Christmas is the season where we're supposed to be all giving and full of the milk of human kindness for our fellow man. Unfortunately, there are also shitheads who don't care and make this time of year their hunting season. And then there are the people who use the stress of the holidays and the imbibing of alcohol as an excuse to commit crimes against other people.
So far this week, right here in the back of beyond, we had a murder in a house I pass every time I go to the park to go fishing. One gentleman stabbed another repeatedly. Early reports are that they were friends. And the gas station, where I fill up my vehicle with fuel and myself with coffee, got robbed by an employee who also had a bunch of drugs in his car. AND someone busted in the front door of the feed store where I pick up grain for the critters. Assholes didn't get anything, thank goodness, but still, you really don't expect that shit in the middle of freakin' nowhere.
I assume most of you don't live in the middle of nowhere, though. You're living in more heavily populated areas and thus must be even more vigilant than my fellow Ozarkians. (I'm vigilant all the damn time because I have lived in big cities and little cities, burgs and towns and villages and rural locales. It all made me watchful.)
I watched a video this morning of police officers asking whether a woman had locked her car before going into the mall. She said 'yes, of course' and then another officer went to her car. The back door opened right up. Her alarms went off, of course, but by the time anyone would notice (or care... car alarms go off all the time and no one cares anymore), her stuff would've been gone.
They'll steal stuff out of your car. They'll steal stuff out of your cart - like your purse, if you aren't paying attention. They'll steal stuff off your porch...
I saw a report a few days ago of a city's police department leaving fake packages on people's porches around town. The packages were equipped with GPS tracking, so when the assholes stole the packages, the police could catch them in the act. Smart.
Anyway, be alert out there. Stay away from drunks. You know who amongst your friends and family can't handle their booze and become 'instant asshole' (instant asshole, just add alcohol). Lock everything, all the time. If you're having packages delivered, be home. And if you can't be home, have them delivered to someone you know will be home or at your place of work or to a rented PO Box.
Don't let a criminal ruin your holiday season, okay? And have as merry a little Christmas as you can. Or a pleasant Hannukah. Or whatever.
I always lock my car. (I've been known to lock it while in the garage because...habit! LOL) I use the "toddler seatbelt" to secure my bag to the shopping cart, with purse zipped closed. One of the suburban police departments is allowing residents to have their packages shipped to the police department, where they can then pick them up with a photo ID. There's a guy here who's targeting porch thieves. He has 7 cameras set up and he puts decoy packages on his porch. One Amazon box contained a frozen dead squirrel (to hide the smell). A woman took it and he rushed out, yelled that he hoped she enjoyed her ill-gotten gains and called in her tag number. When the cops stopped her a few minutes later, she insisted the box was hers and explained there were feminine products in the box, evidently in hopes the male cops would back off. They insisted she open it. FEMININE PRODUCTS! DEAD SQUIRREL!!!! *bwahahahaha*
ReplyDeleteOur murder rate is up and sadly, we've had a fatality accident (sometimes two or more) a day for the past week. The DUI involved a car-load of high school students who'd been drinking in a hotel room and then were out driving at 3:30 in morning. The car rolled while exiting a street to the Interstate. Two girls were ejected, one killed when a car on the highway hit her (16 yo), the other in critical condition. The driver broke her wrist and was arrested at the ER. She's 18. Makes me so sad.