Yes. You read that subject line correctly. I’m officially an idiot. There were suspicions before but now it’s official. Today, while doing some upfits to my soon-to-be opened training center

I was removing various fixtures from the wall so that we could paint cleanly around them without masking them. In some cases, I was actually attempting to remove vestigial fixtures that were left behind from the previous tennant and would no longer be needed. Some of these now-useless, eyesore wall fixtures were remnants of a security system that we will not be using. The security company came in a week ago and removed some of these wall fixtures but many remained stuck to the walls and marred our already spartan and industrial look. Being the OCD type that I am, I had been going around trying to remove these ones in particular because it bothered me that the walls were littered with a non-functional security system whose only purpose was as an eyesore. Well today, I attempted to remove one, snipped the wires to what I thought was part of a dead, non-functional security system and they actually set off the alarm. For the ENTIRE BUSINESS PARK. Everyone still working there piled outside like a 4th grade fire drill. The wires I had clipped were actually for a fire alarm and I had triggered it. I immediately called the administrative office of the park but they had left just 5 minutes before and were unable to shut off the alarm. Then before I could even call 911 to let them know that there was no fire, a firetruck pulled up to the 150,000 sqft business park with sirens screaming. They managed to shut off the alarm but not before walking through the entire facility in full fire fighting gear. I then managed to to set off the alarm no more than 5 minutes later by attempting to put the fixture back on to the wall. Luckily this time the fire fighters were still on site and could turn it off right away. At the end of the day the embarassment doesn’t bother me too much (I don’t take myself too seriously anyhow). What bugs me is that my OCD need for aesthetic appeal and symetry will cost me time and money (for the rewiring and possibly the fire fighter’s expense). Moral of the story…if it’s not broken, don’t try to fix it.

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