Yesterday morning I discovered that I had left the Love Bus unlocked for 19 hours with my handbag on the front seat. I think my wallet poking out the top of the bag was visible from outer space and yet, the bag remained there on the seat all night, untouched. Take that “Friendliest Street in Blahblahshire!”, I thought.
Of course it isn’t always that way round these parts. Earlier in the year we skipped off to an Australia Day BBQ at the home of a newly-Aussiefied MM and his chronically Australian wife KC and came home to find somebody had skipped off with all our worldly possessions. And by somebody, I mean “stupid junkies” did it – or rather, those were my words at the time. Although they weren’t exactly stupid because they were mindful enough to find and take all the chargers for the equipment they took, all without leaving a a single fingerprint. Stupid smart junkies. Interestingly enough, the backpack they also stole to stash their booty had a copy of Spinoza’s “Ethics” tucked away in one of the zippered compartments. And since it is *entirely likely* that they would have since taken time to read it, they’re probably feeling really bad about what they did to us. Really really bad.
In any case, we got off reasonably lightly. Some other friends in our area got done over in a much more insidious way – they were robbed during the night while they were actually sleeping in the house. RR got up at one point to attend to one of their sons and came back to shake his wife M awake with the words “What have you done with our television?”. Which is kind of worrying as RR is a Man in Uniform. You’d think with all the years of training he’d had, he might not have slept through a robbery in his own house. Or that he might have been able to recognise a crime scene when he saw one (albeit through the blurred eyes of someone with perpetually-broken sleep). And perhaps he’d hopefully not have gone on to accuse an innocent person without sufficient evidence. Hmmm. Some more cynical types might say that pretty much describes many Men in Uniform all the world over… But listen up, cynics: RR is truly a Good Man (in uniform or not), and I like to think that, had he not been tucked up in beddy-bye-byes with his jimmy-jams on, he would have come over all Jason Bourne and totally shown those thieves. Totally. Although his wife M says she’s glad he didn’t, what with the small sleeping children near by and all – and I have to admit she’s totally right. Anyhoo, the worst thing about all this is that poor RR and M got done over again three days later in broad daylight, and then a few days after that, had their car window smashed and broken into. Which truly sucked.
But the thing that really sucks about these robberies is not the expensive equipment that was stolen or the property that was damaged – those things can (after a lot of paperwork) be replaced or fixed (in our case, gaffer tape did the trick on the window). It’s the irreplaceable stuff such as the photos on the memory stick or the emails on the computer or the tape in the video camera that gets me. None of which has any value to the thieves whatsoever but are all priceless to their owners. I no longer have any video footage of my precious Tiddles McGee as a baby thanks to our Australia Day visitors. RR and M lost all the baby photos of both their boys and M’s grandmother’s engagement ring. And, arguably, my husband might have benefited from reading Spinoza’s “Ethics” in its entirety (see “In Camera Hearing” for evidence of this). But thankfully, in a “Family Ties” group hug kind of way, we all still have each other (cue: awwwwwwwww!) and from where I’m sitting in my middle class tower, it seems the people who have wronged us are in a far darker place than I care to imagine or want to go myself.
You know, one of the many reasons I’m in a luckier place is that my drugs of choice are cheap fizz and Beroccas and they’re both widely available for a handful of change over the counter. However, I hasten to add that I never mix them – that would be Totally Irresponsible. Although, now that I think about it, the über-fizz the two could potentially create together could give me quite the Big Buzz… But then, the vast consumption of this heady cocktail might prove to be my ultimate undoing, sending me spiraling down, down, down to a life of petty crime, bad teeth and bad fashion sense (though it must be said I’ve got the teeth and the fashion sense already covered). And, now I *really* think about it, I’d be thin. Thin, I tells ya! Quick! Someone! Anyone! Bring me a glass!
I hate those smart stupid junkies! Some time ago they stole my leather jackets and the watch my father gave me before he died 12 years ago. That Spinoza bloke better really show ‘em and show ‘em hard.
6:50am??impressive, very impressive!!
I am so so sorry.
I was done-over once. Amongst the worthless booty they got was a letter written to me by Ian McEwan. What. The. Fuck?
Unless he takes time out of his busy schedule of writing masterpieces that one’s not going to reappear. First Spinoza and then this. Hell in a literary handcart.
There is a legendary story I like to tell and tell, that involves a jug of cocktails made with suspiciously berry-flavoured fizzy mixer.
Yes, its true, my dear pal Jude ran out of fruit juice at the end of a boozy night of duty free daiquiris on our balcony and wondered if we wouldn’t all still a) like just one more jug and b) feel better in the morning if we started the remedy right away.
People sipped, frowned, looked quizzically at each other, realised, ridiculed, laughed…then drank it anyway.
Did it work?
Well, no-one went to work the next day. And several of us were meant to. So, no, probably not…..well not in the sense of b) anyway.
Jacquie – I like your style.
I called it the Vodrocca, a simple mix of Berocca and Vodka.
Its a real fighting drink, that one..
I’d like to say you sleep through one burg and you are cruely forever tagged, but as it was actually the second time I’ve slept through a burglary. The first being a dorm in a hostel when two visitors came through and took things of everyone’s. I actually woke up I think when they left hence I know there were two. Alas I’m not as light a sleeper as I thought…..
I feel compelled to comment seeing I am the one mentioned in this blog re: junkies sneaking in in the dead of night to do over the back of the house. Then coming back a few days later to do over the front of the house during the day (not home). Then car window smashed in driveway at 2.00am.
Before these incidents occurred we were not the most security conscious of people, thus easy targets. If we had security doors that worked (wished we checked that out before we bought the house) and decent locks they probably would of kept on going till they found someone else with min security or an unlocked door.
At the time I got through the drama by convincing myself that they weren’t in the house to physically harm us (a 3yo and 14 month old also were asleep in the house). They were there to steal stuff they could sell quick for their next hit. But as NDM mentioned who knows what might have happened if there was a confrontation.
We had not long moved into the house when the robberies occurred which in hindsight had made it that bit harder to settle in. We are in for the most part in a low socioeconomic area so we are not cocooned in a suburb where everyone is conservative, white, predictable, middle class – which in many ways is the way we like it and why we live here.
You do not have to venture far in this hood to see how easy it is for people, all sorts of people, to lose their grip on the slippery, slippery slope that is life. Go to the local supermarket and more likely than not there is someone there yelling to themselves or having a drunken argument with their mate. I was walking to the train station the other morning and there was a woman in front of me who finished off a beer and chucked it in the gutter. There are two teenage girls living in a tent surrounded by their rubbish in the local park. Who knows what these people’s lives were like a few months before – they may have been living quite well functioning lives. By the way it is worth mentioning in this particular hood you now would not have much change out of $500,000 for a half decent house. So the haves in the area are witnessing the have nots. I would dare say many of the haves are expecting and hoping the have nots will be eventually forced out of the hood as they won’t be able to afford it anymore and someone else will hopefully deal with it.
Anyway the point somewhere in this ramble is drugs, gambling, alcohol don’t discriminate and make people do things that they would never otherwise do, like NDM I hope I nor my little boys who will one day turn into grown up boys never experience that where nothing else matters except the next hit, the next bet, the next swig.
Back to the post effect of the robbery – yes we now make sure our doors are locked and are security light is switched on (I will go and double check before I go to bed). And yes unfortunately we both even after all these months still have one eye open during the night. During the day I leave the radio on (that will trick them) and I ring the door bell before the boys go running in the door so if there is someone in the house at least they have been warned (not sure how effective the ringing bell strategy would come off in practice but at least I feel like I’m doing something). Then I check to see if the TV and DVD player are there. Sometimes it’s hard to see if our place has been ransacked or not because of the state of disarray it has been left in the first place.
By the way the boys don’t know we were robbed so are innocent and carefree as ever. They just thought lots of stuff was broken at the same time and had to go to the repair shop and the man must have been really busy because it took ages to come back. I have managed to keep from my Mum that her grandmother’s (my great grandmother) ring that she gave me when my first child was born has gone.
I remind myself that these things happen everywhere. You just need to have a look at the burglary statistics to see that. But somehow rationale and statistics are still out played by the noises in the night…