sympathomedic

I have two: I used to live on a tiny street that led out to a main state road. We had a call (volly) for a baby seizing in the house on the corner of the tiny street and the main rd. The address of the house was on the tiny street. As I came down that small road looking for the address, the elderly homeowner (pt's grandma) was on the tiny street, in the dark, waving me over. It was a febrile seizure. No big deal, but the family was well panicked. They needed more care then the baby did. After the EMS crew left, and I was leaving to go back home I saw the elderly lady who had waved me and asked her why she was not in the main road waiting for a first responder. I never met her before in my life. She said, "I have seen you come by with your blue light, so I knew you would be here." #2. I was going to the hardware store in Sept of 2010, in my own car. Call came in for a bee sting reaction less than a minute away. I was about 10 minutes from the EMS station. I went to the call, with a BVM and a radio. I was led through the house to the back deck, where a lady was dying. Blue as blue, no detectable pulse, foam coming out of the mouth. Some movement in hands. + bee sting in last 3 minutes. I advised on the radio of the arrest, got her supine and began to bag her. Other members arrived and we began CPR. I updated the crew to bring the Epi-pen, AED and suction, which they did. My day job is a medic. I don't know which end of the pen the epi even comes out of! (ball breaking comments gratefully accepted; and deserved) This kid from WEMS (who we use to staff our ambulances)came charging around the back yard, epi pen in outstretched hand and slammed that thing into this lady like Ahab harpooning Moby-Dick. The CPR was flawless and the scene time short. NO MEDIC available. Closest ED was Putnam. On loading the pt, she had a weak carotid pulse, a nearly useless respiratory effort and was still blue. On the was to the ED, the WEMS kid called med control and got orders for the SECOND epi-pen! (again, I am a medic. Who knew you you could do that?) Someone introduced me to the patient this year at the towns 2011 September 11 ceremony. I was speechless. I said "I haven't seen you since..." She finished the sentence, "Since I died. My new birthday is coming up this month." The luck of me being close, but mostly the aggressive no-delay treatment by the WEMS crew and the good CPR by the other extra folks who arrived on scene without a doubt yanked that lady straight out of the grave. NO MEDIC involved. Putnam could not do an intercept. One of the top 5 hottest job in my 30 years, but credit goes to the other guys. I hope they see this.

Don't forget some year back a guy stole a Mt Vernon ladder truck from a working fire! His defense was that they had not positioned it correctly. Turned out he set the fire.

Geeze Seth; quite a sad trip down memory lane. Thank you for giving Tom a fitting tribute. I'd love to know how his son is doing today, if anyone knows. Interesting to wonder where Tommy would be today if that sad fate had not intervened. Bill

Who would've thought that scrawney pimple faced kid driving me around Yonkers would have done all this? Good Job, Sethy.

The other day I counted 12 companies that have dissapeared in my time, lets see: Freedom, Admiral, A-1, AA, Park, Approved, Abbey-Richmond, Metropolitan, Metro-North, Empire, Ambassador, Regional(not the one out of Rockland, the one that had a New Rochelle base, became huge over night, then dissapeared), Affiliated, Hudson Valley Ambulance, CMTI(Community Medical Transportation). OK that is 15. Did I miss any?

I was in Maine this summer, and I always buy the local papers. Every day was a new story about this stuff and the violence of its users. They all seem to go berserk, destroy stuff then become catatonic with no memory of what they did. During the summer, this stuff was legal in New Hampshire, but has since been banned there. I don't wish this stuff on anyone.

Holy Geeze! As a 23 year Empress guy, I am quite floored at the positive comments! Thanks, all you folks. I know that in general, folks in this line of work are difficult to impress. Seth- I am 99% sure we did NOT supply any medics to STAT. When they first became the WCMC stat team from their earlier, original incarnation- a NYC hospital whose name and helo program name I have forgotten - maybe aeromed? (recall, I did say 23 years in Yonkers- it wears on the mind), they did NOT have a proper license for this area, so Empress let them operate under ours- that is why the early pics have the Empress name on the side of the helo, as per the rules. They ran/flew with two RN's and a pilot. Then later they went to a medic and an RN, but that was after they got their proper license and took the Empress name off the helo. When they went to the RN and Medic crew, they hired many senior Empress folks for their staff- The Old Goat, Locker etc. Anyhow, I hear we are hiring about 30 folks, 15 EMT's and 15 medics. We are a proud Union shop, IAEP Local 20, with a pretty good benefit package, esp by private EMS standards. IF ( a BIG IF): you can say "please, thank you, excuse me and you're welcome", speak proper English, show up on time, wear a uniform properly,(no sports team logo apparel) drive without crashing, deal with pt care while NOT texting, smoking, chewing gum, wearing ear-buds and follow some other basic rules, you will probably do well here. OH- and not bang out sick unless you ARE sick. If any of that seems like it is encroaching on your life style, there are other places to work. It may sound harsh, but I am the Chief Shop Steward, and dealing with folks that can't do that stuff takes up much of my time. The reason we got the positive comments in this thread is because we earned them. Lastly, X129 and X635: come on back, I'll find a room in my bus for ya.

Wow! Only ONE mutual aid call IN went ALS and I got to do it! Barry: I think the Journal News did a piece about how after WWII Vista was moved from CT to NY. I recall it said there still CT evidence in Vista- scout troops still affiliated with CT not NY and some other left-overs. Or maybe I read that in The Star, after the Elvis article. Bill

When doing some research a few years back, the NYS OFPC a wealth of info, told me that only the Governor can remove a fire commissioner. Since then, and perhaps after a law change, I have been told that a commissioner that misses too many meetings can be removed, or it happens by itself under that circumstance. There is also the NYS association of Fire Districts that is also very open and willing to share info. In the last election they corrected several areas of mis-information I was given by my District's office staff.

They are voters, Dan, not beggars. Many of these little noticed elections have only a single candidate. I believe in NYS fire commissioners cannot be "paid" but they can vote to give themselves some perks- cell phones, lap tops, badges, the use of cars, secretarial services, and lots of free-bees heaped on them by vendors trying to get their business. But basically you are working for free. I think I heard that commissioners in paid/combo depts can opt in to the health plan they have for their paid staff. THAT can be a BIG benefit for a five year term. In terms of making a Fire District vote choice based on a candidates moral make up, I know a country that a few years ago re- elected a president that had a well publicized affair while in office. The country's initials are USA.

My kid dragged me to a reptile show at the County Center. I took a card for a reptile rescue group. I think they were Brookly based. 718 436 5163. I never tried the number. When I go to a job and see an empty tank, my #1 assessment question is , "What was supposed to be in there?".

I forgot the name of the NYS assemnlyman from Queens who hit his girlfriend in the face with a glass and was charged and ended up either resigning or getting tossed out. He was a former NYC PD officer collecting a 3/4 disability pension due to a psychological condition. Yet the folks in his district elected him to NYS office. Not 100% the same issue, but it goes to show you who gets elected. If a guy is investigated and not charged, he cleared a hurdle many guys probably couldn't. And he knows that knock could come any time, so he likely, IMHO, treads a little more carefully than most.

Just a shot in the dark here, but I am gonna guess that what you saw was the SFD commissioner that draws his salary as a WEMS dispatcher. WEMS gets $170,000/year to dispatch the SFD. The SFD's position, as stated at a Town Board meeting 8/5/10 is that the SFD call volume is too high, and the Districts's dispatching needs too complex for 60 to handle. Just don't tell that to New Rochelle, Eastchester FD and EMS, CPRP, PeekskillFD and VAC, Mohegan FD and VAC, WEMS flycars and all the other agencies with higher call volumes. As for the post c/o my disparaging the SFD: I don't see it that way. We have a good group of dedicated members. They do stuff I can't or won't do. I do some stuff they can't or won't do. Either way, I respect them.

The person in question was never (NEVER) charged. I understand he cooperated fully and was never a target of this investigation. Do you know what your friends are up to at all times? I think that if this happened to you (a friend getting in trouble) and it prevented you from attaining a goal, you would feel that you were being blamed for something you had nothing to do with. And you would be right.

Barry: Quoting myself, "I know a (very) little about ISO... ISO will hold it against a department because they have different types of tanker fills and dumps? If Somers, Millwood, Katonah and Yorktown don't have identical or similar fills and dumps on their tankers but all can fill and dump in the same approved time frame they all lose points? Geeze. As for the rest of your post, it sound like this is a pretty complex question - will money be saved? Just some numbers: I now pay $500/ year to support the $2.8 million budget. I figure we would need 8 guys and a boss per tour, with two for EMS staffing. (BTW, 5 EMS per day, 90 minutes each, = about 7 hours/day, only a crew of 6 available, and only 4 if TWO EMS jobs running which is not infrequent). 4 shifts = 36 guys, plus 2 spares for vacation etc and a 1 Chief, at $140,000 a year each = $5.5 million per year in staff costs alone. Less the $200,000 saved by firing WEMS and some office staff = $5,300,000. In round numbers we would be tripling our district budget, which I assume would triple (300% increase) my fire taxes to $1,500, per year, or a $1000/year increase. My insurance bill is (updated #, I just looked it up) $1871/year. So unless the use of that paid crew would cause a insurance drop of over $1000/year or 60%, it does not make clean economic sense. Do you think that amount of insurance cost decrease is feasible? That type of figuring is way out of my scope of practice!

I think The public would scream bloody murder and elected official would cower in fear at any attempt to raise the standards, unless it was easy and cheap, like an online test? Easily cheated on though. I was on the call in Yonkers where Trooper Ambrose http://www.trooperambrose.com/ was killed, also burned in his crown vic after a chain reaction started by an speeding intox. That call got the ball in NY rolling. One of those calls you carry around with you.

While Barry taught me how to quote a previous post in mine, I still can't to it multiple times. To answer a previouse poster: 2,900 sq feet on .99 acre. 4BR. No outbuildings. No attic no finished basement. Wood frame. Yes I have STAR. I pay $9300 in School taxes (Just yesterday, matter of fact). Town tax bill= town, fire and EMS was $2900. I live in NO county district (sewer, solid waste, water, I have to fend for myself with all that stuff) I don't have the town/county FD breakdown, but I kinda sorta think it was about $500 fire, $1700 town and the rest county. I could be off, and I don't save the bill, just the proof of payment. That would jibe, though with my rough estimate of fire taxes as a % of total municipal tax burden. I am still lost: with Barry's data, can we figure out how much a small 24/7 or weekday paid crew will cut the ISO for a SFR, and what that will = in terms of actual dollars? Does it come anywhere near enough to cover the investment in costs of that crew? Ooh, one more thing: I cannot afford a flat panel. If I need high def, I go the the firehouse! Since I don't want to pay for MSG, HBO, starz or the like, my huge, boxy TV is fine. All I watch is news 12, and deadliest catch anyhow. I work about 50 to 60 hours a week at 4 jobs to live in Westchester, so no time for TV. Besides any spare time I have is now spent doing research for EMT Bravo posts. Meant to be funny, but it is true.

I think many of my guys in Somers probably would risk their lives. I am putting it right here what I have said in the station many times. I am not going to leave my wife a widow or my kids fatherless in order to fight a fire in a fully insured unoccupied building. I don't want anyone doing it for my house, paid, or volley. My wddding album and family pics are digitized and stored off site for that reason, as are every important document I have (including insurance policy.) One of our guys DID lose everything in a fire about 2 years back. Two family members were home. He was miserable. Be helped him salvage. He got a rental, and his new home on same spot is magnificent! In terms of cutting Town services: Maybe you missed it: We have a p-t PD with no night shift. They get no pensions. Our Town does NOT collect trash, we each have to hire a garbage co, so no fleet of trucks, mechanics ets. Our Town hiway has lost 4-5 positions since I moved in, and has not bought a new truck in over 4 years- for a town bigger than Manhattan. We pretty much have 1 real town park that runs constantly. It's access road and lot are crumbling. They closed the skateboard park as they could not run it. Our town hall was built in 1825. Annual Town budget is about $11,000,000 for a population of about 19000 people, BUT the FIRE DISRICT budget NOT included in that, is $2.8 million. So fire/EMS costs consume about 20% of all tax money collected at the Town level, excluding school taxes (which are biggest of the 3 by far). I am curious, Sir and others. Can folks on this thread discover the same info for their Towns? What are you spending on fire and EMS and what is it as a % of collected taxes? Remember in NY cities have true departments budgeted out by their municipalities. Villages may have true departments or Fire Protection Districts, the latter of which are considered sort of a vender under contract (the Fire Company works under contract with the village to handle the work). Town's may have Fire Districts, run by commissioners that operate fully free of Town officials input. These Districts set their own tax rate and budgets and ops. They answer to no one except 1 time a year, 2nd Tues in December, when ONE commissioner is up for election. Polls open 6PM to 9PM most districts. Yes that is right a 3 hour window to vote, in the dark, in the cold, frequently in bad weather, about 10 days before Christmas. Good thinking. Not a worse scenario to keep the public home and turnout low. FYI the NYS OFPC tells me the single exception to this law in all of NYS is the Town of Mamaroneck. They are a Town and a Fire district, where the Town officials act as Fire Commissioners also. No info as to how or why this was done. Any one know?

I spoke to a guy in the VFD who deal with insurance liability. The premiums are figured based on "perils" like fire, theft, falling trees etc and how likely the ins co will need to pay out if one of those things happens. The other portion is liability- how likely are you to get sued for a fall on your steps, neighbor drowns in your pool, your dog bites the mailman etc. He says about 85% of the premium is peril based, the rest liability based. This may help some, but is not a full answer to the ISO effect on total insurance cost. Also does a better ISO rating effect single family residential in the same way as modern commercial- the two main types of structures in Somers? There must be folks on this site with that kind of knowledge, unless we bored them to death by now.

115 I in no way meant to demean in the way you attributed. I appologize to you and anyone that felt I was doing so. I meant to say that the individuals who perform FD work are fairly costly and they deserve it(the money they earn), agreed? That being agreed to (I hope) my point throughout the thread is: Paid firemen are costly, my taxes are high, there are very few emergencies in my town that could be effectively mitigated by a small crew in a very spread out town, (larger than Manhattan, many non hydrant areas), despite the $170,000 needless expense of dispatch and the appx $100,000 for office staff that might by re-channeled to cover the costs for paid firemen; there is $270,000, which at $140,000 loaded cost = a tad less then the cost of two firemen) the proposition to spend many dollars to hire a small group of folks who would have a tiny chance they would be effective in the small likelihood of a fire and that makes it not worth it. I see crime and the lack of PD resources in Somers a much larger issue, and IF I had the money to spend, that is where it would go. I heard a politician discuss the the tx/budget issues in NYS and he said "As long as New Yorkers maintain their insatiable thirst for services, we will not be able to reduce taxes in a meaningful way." Unpopular as it might be an a fire site, I am no longer thirsty. My guess is many taxpay/service consumers feel or the same way, or will soon and municipal pension costs expand greatly in the nest few years. As usual, I invoke the right to be wrong.

Is it impossible because there is a big target on the back, Seth?

Wow, I was away for a few days, so there is some catching up to do: I am in favor of customer service. I wish I could get a few cops to my home in a few minutes like many other towns can do. My town has a part time, day only PD, ans a single trooper car at night. What kind of customer service is that going to provide? I can only afford to buy a certain amount of customer service, so I have to be a good consumer and choose wisely. At $140,000/year/fireman and two fires a year in a town with 20,000 or so residents, I am afraid I can't make you all happy and buy, say, a dozen. Barry: OK, ya got me on the "how long have you been a medic?" answer to my never having met anyone saved from a fire. In retrospect, I have met several dead bodies pulled out, and RMA'd some others. In 29 years on the bus I bet I have taken, I dunno 12 fire victims. Thinking more about it, many of them were folks who set themselves on fire with stoves, gasoline, cleaning products or other situations in which there was not a fire on anything but them. I'll admit, this is a dumb arguement. Yes people are on occasion rescued from fires alive and live to recover. Conceded. As to your taxes- I bet you live in a more dense district than I, and it has losts of taxpayers in it to pay for service. Somers has many HUGE parks (Lasdon, Muscoot, North County Trail, Anglebrook)and resevoirs that don't pay taxes, but suck up a lot of real estate. Can you look at your policy and tell me how much of your premium goes to insure for fire loss? I looked at mine and no way can I tell. When folks on this thread talk about a % of savings based on ISO reduction, is that a % of the ENTIRE premium or just the portion of the premium that goes for fire loss? The answer to that goes a long way in figuring out if more firemen = money spent or saved, and I don't have that answer. As for SFD dispatch claims by Pilla; He is no longer a commissioner. I ran a very successful campaign to get him out. I got the first non SVFD member in history onto the board, Jim Arena. Pilla was serving with no pay as a commissioner and spending tons of $$ on his pet projects (his words) of dispatch and the radio upgrade. GUESS WHAT?? upon his defeat, the SFD HIRED him as a paid staffer to continue that work! Now he gets in the %15- 20,000 year range to work on keeping dispatch and upgrade the radio system with grant money that politicians pandering to the fire service lavish on us (after first borrowing it from China). There is NO defense of the SFD decisions as to how they choose to spend money for dispatch service. One must note that one SFD commissioner is full time employed as a dispatcher for WEMS. Hmmm... Heritage Hills: From vafrious things I have seen, Heritage does NOT consume a disproportionately amount of service. This may be because many of their residents leave in the winter.

As an SVFD member, I get an annual list of the calls I go to. I believe that it has the fire and EMS breakdown of total alarms for the department on it. I think MVA's are considered EMS runs for that purpose. I am not sure if fire runs are broken into sub cats like the flooded basements, water/scuba stuff, outside odors and the other 95% of the volume that makes up non-fire emergency stuff we get called for. If I get a chance n the nest few days, I will break out the binder and try to answer that question. I can tell you that EMS calles have been the driver for increasing call volume, just like the rest of America. I saw a stat that the number of FIRES in America has dropped 1% each year for the last 30 years. That stat pre-dates the advent of the self extinguishing cigarette. 30,000 fires a year are (or were) started by cigarettes. In the same time, US EMS demands have gone up 247%.(yes two hundred forty seven) These are New York Times stats, so they are suspect. Check FOX news for "fair and balanced" numbers!

How much would you save to remove the inhouse dispatchers, the inhouse mechanic, the paid administrative personnel for the district, and switch that funding over to career firemen? You're already double taxing your district for services that are already provided by the county.... I understand the dispatchers cost us about $170,000/year. We have 5 part timers in the office that run about $15-$20,000/year each. So that comes out to about $270,000 total. I do not know of any paid firemen that also do the work of mechanics, so I assume that either the mechanic would need to stay, OR a similar amount would have to be spent on outsourced repairs, so no savings there. The other 5 office staff have titles like Clerk, Treasurer, Secretary, Purchasing agent and computer services. We also have a paid training officer, ironically a paid fireman working a second job. I am pretty sure most paid/combo departments have some type of civilain office staff. I believe Eastchester does, as does Mohegan, to cite two examples- and they are full timers, so lets just say that 1 full timer= 2 part timers, but full timers get BENEFITS that SFD part timers do not, and benefits = pension, medical etc and that is pricey, so lets say that ONE FT = 3 PT's. So now you are only saving the dispatch money ($170,000 and TWO PT office staff = about $36,000/year, totaling $206,000/ a year that at todays rate gets you about 1 3/4 firemen. If those 1 and 3/4 guys are willing to do tires, brakes, belts, oil changes, batteries, maintain the 4 house generators, fix burned out lights, schedule warrenty work, mount brackets for new equipment, do minor wiring, maintain the 2 dozen portable motorized pumps, saws, generators and fans and drive the trucks (out of town by the way) to a larger garage for repairs too big to handle, then maybe the mechanic would be eliminated, saving another $30,000, which of course the Union would immediately demand in compensation for their members doing all that stuff (I am a shop steward and I would do the same thing for my guys). If they are willing to go to 4 firehouses and sweep, mop, clean the bathrooms, refill the soap and toilet paper, take out the trash,(the two larger stations get a LOT of traffic) then another $14,000 might be found, but you know where that will go (see above). If the proposed new firemen would do construction projects and building maintenance on the 4 stations- change light bulbs, fix broken plumbing fixtures, unclog drains indoor and outdoors, fix broken windows, doors and gutters, build and install fixtures like bulletin boards, shelving and hose racks, battery chargers and lights, do minor electric work and painting, change AC and furnace filters and change the exhaust system filters, build or tear down the occasional wall and do interior remodeling, then the part time maintenence guy could go, freeing up about $20,000. I know some paid firemen do some of that stuff, but I don't think they do all of it. If not, then someone will need to stay on the payroll to do it. BTW: in terms of double taxing, its about to get worse! The SFD is in the process of a HUGE radio upgrade with several remote radio sites and coordinated receivers and transmitting ability from the 4 stations. All while the County radios sit idle in our rigs and dispatch desk. So: taxes bought the big county system which Somers opts not to use, and taxes are buying the Somers system, for the paid dispatchers to use. THIS IN A TOWN THE SIZE OF MANHATAN THAT HAS A SINGLE STAFFED POLICE CAR IN IT FROM 0000-0500. Getting back to my original post, I feel my tax $ is better off in my pocket, but second best spent on cops. I know LOTS of crime victims. I pay about $1200 a year in total home insurance. The policy defies my ability to understand it. It talks about how much they will pay to fix it, rebuild it etc, but they do NOT say how much of that $12,000 is for fire protection. One thing I do know: I get a 2% surcharge on my insurance to fund my VFD benevolent association!! They do buy me dinner once a year, and the way I eat, I come out ahead on that one. I know a (VERY) little about ISO. would 4 guys, M-F days really get me a %10 drop in insurance? Coming from a station 10 minutes away to an area with out hydrants or ponds? I cannot defend the office staff. I work part time at a VAC and the 1 person office staff they have could do our office work standing on her head. The mechanic maintians a LOT: 2 ladders, 1 with a pump. 5 engines, a tanker, heavy rescue, 3 ambulances, 4 chief cars (gotta have a spare!), rehab bus, scuba truck, fire police truck, mini attack, mini van (in case a bunch of soccer moms join) two other utility trucks, 3 trailers, 1 boat with an outboard, 4 station power generators, a very large number of small engines. As you can guess, ambulance and Chief car work take a lot of time- cuz thats where the mileage is. But all those trucks with their various systems need a fair amount of looking after. I believe he is a part timer on paper, but ends up doing closer to full time hours. He will come in on a weekend if they call him if a rig goes OOS. When our District Commissioners were asked that question in August 2010 at a Town Board meeting, they said that Somers call volume was too high, and its dispatching need to complex to be handles by the county. I was there myself to hear it. They said that Somers follows a set of protcols that have been established and adjusted over years, and the County would not work with them. Nothing that $170,000 won't fix.

I live in Somers. I am an FD member. I own my home. I pay about $10,000 in property taxes a year. About $500 are fire and EMS taxes (it says "fire and EMS" on my tax bill). My home is made out of wood and there are no hydrants in my immediate neighborhood, though a recent water project put one in about 1800 feet away. At age 45 I have never had a fire in my home. I have never been in a structure that caught fire. (other than going as a fireman) No one in my family (brother, sister, mom, dad) has either. I have never met anyone that has been rescued from a fire. I have absolutely no expectation that under currant conditions a fire in my home would be extinguished in a manor that would save anything of value. We in Somers do not use the F.I.T. devices that allow 1 man to knock down a fire. I do not want anyone risking their lives to save my house. It is insured. I have no ability to pay yearly taxes to fund a crew of firemen that may or may not be available (due to calls) to come and successfully/unsuccessfully save my home. I am told that the "loaded cost" of 1 fireman is about $140,000 per year (salary, pension, workers comp, OT for vacation/training, days off, sick time etc) So a small ( 4 guys- gotta have 2 in 2 out, right?)crew will cost me about 1/2 million dollars a year. Our Somers Town Budget is about $11 million dollars/year. The SFD budget is about 2.8 million, though they have managed to save over 4 million in various special accounts. (I have heard of tax and spend, but the SFD taxes and puts it in the bank!) So $500,000 every year in costs for the small daytime crew represent about a 20% increase in spending for the District. That is about $250,000 PER FIRE for the roughly 2 working fires we average a year. Yes it will be sad if my home burns. Even sadder if I and/or my family is home when it does. I have 7 smoke detectors ($7 each) and about as many extinguishers. For $500,000, I will step out the window into fresh air, walk across the kitchen bump-out roof, and jump the 9 feet, hopefully into deep soft snow (most fires are in winter). Since I am a 10 minute firetruck drive from the main station, I would probably have to do that anyway. I am really sorry. I would love to see everyone get a great job as a paid fireman. I would love to have a standing army of highly trained and well equipped first responders in our four stations staffing 2 ladders, 5 engines a heavy rescue and a tanker. May as well throw in the scuba truck and ATV thingy too. I simply don't have the money it would cost to do that. As the "buyer" in this transaction, I am afraid I can't afford it. I will be careful to not overload any wires. I will keep the chimney clean. I will hope for the best. At 45 years old, I will be moving into assisted living in another 30 years or so. Hopefully I'll make it, house intact, then they can hire as many firemen as they want.