Break In

While the mold that had us staying with Ruthie's mom in Lawrenceville continued to fester untended in our apartment, word must have spread that we weren't sleeping at home.

The apartment manager called this afternoon to tell us that our window had been broken from the inside, by a hammer thrown in a domestic dispute between us, and that we were going to be billed for the window.

Since we were sleeping in Lawrenceville, I had my doubts about her story. Ruthie and I drove back down to check on the damage, and we found that not only was there glass shattered all over the apartment from the outside, but that many of our valuables had been stolen.

We talked to the manager, and she worked really hard to hold on to that "broken from the inside" story, despite the fact that shattered glass was spread all over our living room:

Our initial inventory suggested that we lost a Macbook Pro, over 70 DVDs (a collection I built intentionally over several years), our DVD player, our comforter (more on that in a second), and some breaded frozen eggplant from our freezer. Other contents from our freezer were scattered on the kitchen floor:
Luckily, since our iguana was sitting on the side of the couch, the thief or thieves seemed to be avoiding the area where her tail would strike (this meant I got to keep all my Coen brothers, Robert Altman, Sam Fuller, and Terry Gilliam films, thank God). We knew that Rockette would serve some practical purpose some day:

When they saw us at the apartment, several of the kids came around to tell us what they knew. One good thing that came out of this was that we had a good chance to connect with the neighbors, and many of them expressed regret for the break-in and offered helpful bits of information. Here is the Huntington Creek detective squad posing for a picture:

So, the best we can figure, it was a sloppy smash-and-grab operation. It seems the burglars broke a window, unlatched the patio door, and entered the apartment, going to the freezer (a common hiding place for cash, I am told).

They then went into our bedroom and threw what they could grab without getting smacked by our iguana (hooray Rockette!) onto our comforter, wrapped it up, and exited through the front door, which they left open.

In the morning, a cleaning lady saw the open door, closed it, and called the police.

We are obviously shaken by what happened. From a long-term perspective, we can survive the losses. In fact, I'm surprised we didn't get burglarized sooner.

But still, it feels awful. Especially since the manager, a new hire, seems intent on blaming the whole thing on Ruthie and me, who are probably her greatest asset in terms of improving the property.

And to add another difficult element, the mold problem is still unresolved, so we can't even stay there very long to deal with the fallout.

I'm still hoping for this long story of mold, burglary, and management trouble to turn a good corner. Fear not, dear readers, I'll keep you posted as it develops.