Wednesday, January 20, 2016

The Case of the Missing Dragon

I don't often talk about what happens at a personal level here at Grubb Street, and when I do its about the positive things (holidays, parties and gatherings). But in this case I'm making an exception.
Lockheed, in happier times.

You see, someone has stolen our dragon.

We had a dragon gargoyle, about two feet tall and about 60 pounds heavy, that for several years has guarded our front stoop. And right before Christmas, the Lovely Bride went out with a Santa hat to put on the dragon, and found it gone.

And it was very concern-making, in part because we don't know exactly WHEN the statue disappeared. It was there for Thanksgiving, but in the rainstorms that followed we were not paying attention and it could have happened up to a few days previously. 

Possible means and motive are equally wonky. Our driveway isn't particularly obvious to people driving by, and someone stealing it on-foot would have to lug off a sixty-pound concrete statue. In could have been a prank, but there was an uncarved pumpkin right next to it, a remnant of Halloween kept on to T-Giving, that was unscathed. Stealing it for sale it is equally wonky, since there were other things in the area that could have been scarpered just as easily that were untouched.

It is not the first time this sort of thing has happened. Our area is rural turning to suburban, but we have had thefts over the years. The gargoyle itself was a replacement for a light-weight lawn ornament sea serpent that mysteriously vanished one afternoon (AFTER we were visited by Mormon Missionaries, who probably were not at fault, but could have just been Stalking Horses, I suppose). We were outright burgled many years ago (they got old computers, a TV, our CDs, and a skull-shaped pin made from a prop of the Terminator movie; We responded by getting a security system and training the cats in Akido). And in a case that continues to confound me to this day, someone stole our garbage one year (for what, information? Sorry, we shred).

The LB and I are concerned and little uncomfortable that someone came up to the house and pirated our dragon off. On one hand, it is just stuff, but on the other it is stuff that we had a direct connection with (it was named Lockheed. Now you can feel REALLY bad). We reported it, of course, not because we expect an APB on a concrete dragon, but in case there has been a spate of lawn ornament thefts, and if, after long investigation, the Kent police find it with a thousand garden gnomes down in a warehouse in the valley.

Well, there's hope at least.

More later,