"It Was Fun Till We Got Robbed - Let's Nail This Thing Down!"

“Look before you leap.”

“He who hesitates is lost.”

Don’t fight, boys.  Which is it?

That’s where we’re at here. 

Contrasting alternatives.

It can’t be both.

It’s either one or the other.

We are not talking “opinion.”  Based on the available “Time Frame”, the burglary of our Hawaiian hotel room was either an “Inside job” conducted during  “Housekeeping’s” entry into our room when we weren’t there, or somebody pushed on our not entirely “Secured” door – while we were sleeping – and quietly walked out with our stuff.

Let’s…

No, wait.

First, a confession.

Burglarization is a personal invasion, which feels generically yucky.  But there is something admittedly exciting about saying, “We were burglarized in Hawaii”, more exciting than “We went to Hawaii and nothing happened” or “We were burglarized in Poughkeepsie.”  I need to confess that jingle of excitement.  As well as the Law & Orderish “rush” of successfully “Cracking the case.”  It’s all stupid, but there you have it.

Now…

Imagine an impeccably drawn “Time Line”, rather than just this:

December 31, 2018 – 5:08 P.M. – A hotel elevator captures me returning to our hotel room, carrying my subsequently stolen Major Dad commemorative shoulder bag.  (Distributed as show “Holiday Gifts” during “Season One” of the series.)

December 31, 2018 – 6:10 P.M. – We exit our hotel room for the downstairs New Year’s Eve Banquet.  Our door is perceived by the hotel’s surveillance equipment to be “Fully Secured.”

December 31, 2018 – 6:21 P.M. –  “Housekeeping” enters our room to turn “down the bed.”  (And leave candy), departing at 6:29 P.M., when the door is once again “Fully Secured.”

December 31, 2018 – 7:38 P.M. – We return from the downstairs New Year’s Eve Banquet, leaving the door closed but, this time, not “Fully Secured” upon re-entry.  We remain in the room, awake or asleep for the rest of the night. 

January 1, 2019 – 7:45 A.M. – “Honey, I think we’ve been robbed.”

And that’s it.

Confirming the robbery was the fact that the “Fraud Squad” alerted us to “suspicious transactions” on our Bank of America “Debit Card”, conducted on 1/1/19.  Safeway:  $412.46 (declined.)  Safeway:  $77.85 (approved.)  And Boost Mobile (which we were later informed was for a throwaway “Burner Phone”):  $100 (approved.)

There were other “suspicious transactions” attempted on our credit cards (until we judiciously cancelled them), one of which later in the day was – get this! – The perpetrators ordered food delivered by “The Bite Squad” from our actual hotel!

Now that’s Hawaiian Hutzpah!  (Actually “Hawaiian Chutzpah”, but I like the alliteration.)

To this date, none of the salient “leads” have been fully investigated.  (Safeway requires a detective’s subpoena to release the relevant surveillance footage.)

But here’s what we know.

Our room was burglarized between 6:10 P.M. on December 31^st and 6:30 or so A.M., when we woke up the following morning.

Pursuant to this established “Time Line”, the choice of possible perpetrators are:

“Housekeeping” and/or their nefarious accomplices.

And visiting “Hooligans”, who, pushing on all the doors, found one not “Fully Secured”, entered our hotel room sometime during the night while we were in there, and robbed us.

From those available options, which one immediately seems more likely?

“Housekeeping”, right?

They had independent access to our hotel room while we were downstairs, sampling the overpriced buffet.  By less likely contrast, “Hooligans” had to risk being caught pushing on doors and entering a darkened room where people are sleeping and carrying off their belongings. 

Okay, so it was “Housekeeping.”

No.

At least not according to hotel “Security Chief” Joseph, who told us,

“Our employees have too much at stake to risk such imperiling activity.”  Ditto for ordering delivered food from the hotel.

Okay, so then it was “Hooligans.”   

No.

Why would visiting hotel guests try to buy four hundred and twelve dollars worth of groceries?  There is no place to put them.  The room’s refrigerators are miniscule.

So then it was definitely “Housekeeping.”

No.

“Hooligans”, I was informed in a subsequent call from Hawaii (“5-0”?) detective Michael Thompson, have been known to use burglarized property to buy “Gift Cards” at supermarkets, and then treat themselves to a party in a hotel room, secured specifically for that purpose.

So it was “Hooligans.”  But not affluent visiting “Hooligans.”  Indigenous “Hooligans.”

Maybe.

I mean, breaking into an occupied room in the middle of the night?

The “Finger of Guilt” moves inexorably back to “Housekeeping.”

Except we’re liberals. 

With little enthusiasm to blame hard-working people.

And that’s that.  Two categories of “suspects”, both of whom could either have done it or not done it.  The case remains open, anticipating a breakthrough. 

I am thinking of one case-cracking “loose end” that you yourselves may be able to help with.

Amongst the belongings in my purloined Major Dad commemorative shoulder bag was my ubiquitous traveling notebook, in which I jot down possible post ideas that suddenly come to me.

You read blogs.  I’m figuring, if you come across one that feels naggingly similar to this one,

We’ve got ‘em!

Other indignities aside, I would hate to think someone’s stealing my material.

Especially someone with more readers than I have.