I was wrapping up a fun fab Friday that mirrored the fun fab week I’ve been having when my cell phone rang. It was my mom-in-love. She said “the police called”… well that was all it took to shut down the fun fab stuff. Nothing good ever comes from a sentence that starts with “the police called”.
For those of you who are foolish enough to think that Howard County is a peaceful, quiet place where everyone and everything is totally safe….press the reset button, Boo. Crime happens here too. My husband’s very basic 2011 Honda (the one that doesn’t even have power locks) was broken into yesterday while quietly waiting his return from work. It was parked at one of the local commuter bus parking lots. My mom-in-love said that his car window was busted and the bastards-my word not hers- stole his airbag. I made the ‘Huh?’ face while she explained the scenario. ARGH!!!! Like we really need to deal with this. This is so frustrating. It’s not frustrating because we have to wait for the police to find the bastards (again my words not theirs). Let’s face it. They probably never will. It’s frustrating because of the inconvenience of it all. The phone calls to the insurance company. The retrieval of the police report. The picking up and dropping off of a rental car. The uneasy feeling of knowing you’ve been violated. And who among us working class folks has $250 for a deductible just idling in their bank account with no set purpose at all?
In general, Howard County doesn’t have a high rate of theft from automobiles compared to some other parts of the world so I will hold off calling my real estate agent. In 2010, theft of auto parts totaled 830 which was down 16% from the previous year (I would like to see more recent stats become available though). The crime rate overall is the lowest it’s been in five years too. I didn’t understand why anyone would steal air bags. I called a couple of friends of mine from my city girl days in DC; one is an auto mechanic, the other is a police officer. They both explained to me that air bags are a hot commodity particularly on late model cars. They said that you can get a good chunk of $$ for them and that some junk yards will pay bastards to steal them from cars. How creative.
So if you have been in the dark about theft like me consider yourself warned. Thieves I mean bastards are steal valuables, money, and air bags from your car.
Thanks for reading!!