Our Tax Dollars at Work

Last night I was woken up by the sound of our doorbell. It rang three times quickly in succession. I squinted at the clock—it was close to midnight. Who could possibly be ringing the doorbell at midnight? Was Andrew hosting a late-Monday-night party he forgot to tell me about? The doorbell rang again, then again.

I thought it might be stupid kids playing around. But it is February and the stupid kids are all in school, so . . . that couldn't be it. Andrew got up to go check it out. (Isn't he nice like that, answering the door in the middle of the night so my bedhead and I can stay upstairs?)

It turned out to be the police. Incidentally, this is not the first time the police have woken us up in the middle of the night. (I thought I had blogged about that, so I was just going to link to the original story so I wouldn't have to retell it, but apparently I did not blog about it, so no link. I still don't want to tell it—it's a long story—you're just going to have to make something up. Your version will undoubtedly be more exciting than the original.) From my spot at the top of the stairs just around the corner, I couldn't really make out what they were saying, but I could hear an apologetic tone to their voices.

Andrew went outside with them, so I went to our window and peeked through the mini-blinds. I saw Andrew right our trashcan, which had blown over in the wind. Surely the police didn't stop by to tell us our trash had fallen over. Hmmm.

Apparently when Andrew took our trash the trash out, he forgot to shut the garage door. And someone had called the police. I suppose that was a nice thing to do. With the garage door open, our house was pretty much open to the public. (except of course, for the, um, security system, and the cameras, and . . . the guard dogs. yes, of course, the guard dogs. all you criminals out there, take note.)

“We really need to get to know our neighbors,” Andrew grumbled as he got back into bed. Yes, I agree. If a single one of our neighbors had our phone number or, you know, knew our names, maybe they would have just stopped by or called to tell us the door was open instead of CALLING THE POLICE. Sheesh.