The Stealers

My wife hopes the person who stole some of her Halloween decorations really enjoys them.  I'm sure that they are smashed on the street somewhere else in Oshkosh--creating a short-term laugh for somebody--but she is not going to be happy for a while.  Being the realist that I am, I had warned her stuff like that left out is just going to be stolen or vandalized--but out it went anyway.

I'm never surprised by what people will steal--or the lengths to which they will go to get something that is not rightly theirs.  All you need to do is tune in to any of our newscasts to learn that.  Take for instance the Crimestoppers reports we get every week from Waushara County.  They've seen entire farm irrigation systems, large commercial grade lawnmowers and large amounts of construction equipment from homebuilding sites.  What gets me is that a lot of this stuff would require multiple people and big trailers to steal--yet no one ever sees anything suspicious?  And then you had the guy in the Town of Menasha stealing all four of the sewer grates at a busy intersection.  There again, heavy objects out in a very visible location and nobody thinks "Why is that guy removing all of those grates?

The one that really made me laugh this week was the theft of a semi-trailer from the WalMart distribution center in Beaver Dam.  First, that would require having a semi to actually haul that away--I doubt someone was able to hook it up to their diesel-dually.  Second, what do you then do with an empty trailer that has a big WalMart logo on its side?  That should look a bit out of place anywhere you try to store it.  The chuckles were doubled when police noted those at the distribution center weren't really sure when the trailer disappeared.  I'll admit, I didn't notice my wife's decorations were missing--but those were pumpkins and stuf--not a 50-foot long semi-trailer.  You'd think someone would say the next day "Hey, wasn't there something here before?"

And then you have the people who think the best theft victims are those in their own family.  We've had a couple of stories recently of nephews breaking into Aunts and Uncles houses to steal cash, guns and other items.  I bet that makes for some interesting conversation at holiday dinners and family weddings.  This week we had a conviction in a case where a woman forged her in-law's signatures on promissary notes and contracts--then sued them for a quarter-of-a-million dollars.  That really takes some guts.  She even went so far as to continue calling them the "quote/unquote alleged victims"--while using flying quotations hand gesture--in court.

So enjoy our Halloween decorations, Stealers.  I know you think you "deserve" to have them more than us.





OK--now that my wife thinks this Two Cents is done...feel free to steal our Christmas lights this winter so I don't have to climb up the ladder in freezing cold weather to put them up and take them down anymore.