Santa Fe is probably cool in Feb, heat doesn’t kick on often in the desert, but mice still need to make burrows in heat ventilation ducts even ones in celebrity mansions.
Then on fateful night, but for a $15 Walmart CO detector, a dog is gassed to death.
Hank Hill would nod approvingly.
And (as I found out) CO detectors wear out after about 10 years.
Since 2009, UL-listed CO alarms are required to sound an alarm after ten years of service:
FWIW, those determined to commit suicide might use a pet to test the effectiveness of the method to be used.
That’s how I found out.
Or feel that that is the best solution if they think no one would take it in.
The TMZ article that @PastTense linked to indicates that only one of their three dogs was found dead.
Had one of those. The alarm went off but no indication of why. It was summer, oil burner off, no gas heaters. Called the company, they had no clue. Gave them the serial number from the device, after a while someone figured out it was 10 years old.
My CO detector crapped out a year or two ago, and I’ve never replaced it. This story has motivated me to order a new one, arriving tomorrow.
I always liked him in Royal Tenenbuams - he was Royal. So many good lines…apparently about death no less:
Royal: You know, Richie, this illness, this closeness to death… it’s had a profound affect on me. I feel like a different person, I really do.
Richie: Dad, you were never dying.
Royal: But I’m going to live.
Royal: I’m very sorry for your loss. Your mother was a terribly attractive woman.
I recommend watching the movie First to Fight. He had done a bunch of TV before that but that’s his first or second movie. It’s loosely inspired by the life of John Basilone. A Marine fights bravely against the odds, is awarded the Medal of Honor, is sent back to the states to sell war bonds then volunteers to go back to fighting. Where it differs is when he goes back he’s paralyzed with fear because now he has something to live for. Chad Everett is the lead. Gene Hackman plays his gunnery sergeant. To me it is a real transitional movie from old style to new. Chad Everett acts in a manner that feels very familiar to the work in the 50s and early 60s. Then in the second half of the movie Hackman is on the screen and it feels so much different. His character feels much more real and alive. The movie came out in 1967 and shows the direction things were going.
Today’s forecast is a high of 51 and a low of 29. Definitely weather you’d want the heat on for, especially in one of those southwestern homes that’s built to stay cool.
We live in a tinderbox (log house) and have an LP furnace. About five years ago I purchased six smoke/CO detectors, and mounted them in various locations around the house.
“While some actors congratulate themselves for venturing into the moral gray zone, Hackman has called it home for so long that we’ve ceased to notice. In his performances, as in life, the good guys aren’t always nice guys, and the villains have charm.”
– Jeremy McCarter of Newsweek, quoted in the NY Times article I linked to above
Has anyone here seen Scarecrow? It’s a 1973 movie of his that the New York Times obituary says he considered his best performance. I don’t think I ever saw it.
I caught it at the (pre-Tarantino ownership) New Beverly Cinema a couple of decades ago. It was a pretty decayed print and I don’t remember the cinematography being all that special and it is a pretty slow, character-driven film but it is a performance from a Godfather-era Pacino before he started chewing scenery like it was bubblegum. Hackman gives a good performance but as others have said he never really gives a bad one.
Stranger
It seems that The SDCSI has got it wrong.
Authorities reported no signs of injury but deemed the deaths “suspicious enough” to investigate and have not ruled out foul play. No cause of death was given.
Both quotes from the BBC
The local utility responded and found no sign of a gas leak in the area. The fire department detected no indication of a carbon monoxide leak or poisoning, according to the search warrant.
From my direct personal experience, the heat exchanger in a furnace can be just fine right up until the moment it is absolutely not fine. Unless you have a maintenance person preemptively replacing parts that have not yet broken, even a person with a scrupulously detailed maintenance plan can be caught by this kind of failure.
Holy smokes (or maybe I should say fire)! I did not know he was in Young Frankenstein and even watching that clip where he looks like Rasputin I only barely recognized him.
Wait! Where are you going? I was going to make espresso!
I’m just going to believe Mel Brooks let him ad-lib that line
That’s what I choose to believe despite the evidence.