I don't know anybody who ever had their house really catch on fire.  You know, when Firemen show up with Axes and go to town, and then you're left with a big, gaping hole in the wall, surrounded by char and the smell of smoke.  Except, of course, now I know one person - me!

I woke up this morning and my brother, Derek, came in and asked me if I was awake.  Then he showed me.  It was pretty stressful, I've gotta say.  I took a shot of tequila before going to work!

Ultimately, this served to illustrate the fallacy of using maximum likelihood estimation when I should have been operating in a decision-theoretic regime.  I woke up in the middle of the night and smelled smoke.  I even looked around.  But then I figured it must simply be something outside (not the outside of our house, mind you).  But I was too tired, and failed to consider the risk of not finding a fire - even if it was terribly unlikely.

In any case, hopefully I'll have some pictures up soon.  You can enjoy our misery.