Last Thursday night, well, early Friday morning, around two in the morning, we had a cat fight in the dining room. Woke both Brian and me up. It was Benny and Handsome. Brian said that he saw Benny go behind the loveseat, so I called him and he finally came out, laid on the coffee table purring for me. He was okay. I carried him into bed with me and Brian and I both spent a few minutes petting him and giving him some attention. He tired of it and ran off (the bedroom isn’t his favorite place in the house).
My window, right above my side of the bed, was open. I love the feel of the cool night air on my face and it was pleasant to listen to the falling rain. Neither of us fell right back to sleep, but lay there listening.
We heard a vehicle pull up to the curb. It sat there, running. After five or so minutes, it left. Another five or so minutes and it was back. The engine was never turned off. Suddenly, I heard a big crash. I got to my knees and looked out the window. I yelled at Brian “they hit my truck!” I yelled out the window “HEY!”
Brian jump up, looked out the window and went running outside in his underwear. He yelled at them. It was a couple of guys in a lighter model mini truck with a camper shell. They didn’t back into my truck, the broke out the window in the camper shell and they were in the process of removing the generator that Brian had tied down in the back. The generator was from the property and it quit working earlier this year and Brian was going to take it in someplace to get it fixed. Before he had the chance, the Ranger’s tranny went out and the truck was out of commission for almost a month.
I got my robe on and grabbed a flashlight. It was a huge mess outside on the ground. Tempered glass everywhere. Brian went into the house and got dressed. A man from up the street came down and asked if everything was alright. I told him that someone had broken into the back of my truck. He said that he lived a couple of houses up and dogs barking got his attention. He looked out his window to see a truck with a shell on it parked outside of his house.
We think what they did was stop initially, look into the truck and tried to open it. When they found the shell locked, they drove off. They stopped in front of this guy’s house and discussed their options. That’s when they came back down and quickly made their move. If Brian had taken the time to get any of his clothes on, the generator would be gone, they moved that swiftly.
In their haste to leave, they dropped the utility knife they’d used to cut the tie downs. I’ll be calling the sheriff’s office today to see if they want it. Brian picked it up by the side, so if there’s any fingerprints on it, they should still be there. It might help.
cleanup
against the fence
Brian cleaned up most of the glass and wiped glass off of the bumper. He then backed the truck up to the gate on the bank side of the house. Getting anything out of it now would be impossible. He swept more of the glass from the driveway. We went back inside to the house and back to bed.
Then it started raining again. Hard.
Imagine our surprise when we heard a truck pull up again within forty-five minutes. I got up and looked out the window and it was parked (engine running) across the street. The driver got out and walked over to the other side. “Oh, Nicole, baby, please don’t leave, don’t go, you know I didn’t mean it.” “Oh, Sweetness, it was my f*cking fault, don’t go, I don’t want you out here walking the streets.” “Nicole, honey, let me take you back to your car.” “Sweetness, you know I love you, it’s just that she was there and she got me irritated and I’m so f*cking sorry. I didn’t mean to say it.”
This went on for about fifteen minutes, then Nicole got in his truck and they left. And the rain started pouring down again. As I nodded off to sleep, I mumbled “don’t ever call me “Sweetness”...”
When the sun came up, we stayed in bed a little later than usual and when we were up and dressed, Brian went outside and did more extensive cleanup of the driveway. He got the generator back in the shop and moved the truck to the driveway. He examined the missing door/window and wrote down the serial number of the shell. It’s a GemTop that we’ve had for many, many years. The likelihood that he’ll find a new door is slim to none. He searched online and called the GemTop manufacturer and left a message. They called later. They have no replacement glass.
Better shot in the daylight
And it’s not like Brian can have a piece made. The glass has a curve to it, the locks were in the glass and so was the latch. I mentioned that maybe he could find a used one somewhere, but he said he’s only seen one other shell like ours the entire time we had it (probably ten to fifteen years), so chances of finding a used one are also slim to none. The shell is useless. He’ll most likely just take it off of the truck, cut it into pieces and put it in the dumpster.
Yes, we could contact the insurance company, but we have a thousand dollars deductable. And we’ve learned from experience, that insurance companies raise your rates until what they’ve paid out is paid off. Figure there’s no replacement glass, that would mean getting a brand new shell and we just don’t want to do that at this time.
Besides, we originally got the shell for the dogs. And we no longer have dogs.
Talking about who it could have been, like the guy from up the street said, that door was dark, so it had to be someone who drove by fairly often to even know there was something back there worth stealing. Some dirtbag drug user, probably, trying to steal something to sell and make a few bucks to put towards the habit. It sucks. When we drive anywhere, we’re always looking at other vehicles, maybe we’ll see the would be thieves. But we won’t. We’ll most likely never know.
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