When I dropped Julia off at work we noticed a table on the veranda had been knocked over.
“Must have been windy last night.” I said.
“Or we’ve been burgled.”
They had an attempted break in last week and she can sometimes concentrate on the negative too much.
I, on the other hand, can sometimes be wrong, and I was wrong today.
A person of low moral standards had indeed tried, unsuccessfully, to break in. They have wrecked the door handle, scratched the exterior, left boot prints all over the front and strained the window shutters.
What they didn’t do was gain entry. And if they had have done their haul would have been confined to a selection of second-hand gardening books and used wellingtons.
I imagine the police are looking for a youth of low intelligence and poor upper body strength,. He will be either unemployed or in a low-paid job.
“How,” asked my imaginary assistant, “can you tell that? (Apart from the fact the majority of burglars fall into that category).”
Well, he’s male because he wears big boots. He’s stupid because there’s clearly nothing of value in there. He’s not in a highly paid job, because if he was he’d have access to £10 and he could buy a decent wrecking bar. He has poor upper body strength because anyone with decent strength would have levered the door or shutters within minutes, even using a makeshift tool. And finally he’s youthful because nobody over 40 could lift his legs enough to leave boot prints that high up a wall.
The police, meanwhile, are going to come out and look at the damage.
They say the boot prints are unlikely to be of much value.
This is real life, not CSI – no database of boot prints for us.
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You need a squirrel, Quercus and Julia!
http://www.npr.org/2017/02/18/515921393/squirrel-foils-attempted-theft
That would be good. Though our squirrels are busy stripping the nut trees they appear not to provide security. Slackers!
This is an incredibly funny blog, in spite of the fact that being burgled is no fun. Glad they found the idiot. Back in the nineties a similar idiot broke into my place and stole my laundry quarters and my violin. He was on drugs. Thankfully he pawned the violin for $15 (the price of a hit, I assume) and I got it back, undamaged. I’m glad he didn’t get in…
We decided to keep the mood light so the group members didn’t get upset.
The most annoying thing about these events is the damage they do in comparison to the small rewards.
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I take my hat off to your powers of deductive reasoning. I don’t see that punishment would be much good for a weedy youth of low intelligence. I feel that finding him something useful and interesting to do would be more helpful….or even a reasonably paid job but I am shooting for the moon there.
I It’s a difficult subject. Half of me says, as you do, that the answer is education, self-realisation and a job. The other half wants to nail him to the side of the shed as a warning to others. Give me a week and I’ll be keen on rehabilitation again. 🙂
Fair enough.
We had some prat try to kick our front door in, and the police came and took photos because there is, apparently, a database for trainer prints. That was CSI Sherwood, though.
The CSI visited in the afternoon to take pictures. He identified the trainer from the prints, but I can say no more as it is an ongoing investigation. I doubt they will actually punish him though.
Keep us posted, Detective! And, so glad the would-be thief was unsuccessful.
I will. The school has him on CCTV but he’ll probably get no more than a telling off.
Sigh. At least he should be obliged to do some community service project.
Even that isn’t what it used to be – we had community service on the farm – some singles and some in groups. A lot depends on attitude and the person managing it.
Yes, and after reading your post, I have begun to wonder if community service is really the answer.
I think it’s part of the answer and works well for some people. With a bit of tweaking it could be better. But some people just can’t be helped. 🙂
Have you thought of detection as a new career?
The Police made an arrest in the early hours as he tried to break in elsewhere, according to Julia. Seems they are now working on him to admit to this one too.
I look forward to finding how accurate my deductions were. 🙂
Years ago the office I worked in was burgled – they got away with some seeds in a brown paper bag from my desk (they were probably disappointed to discover sweetcorn when they tried to smoke/snort them), a couple of pairs of cheap ear rings and the safe. We had a big safe – upstairs and not bolted down. The got it half way across the adjacent castle grounds before abandoning it, unopened… the police never did find the thief, although I think they should have staked out doctors’ surgeries, looking for someone with a hernia! Had they managed to get into the safe, they would have been able to enjoy reading all the adult learners’ enrolment forms!
Yes, planning doesn’t seem to feature heavily in some of these raids. It would be nice to think that the theft of the safe did result in hernias all round. 🙂