Imagine you had the choice of walking off with one of the following items without paying: a large Antler suitcase, £200 worth of kids’ and adults’ Microscooters, a woman’s mountain bike or a pair of old, light tan, men’s brogue shoes and a pair of worn women’s ankle boots. What would you choose?
Over recent weeks, you see, I have left all of these items out on our porch. Which of the listed goods has mysteriously actually gone missing? Believe it or not, it was the two pairs of shoes.
Yes, somewhere on this planet is an individual in possession of a pair of well-worn brogues in desperate need of new laces and a fetching pair of black, suede ankle boots. Well, in truth, I very much doubt the same person is in possession of both any longer.
You‘d need to have exceedingly odd feet to make use of a pair of men’s size 10 brogues and women’s ankle boots several sizes smaller. Unless, of course, the individual concerned happens to have four feet. On the balance of probabilities, however, I think we can rule out this last option.
The awkward truth is that I have to take responsibility for these items going missing. We’d been out for a long, muddy walk and our shoes were filthy. I said we should leave them on the porch and that I’d clean them off.
I never got around to it and the shoes sat there for days. Assuming Mrs Adams had moved them, I yesterday asked her where they were. When she stared at me blankly, I guessed the shoes been lifted from our doorstep.
We are fortunate to live in an area with a relatively low crime rate. Even so, when I think about it, we’ve had a number of similar experiences.
A little while ago I went out to the car one morning, ready for the school run. I looked around wondering why the interior of the car was such a mess and then realised someone had been through it overnight.
The car is parked in our driveway so whoever went through it came on to our land to give it the once over (yes, yes, I had forgotten to lock the car, but nobody’s perfect). The one thing stolen from the vehicle: an iPhone charging cable.
A couple of years ago we had a cleaner visit our house. After finishing work, she loaded up her car with her gear and left a vacuum cleaner on the doorstep while she checked the house to make sure she hadn’t left anything behind. In those ten minutes, someone stole the vacuum but, rather oddly, left the steel hose behind.
Be it scooters, bikes or suitcases, I’m forever lugging things in and out of the house. If one of the kids pipes up and says they need the lavatory, I forget the car keys or my phone rings, then I have to leave things on the porch for a few minutes while I take care of whatever has distracted me.
It’s not like we live in some mega-urban area where you might expect items to get pinched if left unattended. Unfortunately, this shoe thing has rattled me a bit.
I’ve always taken our home security very seriously, putting measures in place to protect the house from burglars. I can see I’ll have to change my ways and take steps so I don’t make life easy for opportunists and that’ll mean keeping the porch free of anything that mike look appealing.
It’s very sad it’s come to this. I just hope such petty crime in our area doesn’t get any worse.
8 thoughts on “A strange thing happened in our porch”
How strange that they took the shoes? Someone with a shoe fetish or kids playing silly games?
Although it’s good they didn’t take the scooters or other items and fingers crossed it doesn’t get any worse.
We have all left the car unlocked at some point, or left a window open too!
My specialty is to get the kids into the house and forget about the youngest’s car door, leaving it wide open. Did it overnight once.
Very odd. I imagine these will be popping up on eBay as part of some type of fetish – “Worn boots by award winning dad blogger”. At least I hope so, I have my ££’s ready.
Yeah, that thought had crossed my mind. You’d better have lots of money ready though Dave, I’m not cheap.
I agree that even when only shoes are stolen, it can be a somewhat distressing experience. My sister’s car was recently broken into – even though nothing of note was stolen, the thought of someone sitting inside her car and rummaging through the glovebox and the insides of her car sent shivers down her spine.
Strangely, the robber left his latex gloves (and probably fingerprints!) on the seat of the car – we’ve left it in the good hands of the police.
The incident have certainly made us review our home security measures too.
I must say, I did laugh when I read about the culprit leaving their gloves behind. What a daft thing to do. Having someone invading your space like this is horrible. I can empathise with your sister. It’s not a pleasant experience.
I’m like you John. I’m forever leaving shoes on the doorstep!
So far the only time any of them have gone missing I caught the culprit. A Jack Russell Terrior, waddling down the road with my size 8 dragging along behind her.
I’m useless at locking my car as well!
It is worrying to think someone is in your personal space.
I’m looking at getting cameras installed.
You can get some excellent home security systems these days. They come with apps that broadcast to your phone, wherever you are in the world. They’re great and I’ve reviewed one or two.
I hadn’t thought about dogs. I can’t rule them out as a culprit. We get a lot of dog walkers in our area.