Here we go again.

[randomness]

About 3:40AM I heard a thump and crunch outside, followed by what sounded like male teenage laughter. By the time I got out of the house and to the car, they were gone.

I took a look at the car. "I hope they haven't smashed the driver's side mirror," I thought. They hadn't.

What they had done is to take a baseball bat to the rear window, leaving a smashed rear window, a dented rear corner pillar, and probably damage to the rear door itself.

I called the police. About an hour later a cruiser came by with officer K. Thomas. He said that usually when kids went around playing mailbox baseball there would be a string of damaged cars and mailboxes, and while he hadn't seen any on his way around the neighborhood he figured there'd be some reports in the morning. We agreed that the damage was likely over $2000. He also agreed with the idea of waiting until morning before moving the car. If we move it the broken glass will just fall in, and we'd like to be able to take photos of it in daylight for the insurance company.

I guess I'll find out if the insurance adjusters work Saturdays.

Photos to follow after the sun comes up.

Comments

[lokie]

at least from your posts, you (materially) seem to be having the wrong kind of luck :(

[randomness]

I just hope the superstition that these things come in threes doesn't apply! :)

[dpolicar]

Bugger.
I'm sorry. I hope the subsequent dealing is as painless as possible.

[r-ness.livejournal.com]

Thanks. It's all kind of routine at this point, given how many times I've had it happen.

[r-ness.livejournal.com]

Why do people vandalize anyone?

I'm no one special, not in this regard, anyway.

[koshmom.livejournal.com]

That just sucks. Why is your car such a target? Or is it just the neighborhood?

[r-ness.livejournal.com]

Seven times in three different cars, in three different states. I don't think it's me or the neighborhood, really.

Correction, four states.

[koshmom.livejournal.com]

They'd likely sneak up on the camera and whack it. :)

[r-ness.livejournal.com]

Actually the husband of one of my ex's did that and caught someone smashing their mailbox. Cops arrested the vandal with the evidence.

So it *can* work.

[theloriest.livejournal.com]

Argh! Jackasses!!

I wish you luck with smooth dealings with the insurance and getting your car fixed.

[serendipity9000.livejournal.com]

Good grief! So sorry! What an awful thing to wake up to.

[agrimony.livejournal.com]

Yuck. I'm so sorry, hon. :(

[eac.livejournal.com]

That's awful. Is it your car particularly?

[r-ness.livejournal.com]

Can't imagine it is. I mean, it's got out of state plates, so that might be something. But I think it's more just that it was parked on the street in a quiet suburban neighborhood with bored kids.

There are other cars on the street, but we're parked in ones and twos. The cop I talked to said he expected they'd be getting more reports as people discovered damage.

[lillibet.livejournal.com]

Grr!

I saw a couple of teenagers over in Somerville knocking down construction sandwich boards--I watched to see if they did the one with a light and/or next to a car and since they didn't, I didn't call the cops. But this kind of stupid vandalism really pisses me off.

Are you on The Arlington List? I mention it specifically because a message alerting people that this happened is traditional there, but also because I think you might enjoy it. It's pretty high volume, but you have the option of setting it to "no mail" and checking it out on the web at your leisure, or you can shunt it into a separate gmail label and just delete all unread if you get behind (I read mine whenever it hits 50 conversations and usually find 3-4 that interest me). After a couple of decade of having my community defined largely electronically, I find that matching an electronic community to my geographical one has made me feel much more connected to where I live. And it's great for advice on service people, ways to buy/sell stuff cheaply, information about local news/issues/elections.

And, again, my sympathies on the current violation and its attendant hassle.

[digitalemur.livejournal.com]

This happened out in Holyoke, not in Arlington.

[lillibet.livejournal.com]

Aha! Well, good to know.

[digitalemur.livejournal.com]

Is it bad that my first thought, upon finding out this had happened in front of my house, was, "good thing I'm planning on buying one of those swing-arm mailboxes?"

I think this street is just a good place for mailbox baseball, which I sort of already knew. But now I'm looking out the window every time I hear a car. There have been some pretty bold burglaries on this block in the last 2 weeks, too. It's actually reassuring when r_ness happens to be around and is up for much of the night.

[sarakate.livejournal.com]

Is it bad that my first visualization of "swing-arm mailboxes" was "Ooh, a quintain! Perfect!"

[r-ness.livejournal.com]

So, the last time this happened it was my passenger side mirror being torn off on Willow St. in Somerville. That was clearly vandalism because it was on the side away from the street, by the sidewalk.

That may have been the same lot as the sandwich board people, or it may not.

[chris-warrior.livejournal.com]

GAH. and the fact that this is routine, just floor me. :)

[evilbunnymayhem.livejournal.com]

oh that's just sucktastic.
*hugs*
Here's hoping the lil buggars get whooped at some point... this is a *regular*???? thing? What because it's an old Toyota?
wtf?

[r-ness.livejournal.com]

Actually, it's now a fairly recent RAV4. New car to me.

Counting it up, cars I've driven have been vandalized or broken into seven times in four different states. I park on the street a lot, particularly when visiting people, but also until recently at home. It's a fairly regular thing if you don't have a driveway to park in, I think.

So I don't think it's the car.

[evilbunnymayhem.livejournal.com]

Yeah but ANYtime I want to visit anyone in the ville I park on the street- as does Ben and now Matt....
far as I know this is more anomaly than regular routine. Least I hope so (for my cars sake anyhow). Man, you gotta wonder. Aren't video games enough? Can't they just go spray paint a mailbox? wtf?

[r-ness.livejournal.com]

Actually, the time my car got vandalized along the street in Somerville it was part of an incident where a whole string of cars got hit.

Usually that's the way it goes; bored kids smashing a whole string of cars, mailboxes, etc. and then nothing until the next set of bored kids.

Wrong place at the wrong time, is all.

In a way it's an anomaly, in that kids don't do this every day; but it's routine in that it happens every so often and it's not particularly targeted.

[kenjari.livejournal.com]

Crap. I am wishing some poetic justice on those jerks. I also hope that the insurance process goes smoothly.

[denyse.livejournal.com]

How annoying! Hope that insurance handles it quickly.

[sarakate.livejournal.com]

Honest to god, some people's children. WTF would make kids think that was even any fun to do?

[r-ness.livejournal.com]

Yeah. The officer's reaction was, "Parenting. That's the problem."

Well, fuck

[drwex]

I'm really sorry to hear this.

[gosling.livejournal.com]

Ick.