The Kitchen of NIMH

Joelle said in the early morning on May 28, 2008 while listening to Ingrid Michaelson

Strange things occur in my apartment from time to time.  It’s a 53-year-old building, so it’s pretty much strange-ready.  I’ve lived here a little over year now and in addition to the toilet paper roll that occasionally unrolls itself, there’s been this mystery squeak.

I’ve been trying to find the source of this squeak for months.  I ask other people and they either don’t hear it or just write it off as something else, but when I’m alone… that’s when I hear it.  Of course, that just makes me sound crazy, but I’m telling you, people, there is some kind of squeaky chirping sound coming from my kitchen!  I may be a little zany, but I don’t hallucinate… much.

This also not the same chirping I heard a few months ago.  Our upstairs neighbor, Slick (of Project X fame), had said he thought he had a rat once, though that seemed to have been taken care of and was an isolated incident. Though, in my opinion, rats aren’t an isolated incident, but no one else has ever reported anything.  For all I know Nicodemus and his posse are holding town council meetings under the building… but I doubt it.

I’ve stood like a lunatic in front of my kitchen cabinets, flinging open pantries and declaring “Ah-HAAAAAA!” like I’ve just discovered it was Colonel Mustard in the library with the candlestick.  Sometimes, I just looked as if I’m slowing losing my mind, stopping mid-conversation and waving my arms.  “Wait… wait!  Did you hear that?  No?  Listen! It’ll happen again in a second.” And then of course… it doesn’t.

For a while I thought the sound was traveling through my heater in the wall or perhaps through the vent above the stove.  I thought maybe I had birds nesting in the ducts, but that doesn’t seem to be the case.  The acoustics in this apartment are strange, so the sound travels in unusual ways.

This morning, I finally narrowed down the location to somewhere around the corner of the kitchen, on the counter.  I’m fairly certain this is where it’s coming from, but it’s really challenging to pin down the exact source.  The only logical explanation is that when the coffeemaker is cooling and the lid is shut tight (I have one of those stainless steel keep-it-lukewarm carafe jobbies), and the steam/heat escapes, it could be making a tiny squeak or chirping sound.  Though, I do find it odd that the chirp/squeak is always the same.  *cheep cheep*

Please tell me someone else has had this experience with their coffeemaker and I’m not on the short list for Haldol.