[ExI] news of the weird

[John Grigg]

Spike, good luck with your sleuthing!  You could be on your way to becoming
the next Sherlock Holmes!  If I lived nearby I would be honored to be your
Watson...


John  : )

On Thu, Dec 13, 2012 at 10:36 AM, spike <spike66 at att.net> wrote:

> ** **
>
> Occasionally a news of the weird happens right in one’s own neighborhood.*
> ***
>
> ** **
>
> But before that, there is a back story that is relevant to all this.  Our
> neighborhood has been remarkably free of crime for many years, but recently
> we had an uptick in daytime burglaries.  A couple months ago, our friends
> down the street bought one of those nifty video cameras which does image
> comparison and if anything changes, it emails you a picture of whatever it
> sees, sends it to your iPhone and so forth.  This guy is a big tech whiz up
> at Stanford, so instead of doing my own due diligence, I Koreshed off of
> him and bought an identical system.  It arrived a few days before
> Thanksgiving, but I was busy with family matters, so the thing sat unopened
> in the box.****
>
> ** **
>
> Last week, the guy who bought the system to start with was the victim of a
> daytime burglary.  His home was full of high-zoot electronic whiz bang, and
> the thieves got it all, games, laptop computers, all the electronic
> goodies.  His wife is a Stanford PhD candidate finishing up a thesis in
> biochemistry on a home computer, which vanished along with the backup hard
> disc and home server.  Much of the data was not in the cloud, so there was
> considerable loss of labor.  The home security system, which he had owned
> for a couple months, was still in the original package, unopened.  It was
> not stolen.  So this past weekend, I was busy installing my home security
> cameras.****
>
> ** **
>
> Now, the rest of the story.****
>
> ** **
>
> We have a neighborhood crime watch.  Whenever anything happens where the
> locals might be able to help solve a crime, the constabulary sends out an
> email notice.  Yesterday around lunchtime, the constable tells everyone
> that there was a suspicious activity, Hispanic male, mid-twenties, rang a
> doorbell in a neighborhood where there aren’t that many Hispanic families,
> told the resident he was looking for his lost cat.  When asked, he seemed
> to not know what his cat looked like or the cat’s name.  He did have the
> genus and species, and could likely identify the approximate number of paws
> the missing beast possessed, but could provide very little information
> beyond that.  When leaving the residence, the silly prole appeared to
> signal to a vehicle down the street, which was described as a deep red or
> maroon compact car.  No crime committed, NW notice went out anyway.****
>
> ** **
>
> About two hours later, about 1400, a second notice goes out regarding a
> brazen daytime burglary just down the street.  According to the constable,
> there were “several suspects observed fleeing from a residence” carrying
> what appeared to be the property of that resident, electronics, including a
> television.  This time, a local witness having been alerted, gave good
> descriptions of their car and at least two of the suspects.  One was a
> sturdy black teenage male, perhaps 18, and the driver of the getaway
> vehicle, who was… drum roll… “an elderly white female.”  I kid you not.
> That’s what was reported.  Now the cops have the make, model, year, color
> and plates on the car, a deep red or maroon Kia Sephia, possibly the same
> maroon compact car seen nearby, two hours earlier with a Hispanic male
> searching for a lost perfectly generic cat.****
>
> ** **
>
> So now, this is weird.  We have what looks like a burglary gang led by a
> white granny, with an ethnically diverse labor staff.  I suggested a number
> of possibilities, such as the white granny was actually a young male thug
> in disguise.  Another possibility, all the apparently young male thugs were
> actually white grannies, in black and Hispanic thug disguises.  Or granny
> was being held hostage and forced to drive.  Or the youths were being held
> hostage by the granny and forced to burgle.  Or if the gang were all
> grannies, they grab the loot, jump in the car, pull off the disguises, the
> cops look right past them.  White grannies are as invisible as dark matter
> in the cosmos to the constables.  Or, the perps flee with the loot, jump in
> the car, don their white granny masks, instant cloak of invisibility to the
> local constabulary.  ****
>
> ** **
>
> There are still some things I just don’t understand.  They stole a
> television and fled in a Kia Sephia.  Any television which would fit into a
> Kia would not be worth the physical labor to haul away.  Most modern
> televisions need a pickup truck to carry off, and at least two sturdy lads
> to hoist the thing; white grannies in disguises can forget it, it would
> take half a dozen of them to get one off the ground, never mind fleeing
> with damn thing.****
>
> ** **
>
> In any case, this whole thing will likely make it all the way up to
> FoxNews of the weird, ja?  {8^D****
>
> ** **
>
> spike****
>
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