The Fire
It's funny how you can learn new things. About 20 years ago in Northwest Atlanta, an apartment building burned flat. It was December, and the area was experiencing a cold snap. One man was especially cold because he hadn't paid his power bill and his heat was shut off. He had one heat source: a barbecue grill that sat outside on his balcony. He dragged it into the living room, tossed in half a bag of charcoal briquettes, and lit it. He was reasonably warm and comfortable for part of the night. But then something happened. Perhaps the man got too close to the grill and tripped, or he kicked it in his sleep, or maybe a dog ran through the room too fast. Regardless, what happened was that the grill turned over. In a matter of seconds, the rug had caught fire. And the curtains, and the couch, and the walls, and the ceiling. The building had apartment units on both sides, and there was a firewall down the center, so that if one side of the building burned, the other side would be p