Sorry to steal my title from Coach Robb's thread. About all I can do at this point is try and make light of the situation.

Last saturday night my wife and I decided to get out of the house for a while and went to see a play. We returned home at 11pm or so to find one of our cats sitting outside the front door. Quite strange, since none of the cats are allowed outside. Thank goodness he was too scared to go anywhere, probably would have been eaten by a coyote or an owl.

Upon entering the house we found the door leading to the garage open as well. Inside the garage was a pile of broken glass. Someone had smashed out the window of the back door and entered the house. They were already gone, and had taken their booty with them. First thing I noticed was the cameras. One was my digital. not particularly fancy, I use it for taking fishing and mountain biking photos. They also got my two 35mm SLR cameras. These weren't worth a lot either, however one of them had been given to me by my late grandfather and the other was given to me by my father. Both were of far more value to me than the dollar amounts.

Upon closer inspection we found they had taken my alarm clock, (Who the h*ll steals an alarm clock??)our nice cordless drill (though they left the spare battery and charger that were sitting next to it.) my checkbook, a couple inexpensive watches, a couple of fishing tackle boxes (with a LOT of expensive fishing lures in them) and a few other smaller things. They also raided the fridge, eating a bowl of pudding and almost half a brick of Tillimook cheese. And they made of with half a case or so of beer.

They left behind all the [i]real[/] valuable things; guns, video game systems, computers, cell phones.

Over the following days we have been finding things here and there that we hadn't yet noticed were missing. Last night I sat down to do a bit of fly tying only to discover that they had made off with my tying kit. It wasn't valuable or anything, I think I paid $20 for the whole thing, vice and tools, etc. but it really ****** me off.
I guess now would be a good time to upgrade to a nice DanVise or something like that...

In the end, it was all just "stuff." My wife and cats are okay and that's what matters. It pains me to leave the house with her there alone now, although as an armed enforcement officer she is more than capable of taking care of herself. It's hard to feel comfortable knowing that they were in there.

I'm by no means a confrontational or aggressive person, but were I to ever find out who did this, I don't know what I would do. Quite possibly something that I would later regret.

The big stinker in all this is that we do not have renters insurance. I do, however, have the paperwork sitting on my desk to purchase it. Just hadn't had the time to get it done. Guess I'd better make time now.