Upgrading Our Rodentia, En Route to Mickey

A couple posts back I mentioned the invaders who’ve moved in, and want to live here rent-free. Recently, we’ve had others rats in our lives, too.

This post I’m telling you how Mrs. Ombud and I are going upscale. We are hitting the road — or the skies, as it were, on our way to Orlando, Florida (our first time in the so-called Sunshine State), for about a week’s worth of Disneyworld and Epcott Center. And for me, some Grapefruit League baseball, too. I hope. 

But, given the winter we had, it couldn’t be ours without a little more adversity.

Last Thursday morning as Mrs. Ombud was dropping our dogs off at Happy Hound doggie day care (which they visit a couple times a week, and wears them out, saves us having to walk them weekdays, and cuts down on doggie neuroses, too) she had a very unwelcome surprise when she stepped back out to the car. Someone had smashed the back passenger window of our car. And stolen her backpack.

She was only gone a minute or two, just long enough to hand off the pups, so they clearly had their timing down.  They got her purse and her wallet. Driver’s license. Credit cards. Her cell phone. Our tickets to spring training baseball games in Florida.

For us, it’s mostly the nuisance of it — replacing all that stuff. The most valuable thing they got was a very nice windbreaker, which comes with a bit of a sentiment, and a travel story.

Several years ago we were in Seattle in October, dealing with the Seattle drizzle- rain-drizzle, and she had on an old windbreaker of mine that was not, frankly, doing the job.

“I’m fine, I’m fine,” Mrs. O said, ready to soldier on (as in: never mind about me). “No, you’re not,” I was adamant, as one thing growing up in Minnesota teaches you is that there is absolutely no point in not preparing intelligently for the weather.

I took her go into a store with me. And we found a wonderful Patagonia windbreaker, perfect for the job and very versatile, too, as it is a light shell so it isn’t too hot when it’s a warm, muggy summer rain, and yet with warm clothes on underneath is waterproof and will keep you perfectly dry and snug right down to freezing weather.  

And then I checked the pricetag and got sticker shock: “one hundred and eighty dollars?!”

That’ll teach me to be adamant.

But the upshot is, she came to love that windbreaker, with all its versatility and added functionality, and now it is gone, as it folded up so nicely and it was tucked into that backpack, too, handy during all the rain we’ve had late this winter.

But we’ve bounced back, mostly. Made the phone calls and got the new credit cards. California’s budget crisis has meant that state workers have furlough days, so the Department of Motor Vehicles was closed Friday, but she made it in that same day to get her new license in the works. And she had taken out an insurance plan on the cell phone, which has already paid off handsomely, as she got her replacement the next day, with the express shipping charge waived, too.

We don’t have the replacement spring training tickets, yet, for me to see the Twins @ Pirates and Twins @ Yankees. But we are forging on — in spite of my trepidation. Because the low-life criminals who stole her backpack got our address off her driver’s license, and with those baseball tickets, they can surmise we are leaving town, too. 

So now we’ve arranged for a friend to come stay here while we are gone. I don’t imagine these low-lifes are bright enough to read blogs, but if they are:  Got that, scum-sucking thieves? Someone will be staying at our house while we’re gone, ready to dial 9-1-1 as needed, so do stop on by. We’d love to arrange for a little jail time for your sorry asses, after you ripped us off and smashed the window of our car.

With any luck, even though we no longer have the tickets I paid for, and paid the service fees on, and the shipping charges, too, even though it’s tight on time as far as getting the replacements, maybe I’ll get to see my Twins playing some spring training baseball for the first time, too.

After various rats out here, we are ready for Mickey Mouse.

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