Another Visitor

You may remember when we first got here and we had a visitor who apparently slept on our front porch and changed his clothes . . ALL his clothes . . very early the next morning and either hadn’t noticed or didn’t care that we had cameras. He sat down, on the steps, ate a package of crackers, picked up all his stuff, even the cracker wrapper, and left. We didn’t know til we looked at the camera feed at breakfast.

A day or so later we were eating at a local place and sheriff’s deputies were in there eating. We showed them the pictures. They knew him . . called his name! Said they would talk to him. Apparently they talk to him often about “issues”.

Several months later, Addie was here and she was sitting in the living room. I was in the kitchen and she said “Granny! There’s someone at the door.” I went to the door and no one was there. Apparently he heard her yell to me but I looked at the camera and he had a glass breaking tool in his hand and was apparently planning to break the side glass if no one came to the door. It just so happened that Vince was coming home and met the guy in the driveway. They had a “heart to heart” talk but Vince also went down to the police station, talked to the Chief who told Vince he would go talk to him. As far as we know, he hasn’t been back.

But, yesterday evening Vince was taking a bath and I was out in the garden working. It was almost 6 p.m. When Vince came downstairs about 7:30, he said “The doorbell rang while I was in the tub.” I looked at the camera and, dang it! It was someone who probably should not have been there. Our doorbell camera is not a Ring camera and it looks very much like a regular doorbell. He must have looked at it from a distance and decided it was not a camera but he walked up the steps, turned towards the doorbell to ring it, realized it was a camera and very quickly turned his back to the camera. That movement pretty much confirmed that he was up to no good. Standing sideways, still with his back to the camera, he knocked hard on the door 7 times and really, as he was hitting that last knock, he was quickly leaving. I thought . . that looked a little suspect. I’m betting he heard the dogs barking and decided this was not going to be a welcoming home. For whatever reason, I’m glad he left and didn’t decide to figure out how to let himself inside.

I wrote my neighbor and sent her his picture and asked her if she knew him or if he had been to her house. She sent me this:

In early May when we were in Louisiana, the neighbor called me to see if some guy had just been over here. I told her we were in Louisiana. She said they were also out of town but he was at their house right then . . she saw it on her cameras. She said she would call the Sheriff and tell him we were both out of town.

I thought that was the end of it but he’s now been back. I called the Sheriff’s office and they offered to come out but he was gone and I knew they had bigger fish to fry. A deputy called me back today and said they got other calls about a suspicious acting person in our area last night and “made contact” with him and asked us to call them if he comes back.

I find it really frustrating that people cannot behave themselves and leave folks alone.

We were in Texas almost 10 years and never had anything like this happen. Of course, it would have been pretty scary to come all the way back to where our house was and with the gate and fence, it wasn’t very welcoming to a trespasser. When we lived in MO the first time, one night about midnight someone rang our doorbell. Vince jumped up to go to the door. I said “Don’t open the door!” Of course, he opened the door. I think the guy had been drinking and he wanted to use our phone. Vince said no . . tell me who you want to call and give me the number and I’ll call them. He wouldn’t so Vince suggested he keep walking!

But here, we haven’t even been here four years and this is two different people coming to our door on three occasions that we’ve been home. We don’t live in a bad area although there are people with mental issues or drug/alcohol issues everywhere I guess. Doesn’t make me feel very good about being here but I’m not sure there are many safe places left.

Last night I was checking cameras about every hour. I had turned the sensitivity up on them so they would be sure to capture anything that moved and about 4 a.m., it got windy and every camera went off and I had turned on the notifications. Scared me half to death and I never went back to sleep. I told Vince he has guard duty tonight. I’m turning my phone off and going to sleep . . but I won’t.