How I spent my Saturday...

So, I woke up this morning, had breakfast and logged on to ROM. Nothing much was going on and my hubby wanted to go for a drive so we headed down to the car. (For those of you that know, we're currently looking for a house and we were going to take a look at one.)

We went down in the elevator to the parking garage and walked over to the car. We got closer to the car and noticed that there was broken glass on the ground. My hubby looked at it and said 'that's new, I don't remember seeing that yesterday. Perhaps someone had an accident.'

Upon closer inspection, we simultaneously looked up and noticed that where there used to be a driver's side window...one no longer existed.

Yes, our car was broken into. For some odd reason someone targetted our car to break into. It's odd because there's a lot of nicer cars in our parking garage (ie., there's a Lexus, Mercedes, etc--we drive a Honda Accord.)

We were both a little stunned so we only took a little look around. We poked our heads into the car (which was quite easy to do, being that there was no longer a window.) We noticed that the steering wheel's cover was missing and there were wires hanging down.

Upon even closer inspection we noticed that the airbag that used to reside inside the steering wheel was missing. Pretty much at the same time we looked from the steering wheel to the other airbag (or rather, where the other airbag *should* have been) only to see a lonely, empty space.

My first thought was 'where's the insurance and registration information?' My hubby responded 'it's in the glove compartment where it always is.' To which I followed up a further question 'where's the glove compartment?'

Apparently these $*(&#(*@&$#@#@*&$(@#* (censored because I'm too much of a lady to repeat the words I mentioned in the parking garage) removed the glove compartment and it was now sitting on the driver's side seat. Having taken a few very deep breaths and counting down from ten, we went to report this to our super. All he told us to do is go upstairs and call the police (which we were going to do anyways but figured the super should know). We went upstairs and called the police, insurance, etc., and assumed that the police would be over soon(ish).

When we were going over a mental inventory of what could have been missing, I thought of my husband's briefcase which he usually leaves in the car (bad idea, I know, but he's funny like that.) Our super, who is actually a really nice guy, went down to the car to see what happened. He called me to say he found my hubby's briefcase which was stuffed in a corner near the car. Well that was a minor relief, at least the thief (or thieves) didn't take it, but they did go through all the pockets and opened up all the compartments. The briefcase looks like it could hold a laptop, I guess that's what they were looking for and since they didn't find it they tossed it aside.

We were both on the phone for the better part of the afternoon, calling various police stations (we were bounced from one to the other--quite nightmarish.)

Five LONG hours later, we were finally visited by an old, weather-beated police officer who pulled up to our building and called us on the phone to say he was there and that we should meet him in the lobby. He told us to get into his car and he drove us down to the parking garage, my hubby got in the front and I sat in the back of the car. We got down to our level of the garage and my hubby got out and the police officer got out, and I was stuck in the backseat. I've never been in the backseat of a police car and didn't realize that I couldn't get out (neither did my hubby as he walked away leaving me inside.) The police officer had to yell to my hubby to go around to my side of the car and let me out. I was not amused. ;)

The police officer took one look at our car and said 'wow, they left quite a mess'. I felt like saying 'no shit sherlock' but decided it was probably in our best interest to say nothing. There was glass on the ground, on the driver's side seat, passenger seat, backseat and floor of the car. He looked around the car, noticed that the window was obviously gone and started dusting for fingerprints.

I didn't realize that he couldn't dust for fingerprints if the surface wasn't flat. Our dashboard is a mock leather with little bumps on it (I'm not describing it very well, but I'm sure most of you know what I mean) so he couldn't get any prints. He told us also that he can't take prints on the outside of the car because the prints he lifts could be anyone's prints and even if he found any, they wouldn't hold up in court (ie., it could be someone who passed by our car and happened to touch it on their way past).

He took our glove compartment out of the car and dusted that, he got one smudged print which wasn't of any use. We noticed that the hood of the car was ajar and didn't (and still don't) know if anything was tampered with. The police officer asked us to start the car and, miracle of all miracles, it started.

I thought to myself, 'if the hood was popped, maybe they popped the trunk, we should probably take a look inside to make sure.'

The officer asked my hubby to open the trunk and look inside. Well, wouldn't you know it? Yes, they messed around with the trunk too. How thoughtful of them, they closed the trunk after them.

Not much was taken from the trunk, but what was taken was odd. I had my gym clothes in the trunk, the clothes were there, but the bag I carried them in was gone. The bag itself wasn't fancy or anything, just a simple Adidas bag. Also, a number of months ago I bought a set of multicoloured mugs and threw them in the trunk and well, I forgot about them (they were really cheap, $4.99 for a set of four). The set of four was packed in two sets of two. Both sets were opened and they took two of them. How odd. They took the time to open up the box AND took the time to decide which colour of mugs they wanted. I know it's petty to think about that, but it's just such odd things to take.

The officer thinks that the gym bag was taken because the thief (or thieves) broke into our car and then needed something to carry the airbags off in. He told us that because of the things the thief took, they weren't very bright. He said that they either needed airbags or were told to get airbags from a Honda and then they just took whatever else they wanted.

(On a side note, the officer told us that a colleague of his was called to a break and enter call a number of months ago. When the police arrived, the burglar--who happened to be 15--was still inside and still holding stolen goods. The kid went to court and he was sentenced. For his crime he was given the ever-so-stiff sentence of having to write an 800 word essay on 'Why it's wrong to break into people's homes' and he had five months to write it.)

I'm just thankful that nobody was hurt and (grudgingly) that I'm able to write about it. I feel so weird, I guess I'm lucky in a way, this is the first time I've been a 'victim of a crime'. It's such a bizarre feeling, I can't quite put it into words. I guess it's like they say, you really do feel victimized when something like this happens...

Well, that's how I spent MY saturday, how did you all spend yours?