There’s A Fine Line Between A Cookout & A House Fire

It was so nice over the weekend, I decided to grill out. I spent several hours Sunday cleaning off our deck and getting it switched over from winter to summer mode. Then I cleaned off the the grill, brushing off leaves, pine needles, dirt and so on. Finally, I was ready to fire it up!

While cooking some nice looking, juicy burgers, I dropped one into the grill. It was just one, no big deal, I've done it before. After I removed the burgers, I tried turning down the gas so I could cook some hot dogs. Turning down the gas had no effect, neither did turning off the gas. The flames didn't get smaller, in fact, they grew!

Being that the grill was about 2 feet from my house, I decided that it might be a good idea to get more distance between our dwelling and the stainless steel inferno. I then told my wife that she should cook the hot dogs inside because the grill wouldn't be ready for a while.

The thermometer was spiked well beyond it's maximum reading of 700 degrees, and the flames were easily five feet in the air. I remembered back to when I almost burned my garage down trying to make the fire trails from 'Back To The Future' as a kid. That was the day I taught myself how to use a fire extinguisher.

We finally extinguished the blaze, and within a half hour, the grill finally cooled off. The moral of the story is this: When you clean the exterior of your grill, it's not a bad idea to clean out the inside as well, removing caked on grease and gunk. Don't grill out two feet from your house. If you're friends with a firefighter, make sure he's on site when lighting your grill.

Now the fun part! Have you, a friend or family member almost burned something down when trying to grill out?