We were blind but now we see

I found a scrap of silver lycra that could have come from a great Elvis costume. My little mudcats are very happy to have eyes now. After escaping unscathed through the wild weather yesterday, we settled in to watch three hours of Matt Damon being a stoneface in "The Good Shepherd". Slow but compelling. Three quarters of the way into the movie I smelled smoke. Thinking a neighbor had lit their fireplace to cut the chill and damp that had set in at dark, I dismissed the smell. A few minutes later I caught it again, this time stronger, insistent. I bolted upstairs to see if some nitwit had left the iron on my studio. Nope. A quick trip through the upper rooms and I could tell the smell was wafting in through the bathroom window and I caught an ominous glow just out of view. I dashed out the deck door to see a house completely engulfed in flames not more than a quarter mile away through the woods behind our house. As we stood on the deck watching and hearing that the firetrucks were already bearing down on that neighborhood we watched as the wind lifted sparks high in the air and carried them up over our house and the houses on both sides. We quickly went out and roused the neighbors on both sides (they were sleeping!) to be watchful and anxious with us. By the time we got back to our vantage point it was almost all over. Fortunately we found out today that no one was living in the house and no one in the houses close by suffered any losses. So frightening to think of losing everything in a matter of a few minutes.