Well, I’m now iPodless. So’s my wife. And Bill even lost one of his video iPods and his dock that we had borrowed to watch episodes of Lost that he’d downloaded from iTunes. Someone waltzed into our house sometime today, put our dog in the bathroom (with a bone) and proceeded to burglarize our house. Three iPods, a cider jar full of loose change, our digital camera, a Sony minidisc player, my (broken) iron cross biker watch, my wedding ring that was too tight for my finger, and I think that’s it… we haven’t noticed anything else missing yet. A St. Louis city cop and a crime lab officer came (got there very quickly, actually, and were very helpful), dusted for prints and got a couple of good ones off of my computer (where they’d disconnected my iPod) and the glass jar. Obviously they could have gotten a lot more, but it looks like they (he/she/whoever) were looking for small stuff they could easily carry out the door… money, guns, jewelry (luckily most of my wife’s is just costume jewelry!), small electronics and valuables. I think our front door hadn’t latched properly when my wife left for work. It’s a tricky (old) door that you have to make sure you really pull shut, or the lock won’t engage, so whoever it was was probably able to just push the door open and come on in… and they had to either be familiar with our dog, or know dogs in general. Anyone that lives in our neighborhood knows our dog, and knows she’s not ferocious (golden retriever, go figure).

We’ve only been burglarized once before, and that was our apartment in Kansas City in 1993.

What worries me most is whoever did this now knows exactly what we possess… and may return. It’s doubtful, but the probability remains. Most of the time, they won’t. And they’re usually just looking for the small stuff, but it still makes you feel very uneasy.

Anyway, be careful out there. Make sure your doors & windows are always locked tight when you leave, and keep your eyes out for suspicious characters.

And if anyone sees someone wearing my watch, let me know.