*Those rarely end well for me. You’d think I would learn this.
So here’s what happened to me today.
Last night, my wife went out to diner with her brother, while I stayed home with the kids. Around the time I was expecting her to come home, I get a phone call.
It was my wife informing me that the ignition in our car is stuck. Specifically that the key could not turn. After years of reliable service the lock just decided that it didn’t like her key anymore. She could turn the car on with the remote start. But she couldn’t get it out of park without using the key.
Since it was too late to get a hold of the dealership, we had my brother-in-law bring her home. He then gave me a ride to the car, in case my key still worked. It didn’t. And while I was preparing to leave the car in the restaurant’s parking lot overnight, I happened to glance at the garage door remote and I had a thought*.
If I was the sort of person who liked taking other people stuff I might break into an unattended car at night. And if I broke into a car and I didn’t find anything worthwhile right away, I might look a little harder than normal. I mean, I’ve already risked jail and all, might as well try to see get something out of it. And while looking a little harder I might spot the garage remote, and it might occur to me that a garage remote is a way to get into someones house. And houses, as we all know are an excellent source of other people’s stuff.
Now I realized that I might be getting a tad paranoid, but I figured I didn’t want to risk my family’s safety on the assumption that there aren’t any criminals as clever as me. So I took the garage door remote and stuck it in my pocket when I left.
Last night, as it is most nights, I got to sit up with a very loud and very angry baby. I just wanted to sleep, and this was evidently a source of much offense and discomfort to him. My baby is kind of a dick like that.
At some point, while tending to the child, I must have sat down on the remote that was still in my pocket.
Which meant that the garage door got opened at some point in the middle of the night. So my clever attempt to secure our house had actually caused it to be wide open.
The irony was not lost on me either.
Eventually I got to go to sleep and my wife took her shift on baby patrol. Around six in the morning or so, she heard what sounded like the cat making a racket, in a room near the back of our house, which just happens to be situated next to the garage. At once point she even wondered if the cat had managed to somehow get into the garage, and was on her way to check, when she was distracted by a baby.
Well it turns out that the cat was not in the garage, the cat was in his traditional location at six AM, lying on my pillow attempting to smother my face with his butt. What my wife heard was some local scofflaws helping themselves to the contents of our garage.
Yes I just said scofflaw. I’ve had two hours of sleep, get over it.
All in all, they got two large bins of DVD’s, and a plastic gun case. No gun was , but it may have had some Warhammer miniatures in it.
When all of this was discovered my lovely spouse became understandably annoyed. She expressed dismay that she didn’t wind up taking a look into the garage, as that may have scared the burglar away. Of course it may also have lead to a nasty confrontation in the dark with a crazy junkie, so I am just as happy that she didn’t.
My wife, for all of her many good qualities is short. And like many short people, she can get really mean when riled up. I’ve always theorized that short people have the same amount of angry that everyone else does, but they have less body mass to dilute it with.
Alas my wife is also recovering from childbirth, and isn’t back up to speed physically yet. Given her temperament this could have led to her writing checks that would lead to severe overdraft penalties. And overdraft penalties in this context means “Beaten down with a giant box of DVDs by the cast of A Clockwork Orange“.
Granted instead running into one or more PCP addled psychopaths she may have some across a teen-aged dork on Christmas break who was thinking that he had just scored some free movies. Who would probably be scared, and who might very well think that he was holding a gun. Which would have been freaking hilarious.
“Stay back lady! Or I’ll use what’s in this case!”
“That case is full of little tiny orks. So unless you’re some kind of extreme dungeon master they probably won’t help you much. And in fact you will shortly be having them inserted directly into your body. The hard way.“
On a related note USAA has awesome renters insurance. I’ll be receiving my settlement for the missing movies tomorrow.
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December 23rd, 2009 at 5:04 am
did you try twisting the steering wheel? It was probably locked and keeping tension on the key cylinder so you couldnt turn the key.
captcha convenient deleon
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Wolf reply on October 4th, 2010 5:05 pm:
This happened to my cousin while the whole extended family was at a bar. They spent over an hour trying to get the key to turn.
I spent about 1/2 sec on the problem, and my feet never left the parking lot pavement. (true story)
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December 23rd, 2009 at 7:02 am
lol well i hope you weren’t to fond of the warhammer minis.
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December 23rd, 2009 at 8:00 am
DVDs and miniatures can be replaced. Short angry wives and crying babies cannot.
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December 23rd, 2009 at 8:20 am
Glad your insurance covers the loss!
Personally, I think your cat opened the garage door and sold your DVDs and Minitures to feed his growing catnip addiction.
Oh, my father wanted me to pass on that you’ll get sleep again in about 22 years. If you’re lucky. I THINK he’s kidding..
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Minty reply on December 23rd, 2009 10:40 am:
“I THINK he’s kidding..”
Yeah, it can be hard to tell if someone’s joking when they’re sleep-deprived.
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Shadowydreamer reply on December 23rd, 2009 10:53 am:
I’m 34 now – he can’t blame me anymore.. I also live an hour’s drive away!
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sandy reply on December 28th, 2009 8:24 pm:
You keep thinking that…
December 23rd, 2009 at 9:45 am
Lets hear it for USAA!
I’d have liked to read the police report about the perps being apprehended by a little lady, who then inserted various metal figures into their orifices [orkifices?].
RE the car, also could be your keylock “tumbled,” they do that from wear, you can tell when the brass starts to shine thru on your keys. Getting new keys can delay this for a few more years.
I hope the steering wheel just needed to be turned, otherwise, not so fun.
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Tzanti reply on December 24th, 2009 9:09 am:
Getting perforated with little lead gaming miniatures is orcupuncture.
But seriously, mate, it’s only stuff. Glad none of you were hurt. Hope your Christmas gets better from here on in.
captcha: Hiccuped he – yes, I have indeed started on the Christmas brews. One bottle of Punk IPA down, and about to head to the pub.
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December 23rd, 2009 at 10:15 am
You should keep a loaded shotgun next to the door to the garage in case this ever happens again. Then again, given your wife’s temperament, maybe you should just have blanks in it. I don’t think you want your car full of buckshot.
Captcha: Levees These. Is that what the orcs would have done to the robbers, or what the robbers did to the orks?
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HardNose reply on December 27th, 2009 10:05 pm:
Ain’t gotta be loaded, just the SOUND of a pump action shotgun will send most would-be thieve s fleeing.
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StoneWolf reply on December 28th, 2009 5:40 am:
Yeah, but ultimatly anything that appears to be a real weapon that is not is dangerious as it increases the stress of a situation that can lead to stupid decisions. And since whatever you are holding is not in fact a weapon you ability to defend you and yours against stupid is quite compromised. Basically, never ever draw a weapon unless you are fully prepared to use it. Even if that weapon is just a wet noodle.
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December 23rd, 2009 at 10:41 am
So your car is broken and your house has been broken into. Since bad things come in threes, I say we start a deadpool on the coffee maker.
Captcha: “Nibbler Nixon.” Gods, I really hope that isn’t the third bad thing to show up. That’s just wrong.
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Shadowydreamer reply on December 23rd, 2009 10:56 am:
Oooh. I predict at 0h-god-hundred Christmas Morning the coffee maker goes fzzzzt!
Captcha : Helixes 500 .. Apparently Captcha bids that a physics anomoly will eat the coffee maker at 0500
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paula reply on December 24th, 2009 10:18 am:
I’m betting on the refridgerator, with complete freezer meltdown leaking all over the kitchen floor, exactly two hours before your inlaws come over for Christmas dinner!
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CCO reply on December 23rd, 2009 11:00 am:
Put me down for the stove.
Sorry about your house getting broken into, Skippy. My wife would kill me if I had done that.
Speaking of pools, I wanted to started one to see how before Skippy has vomitus on his head from either of his children. I picked out 180 days.
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Minty reply on December 23rd, 2009 11:50 am:
I’d be surprised if it hasn’t happened already.
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John Stephens reply on December 23rd, 2009 1:43 pm:
Puke ain’t so bad. Wait ’til his first genuine Code Brown. Those who know, know. Those who don’t, can’t.
JMireles reply on January 23rd, 2010 10:44 am:
One night, I was playing with Baby Girl. We were on the bed, with me laying flat on my back. I was holding Baby Girl up over me, when I made the mistake of tipping her forward. THANK GOD my mouth was closed, because she coated the lower half of my face.
December 23rd, 2009 at 11:14 am
Heh. I half suspect that had your wife investigated the garage, the resulting kerfluffle would have neded up more like this: http://www.superstupor.com/sust12272007.shtml
Captcha: Badgers last
Badgers last what?
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December 23rd, 2009 at 12:18 pm
Whoever decided that women were the weaker sex never met one. We can be sadistic, unsympathetic, unforgiving and uncompromising. We also have no problem fighting dirty and generally have a higher pain threshold than men-we have to, considering the whole childbirth thing.
If I found someone in my garage, considering how many pointy objects my fiance’ and I own, they would never find enough of the corpse to ID. Of course, I’m in good shape, train regularly, and am not recovering from shoving two whole human beings out of my body. Still, I think that Skippy should totally get his wife this shirt.
http://www.cafepress.com/orderofthestick/6985506
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Willy reply on December 25th, 2009 8:54 pm:
However, women typically have less muscles then men. I think it has more to do with (some) women viewing themselves as helpless princesses who need a knight in shining armour to save them, instead of kicking the guy in the balls and scratching his eyes. Or, if your in the states, get a gun. It evens out most fights fairly well.
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AFP reply on December 29th, 2009 8:34 am:
On my fiance’s wishlist is a pretty pink handgun for self defense. Any gun can kill a would-be attacker, but the pretty pink handgun provides them with that extra little bit of humiliation when she guns them down or scares them off.
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Stonewolf reply on January 13th, 2010 7:56 am:
Awesome shirt! And generally men are stronger. We are better at lifing heavy things. We never claimed to be meaner or scarier. An angry mother is far scarier than a horde of hostile natives. Guys will generally kill you and be done with it, but women are patient.
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December 23rd, 2009 at 2:58 pm
Actually, Skippy, you were right to be paranoid, even if it didn’t work out so well. A common theme in car thefts today is to steal the registration paperwork (with your home address) and then either a garage door opener or spare keys (if you’re stupid enough to have them in your car). Most people don’t think to look for these items first, so as far as they know, nothing is actually missing. Then, while the person comes out and discovers their car broken into, waits for the police to get off their donut munching arses, takes the time to file a police and then insurance report, etc, etc, etc… the break in people race to the person’s house, rob them blind, and make a quick getaway. To think, the police delay actually cost you the stuff in your house. Even if you recover a stolen or misplaced set of keys, if your address could have been found in connection to the keys, you should replace your locks.
And sadly, it works out that way often: this is exactly what happened to my sister… except she had an alarm on her house that autodialed the cops, so they nabbed the robbers in the midst of carrying out a TV… now instead of watching adult activities on a big tv, they get to participate in adult videos of the “less conventional” (read: gay) kind with their cell mates.
Captcha: Warble off — what I do at the end of the night rather than drive home drunk from the bar.
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December 24th, 2009 at 10:35 am
Just for information’s sake: one of the things I do at the newspaper I work for, is setting up the weekly police report; the lessons you can glean from that alone are:
1. Hide the GPS. Really, how hard is it? Put the GPS AND the suction-cup holder thingie in your glovebox. (Oh, and leaving a suction-cup mark on your windshield means you might just as well not bother hiding the thing in the first place.)
2. Lock the damn car. It’s amazing how many police reports involve stuff stolen from unlocked cars, including my favorites: cars parked overnight, unlocked AND with the keys left in ’em.
3.And for gawd’s sake, don’t drive drunk. Really, don’t do it; it seems like almost every arrest or car crash involves alcohol…..
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ltc_insane reply on December 24th, 2009 5:30 pm:
“1. Hide the GPS. Really, how hard is it? Put the GPS AND the suction-cup holder thingie in your glovebox. (Oh, and leaving a suction-cup mark on your windshield means you might just as well not bother hiding the thing in the first place.)”
heh my friend found a good way to get buy this after he got his GPS stolen out of his car he took one of those stick on hooks you mount on walls and attached that to the back of the GPS then hooked it thru one of the middle air con vents then when he leaves the car he just slips it into his pocket.
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Willy reply on December 25th, 2009 8:52 pm:
You’d think it would be able to find a stolen GPS though…
By the way, people who leave their keys in their unlocked cars practically DESERVE their car to be stolen, if you ask me. Even if it’s a mistake, that person probably shouldn’t own a car as its too much of a responsibility in the first place.
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paula reply on December 26th, 2009 4:47 am:
Yeah, they might just as well prop a big sign on top of the car: “Free car! Come and get it!”
And I always wonder what their insurance company says about their claim, when the police report says the car was unlocked with the keys inside…..
Papasawn reply on December 28th, 2009 2:13 am:
Interesting story for you, Paula. I grew up next to a guy that has a classic convertable (talking 1930s kind of classic). It’s so old that the cloth top has to be custom hand made for it… no company produces them any more.
The insurance company has asked him when he takes it out to place any valuables in the locking glove box or take them out of the car… and then to leave the car unlocked. Their logic is that it’s cheaper to replace anything inside of the car than to replace the top.
It’s the first time I’ve ever heard of an insurance company telling a customer to leave the car unlocked (granted, he only takes his baby out for car shows and then stays with it the whole time anyway…)
Minty reply on December 28th, 2009 10:19 am:
@Papasawn: And he probably keeps it in a locked garage or something, since the car itself is so darned valuable, eh?
paula reply on December 28th, 2009 2:55 pm:
And he doesn’t leave the keys in the dang ignition!
AFP reply on December 29th, 2009 8:30 am:
Actually, from what I understand, there’s no way to track the GPS’s. Some kind of privacy Big Brother issue. They can recieve tracking info from the satelites, but they don’t broadcast their location.
My car has one of those ugly fuzzy dashboard covers. My GPS has a couple strips of velcro on the back of the suction cup base (opposite of the suction cup), so I just stick it to the fuzzy dashboard cover and stash it when I’m getting out of the car. Dunno what I’ll do when I get a new car.
I did see a pretty cool car stereo/GPS at Wal Mart. Had a big touchscreen interface that, when you hit the close button or turned off the car, would flip up and retract into the faceplate. You ended up looking at what appeared to be the cheapest car stereo ever, with the big buttons and minimalist LCD screen. Whole thing fit into the same space as a single-bay CD deck.
Captcha: Remarked WASHINGTON: “It is better to offer no excuse than a bad one.”
December 26th, 2009 at 1:32 am
What a Merry Christmas its been. in addition to Skippy’s house and vehicle broken into; I have some holiday tales. The business i work in was broken into on Xmas eve; kicked in glass door, few hundred bucks taken, alarm didn’t go off. Myself and the Girlfriend go to the store for missing cooking items on xmas day; on the way out an unscrupulous con artist tried to hit me and everyone else with the works: “my kids are starving, we are stranded here because my wife died here” oh and it ‘happens to be in a city with a really high tax base in a state/county with a high cost of living? by the way, nice $300 shoes and gold watch. Also we were in the store no longer than 4 minutes, in that time someone smashed into/destroyed the car next to mine and left without so much as leaving a note.
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Mercer reply on December 26th, 2009 1:35 am:
oh and the con tried to convince me to go into the store and get some cash from the ATM when i told him i didn’t have any cash on me.
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December 28th, 2009 at 5:52 pm
Alas, those of us that are stuck in Hell (Read: Minot, ND) must not only leave the keys in the car, but the cars running when they leave them in winter or else they might just freeze and not start again until spring. The sky gave us all a gift over the holiday week- 33 inches of snow complete with 10+ft drifts. The record breaking 2ft of snow that fell on xmas day managed to trap me in a friends house for 48 hours without access to a bed or clean clothing. And to make everything worse- I am 8 months pregnant and my body decided to throw in some contractions to spice things up a bit during the worst of the blizzard. With the only road to the hospital closed and the gaurds not letting anyone off base unless it was a “bona fide emergency”, this meant that I got to wonder whether I was about to deliver my baby in my friend’s living room because unless I could say I was in labor they wouldn’t send an ambulance or a snow plow to free us. It took the snow plows 2 full days to come dig us out- apparently having a woman who is 8 months pregnant is not a good enough reason for them to clear a street. It sucked for me, but I think it was worse on everyone who was also stuck with me for 2 days.
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Sequoia reply on December 29th, 2009 2:05 pm:
“Alas, those of us that are stuck in Hell (Read: Minot, ND) ”
LIES! Hell is in MICHIGAN.
Proof: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hell,_Michigan
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Mercer reply on December 29th, 2009 10:23 pm:
There was also a Hell California. They say it was demolished but the 10 freeway runs over it and its in Riverside. I’ll let you decide which is more Hellish.
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Sequoia reply on January 6th, 2010 2:34 pm:
California has Arnold* AND Alcatraz. Michigan has Jennifer Granholm*. You decide which is more Hellish in case of Zombies.
*Assuming Both Are Immune
December 31st, 2009 at 2:43 pm
Skippy, why did you keep miniatures in a gun case in the garage? No…never mind, I don’t really want to know.
I am a paranoid’s paranoid. I keep the car in the garage with windows rolled up and doors locked. And I keep the door into the house locked and the alarm on at all times. Not that I don’t live in a safe neighborhood. The most excitement we have is the occasional loud party. And that’s how I like it.
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January 5th, 2010 at 9:03 pm
We had a female friend who live alone in a first story apartment. She heard someone trying to break in through the window one night. She first called 911 of course. But then while she still had 911 on the phone, she yell at the guy: “Come on in so I can shoot you and it will be self defense”. Well the guy ran away quickly. Then she realize the 911 operator was saying on the phone, “Don’t shoot, we have officers on the way”. The robber got away but I think he might think again next time.
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January 31st, 2010 at 1:12 pm
I nearly shot an animal control officer a few years ago. The idiot was in my fenced yard trying to take my dogs, he claimed they had been running loose. I came storming out the door with a shotgun that was almost as long as I was tall. Even better this was right after there had been a rash of pet thefts in the area. County Animal control still refuses to respond to my address no matter how many calls they get.
That said its usually a bad idea to confront an intruder unless there is no other option, doing so gives my lawyer a headache.
Skippy glad you and your wife stayed safe.
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