myself. I frequently worked at the top of ladders when I was in my late teens/ early 20s.

I don’t anymore.

yep. learned the lesson the hard way a few times. luckily w/o long term affects

Middle aged, great guy... Ex-plant manager where I worked jokingly told us before Christmas break he was going to drink his Christmas turkey. (Wild Turkey) Apparently he did and then decided it would be a good idea to take down the Christmas lights. He lived but sadly his injuries ended his working career.

Me too...my wife gets mad at me if I change the AC filters in the ceiling w/o her knowing and spotting me.

No matter how many times I tell her...

quote:

Originally posted by HayesGreener:
Kind of sad how a guy could go missing all day without it being noticed on Father's Day.... Glad it worked out for him.

My wife and I have an agreement-I don't get on any ladders if there is not someone else there with me. I don't cheat much. But when I do get on a ladder I remind her, "Now remember, the number is 9-1-1"

He just needs to be ready to be bombarded with ads and emails for ladders with non-slip feet.

Dad was was ~73 in Sept of '21 and a two time cancer survivor, Vietnam infantry combat survivor. Well apparently he decided to get on a ladder to fix the garage door. Mom was spotting.

Somehow the door shifted, turned on, moved and he fell breaking his hip badly.

Dad died in Nov of '22, a downward spiral of events combined to shorten his life.

Stay off ladders unless it cant be avoided.

HK Ag