The Death of a Fire Truck?

One day while waiting for pictures to be developed at the pharmacy (which these days is a lot more than a pharmacy) ,the Camster and I decided to take a run down the toy aisle. I spotted a really cool looking fire engine with a fireman sitting in the driver's seat and found out that it also made a really cool siren noise when a little button on the side was pushed. I showed the Camster how to make the siren work, and he thought it was pretty cool too. I'm not sure if the other people in the store thought it was cool or not, because he pushed the button as I pushed him in the buggy up and down every aisle. Yes-I was allowing him to be obnoxious. I thought it was funny. At least he was having fun and not screaming at the top of his lungs about something. Not that My Camster would do anything like that in public!

I decided that I would buy it for him, because at the time he had mostly what I considered baby toys. Not real boy toys. Now--this isn't the time or place to decide if I was politically correct calling the fire engine a boy toy. The little guy also has a vacuum and Elmo's restaurant featuring an oven and stove top. He loves both of those just as much as the firetruck. But I do think the truck it is a boy toy.

So, Cameron has had lots lots of fun playing with his firetruck. Pushing it and letting it roll across the room and crash into things. Sometimes the firetruck had a driver; the little fireman that came with the truck. Sometimes the driver was in the bottom of the toy box playing with Happy Meal toys, so the firetruck had to drive itself. Eventually, one of the wheels broke off, but the fire truck just kept on going. And the siren wailed every time Cameron pushed the button.

Then, last night, he decided he needed that battery-operated firetruck in the bathtub with him. It did fine, till he pushed the button for the siren to start. It started alright. But, instead of sounding like, "Hey watch out, I'm coming through to help put out a fire!!, it sounded more like, "Hey I think I'm a little waterlogged and I'm just not feeling so well". As sick as it sounded though, it was still just as loud as ever. And it kept going and going. I banged on it. I shook it. This thing was persistent.

So, I hurriedly bathed Cameron and got him out of the tub as quickly as possible. Let him think I was being extra cool by allowing him to run around without his diaper on. Why do babies like that anyway? I don't know--but I just prayed that he wouldn't do anything that would require him being covered with a diaper as I ran to the laundry room to get out my box of tools. The fire truck is still protesting the bathtub, all the while. Ok--the battery box on this firetruck requires a very small phillip's head screwdriver. Hmm- I have a large one. Nope--didn't work. Ok--I have a tiny flat head. Nope--didn't work. In fact, I think I stripped out the screw trying to get get it loose.Siren is still singing its sad song. Loud as ever. Now what to do? I banged on the firetruck some more. Surely the battery was gonna die at any moment. We'd had that fire truck for awhile.

The siren kept on shrieking and wailing, "eww I don't feel good, ewww I don't feel good." This wasn't good. I couldn't listen to this the rest of the night. I didn't want to traumatize cam by taking it out on the back porch and hitting it with a hammer. Plus--I kinda liked that fire truck. It wasn't the fire truck's fault. I was the one who let Cam take it into the tub.

So, I did the next best thing. I took it back to my room, to the the back of my walk-in closet. There I buried it under an overstuffed pillow, a pile of clothes , my laptop case, and another pile of clothes. And, there I left it to wail itself to death. I came back in my room an hour later to use the bathroom, and could still hear it in there. I felt kind of bad.

I ended up sleeping on the couch, and when I went into my room this morning. Silence. No more fire engine siren.

I'm thinking that maybe now that it is not making noise, I may try to see if I can help the poor thing out. Maybe since I am not now in panic mode over thinking I'm going to have to either listen to the siren all night or put it in the car, drive it far away, and dump it somewhere, I can figure out how to get the battery compartment open. Maybe its dried out and some new batteries will give it a new life. I hope so. Cause even though it is missing a wheel, I think I've grown kind of fond of that fire truck.