I was in Park City, UT at Sundance after having watched a full day of White Guilt films when I got a voicemail from Brugos. He said he had some bad news. He wasn't exaggerating. My first thought was that something had happened to Tobe so it wasn't THAT bad. But even though everyone I love is still OK, it still sucks to get robbed.

I freaked out a little bit and decided to fly home early. I knew I wouldn't be able to get my mind off it at Sundance and there was so much to do now. If there was any hope of catching these guys, we'd have to turn the police report in ASAP, so back to Seattle I came. Part of me really wanted to stay at the festival. Those Film Threat guys are so much fun and Bill Pullman was there somewhere. But most of me wanted to wrap my arms around Brugos as soon as possible and then start sifting through the wreckage.

Brugos came home from work on Friday but stayed in the front room for a couple of minutes, straightening up from poker the night before. When he went into the kitchen, he saw that the window and back door were open and there was a pile of DVDs on the floor, leading him to believe that the perpetrators were still there when he arrived home. Immediately, he understood what happened and called the police. Not surprisingly, they weren't much help. Our officer didn't really look for fingerprints (though he found a partial print on the window) even though they should be all over the place. They opened every drawer in our bedroom. There should be some on the back door. There should be at least one or two. But no, Chief Wiggum was more interested in the hookah we had in the corner, from which we have never smoked anything but hookah tobacco. Thanks, officer.

I think that the assholes were probably scoping out the neighborhood beforehand because they knew to park in the Mormon parking lot on Friday during work hours. I guess one of our windows wasn't properly latched but I'm not sure if they would have left us alone if we hadn't had a window open of if they would have broken a window to get in. Either way, in they came and this is what they took:

-My Mac G4
-My Dell monitor
-2 external 1TB hard drives (containing our music and pictures)
-All of the cameras they could find
-My jewelry boxes
-Half of my DVD's
-Papers, bills, checks and bank statements

At first glance, I thought perhaps they would be pretty disappointed with their haul. My mac was 5 years old and I didn't really own any expensive jewelry. Just some sentimental stuff. There were actually several rings in there from VENDING machines. Most of the cameras they took were broken in some way. One of them was a VHS camcorder that once belonged to my dad…in 1988. This thing weighs, like, 20 pounds and the battery won't hold a charge. I wish I could be a fly on the wall when they tried to sell that. As for my DVD's, that was where the real money was. They took a lot of British imports and limited edition DVD's and when I totaled up all the ones that were missing, 61 DVDs came to a $2100 value. Of course, these are all second-hand now so I don't know what the resale will be, but buying them back (if I decide to do so) will not be cheap. Luckily, Brugos has homeowner's insurance. For some reason, they also felt the need to take EVERY ARTICLE OF MY CLOTHING from both the closet and the my dresser and throw it on the floor in a pile. I feel like they could have stolen more if they hadn't taken the time to be such dicks about messing up my room.

Of course, we have canceled all of our credit cards and changed our banking information etc. They had to know we would do that right away. Maybe they thought they could do a little shopping before we came home. They may have thought we were out of town because we had our recycling out early.

We're definitely going to be beefing up security around here, including putting curtains on all the windows on the first floor. I never noticed before, but you can see really well into this house if you walk around the whole thing. I hate that they have contributed to my increasing fear of living in this city. First the woman who died on New Year's Eve and now this. It's just stuff, of course, and I don't know if they were armed or what they would have done if they'd come across a person in the house. I don't really have anything profound to say about it either. Just that it happened and it sucks but I suppose it could have been worse.

January 21, 2008
Categories: Dear Diary . . Author: Baxter . Comments: Leave a comment

January 2, 2008
Categories: Dear Diary . . Author: Baxter . Comments: Leave a comment

I am not comfortable making New Years resolutions in general because I feel like it is a way to make excuses NOT to do something. (e.g. I will quit smoking…AFTER the New Year). If you want to change something about yourself, why not just start right away? That said, the end of one year and the beginning of another does bring about personal scrutiny. There are some things that have come to light for me lately that I would like to change and I am starting now. I won't call them resolutions. But I will put them in list-form because that is a method that usually motivates me.

Starting now, I will:

*CONSUME LESS CRAP. This means drinking less and eating less bad food. This includes saying no to the 2am nacho or french fry. If have only had a drink or two at 2am, I will certainly be less inclined to want the nacho.
*EXERCISE MORE. I have always been pretty good about doing something exercisey every day, but I haven't been very good about cardio since winter hit. I will do more cardio. 3 times a week, at least, I will DDR. Dance Dance Revolution is actually a good means of getting cardio, unlike Wii tennis, which seems to only work out your right forearm. My right forearm is my only muscle that doesn't really need a workout.
*PAY CLOSER ATTENTION TO MY POSTURE. I've seen my shoulders hunched in pictures lately. I've never had great posture but it seems to have gotten worse. I need to pay more attention to where my head and shoulders are at any given moment. Feel free to correct me if you see me slumping. I may say “Thanks, mom” but, like most motherly advice, I know it will be for my own good.
*STRETCH. My back is getting worse. I really need to get back to yoga class. But barring that, I know the yoga positions that will make my back feel better. Lying on the couch in front of the TV isn't one of them.
*LISTEN TO MY BODY. If my body feels really horrible after a night of drinking sugary drinks, I shouldn't rinse and repeat the following Saturday night. If I am full but really want to eat that last quarter of delicious burrito, I SHOULDN'T eat that last quarter of burrito. The pain in my stomach will be worse than my sadness over wasting a quarter of a delicious burrito.
*DO EVERYTHING IN MODERATION. This will become my new mantra. It should help with everything else on the list. Feel free to remind me of this the next time you see me ordering my 6th drink on a Tuesday.

I will not:
*Let Seasonal Affective Disorder be an excuse for not doing something I know I should do (as in everything on the above list).

HAPPY 2008!

January 2, 2008
Categories: Dear Diary . . Author: Baxter . Comments: Leave a comment