Car Talk

Whether it's because I criticized the Washington Metropolitan Area Transit Authority in a post below or whether it's because it's been over a month since the election and some guy still hasn't received his unicorn and lollipop tree, I don't know, but the fact remains that my jeep was burglarized in the Metro parking lot some time yesterday.

The thief knew exactly what he was doing: Quick slash through the canvas on the driver's side door, reach in to unlock, jimmy open the (locked) glove box and center consol, proceed to plunder. Of course, I'm not half fool enough to leave anything valuable in so flimsy a container, and all the guy got away with was a couple rolls of quarters that I keep for emergency toll booth use. For some reason, he didn't bother with the radio or my CD's.

Still, these little acts of random barbarity are very, very annoying.

When I called Metro security this morning - not because I expected to get anything, but just because I thought they might want to know for security purposes - the fellah explained that they couldn't take vandalism reports over the phone in a voice that came as close to saying, "Screw you, pal" as one can without using the actual words.

Whatever.

The slash in the door canvas is about ten inches long. I wish the guy had struck a couple months earlier, as I just recently put a new top on. I'll be damned if I'm going to do that again any time soon, so I'm just going to duct tape the thing from the inside for now.