I don’t often buy 9-volt batteries, but when I do, it’s because one or more of our smoke alarms has developed a case of chirpes – the way that the alarms make us aware that their back-up batteries are no longer viable. Replacing the battery in one of these units (we have five – one in each bedroom and one at each end of the hallway that connects them) is straightforward, but it does require a stepstool for those of us who are vertically challenged.
Last night, one of the units started chirping. Each chirp is typically followed by a minute or two or three of silence. I didn’t want to get up on the stepstool to mess with the alarm, and I couldn’t really discern which alarm was complaining. I ignored it. We went to bed, and I think that I may have incorporated the periodic chirping into my dreamscapes. Susan says her own sleep was fitful.
This morning, the chirping continued. What was I expecting – that it would spontaneously cease? I opened a blister pack of 9-volt batteries, got the stepstool, and replaced the battery in the hallway unit just outside our bedroom door. The silence was golden. Several minutes of luxurious silence later, the chirping resumed. Shit!
I fetched the other battery from the blister pack and replaced the battery anew. Ahh, this time it took. Well, it took for about five minutes before the chirping resumed. Merde! The two batteries came from the same blister pack and are therefore of the same age. I wasn’t surprised that the second one was no better than the first.
A quick trip around the block to Batteries+ and I have four new 9-volt batteries. One went into the unhappy smoke alarm, and all is quite – for now.