The Kettle is Boiling!

The Kettle is Boiling!

I lit the stove under a kettle full of water and raced off for my morning shower. With any luck I would finish before it boiled.

 But I didn’t, it whistled, and Jan looked up from reading her book in bed and called “The kettle is boiling!”

I didn’t hear her, but down the corridor, heads popped out of bedroom doors and took up the call. “The kettle is boiling”. 

My shower deafened me but our neighbour hanging out her washing heard it. “The kettle is boiling” She called gaily over the back fence to her friend who thought “what the hell’ and shouted to her departing husband “The kettle is boiling” instead of “goodbye darling”.

The world must have been feeling silly that morning, because the news ran down the street like a balloon on a windy day. “The kettle is boiling!” people called from door to door.

Passing motorists on the way to work heard it and wound down their windows at traffic lights. “The kettle is boiling” they informed each other. 

At work the news traveled by phone and email far and wide, till even the radio stations heard it.

I stepped out of the shower just in time for the seven o’clock news.

This is what I heard.

“This is Radio National and here is the news. ‘The kettle is boiling.’ ”

“Wonderful” I thought. “That was good timing.”

I went and turned it off…

…and the world went quiet.

 Roger Wooller

10^th September 2003.