Adventures of a College Student: The Toaster Fire

This is a column for stories about the hidden side of the college experience. It’s a column for those embarrassing mistakes that eventually turn into funny memories, a place to share your experience so that others know they are not alone in their mistakes. Have a story to tell? Submit it to the Daily Runner at thedailyrunnereditors@gmail.com.

Our first story opens on an ordinary night much like any other. I had finished most of my work and decided to relax by watching a show on my laptop. My roommates were also in our room – one in the bedroom, the other making food in the kitchen. She popped something in the toaster and came to sit with me on the couch while she waited for it to go off. The toaster was our pride and joy; it was so much better than having to cook bread in the skillet when we wanted toast like we used to.

A minute or so passed before movement in the kitchen caught my eye. I glanced over, and then quickly did a double take. THE TOASTER WAS ON FIRE! It’s not like it was just smoking – there was about a foot of flames coming out of the top of the toaster.

My roommate, who had been sitting next to me on the couch, rushed into the kitchen. The other came quickly out of the bedroom. The first threw our mismatched oven mitts on and unplugged the toaster before picking it up and holding it an arm’s length from her body. The room was rapidly filling with smoke and the smoke alarm started blaring.

Looking back on it now, it must have been a funny sight for anyone watching through our first-floor window. Three girls, one fanning smoke out of the room, the other trying to direct the third, who was holding the still flaming toaster, to set it on the counter. She set it down and there was a moment when we all stopped and stared at it dumbstruck, unsure of what to do next. We quickly decided that it was not an electrical fire or a grease fire so dousing it with water was the best choice. One of us, I don’t remember which, finally threw water on the fire. It went out with a hissing noise and we breathed in a sigh of relief.

While the toaster was cooling down, we fanned the rest of the smoke out of the room the best we could, shut the windows, and collapsed on the couch together. We took a few deep breaths, looked at each other, and burst out laughing. That was an experience for the history books!

Moral of the story? Learning to cook for yourself can be difficult. Be careful, don’t trust a five-dollar toaster, and never ever use said five-dollar toaster to toast a corn tortilla!



Kylie Kisamore is a contributor to the Daily Runner.

One thought on “Adventures of a College Student: The Toaster Fire

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    October 6, 2018 at 6:06 pm
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    LOL!!! Good moral!

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