I can't believe I didn't die

[rm]

Short version:

Son of woman buying the car from the estate of the house I was helping clear runs car in _closed_ garage for 30 minutes to see if it works. (I should note the son is a mechanic!). No one notices. For the next hour I complain of feeling queasy and keep laying down to see if I'll feel better. Fellow who is the executor finally says, "god this is so wiping me out," and all of a sudden I say, "we have to get out of the house, NOW!"

I wind up standing outside in 18 degree weather for an hour making calls to find out what was going on and eventually it's solved; we open all teh windows and the garage and a couple hours later the house is safe.

When I had proper air back in my body again it became shockingly clear to me that the whole thing was much much worse than it seemed as it was happening. We're talking internal organs hurting the whole deal. That the executor could have laid down on a couch too and we both could have passed out and fucking DIED seems all too plausible.

I'm actually pretty rattled.

I was, for the record, encouraged to blog about this particular horror by the client in question.

Comments

[billijean.livejournal.com]

Wow.. that's scary.

Apparently that's what so dangerous about carbon monoxide poisoning - it doesn't set off any mental alarms.

I'm glad you're ok. And what's with the mechanic? duh!

[rm.livejournal.com]

I had always heard about carbon monoxide in the context of sleeping people. I had never heard about it in the contet of, you're perfectly awake and your body just assume that whatever is going on is something else entirely.