Shattered

About 2am last night, I was awoken by a loud crash, much like breaking glass. I lay awake for a few moments, thinking "hey, that sounded like it was in the building, but what would make a sound like that?" Finally I got out of bed, to take a look around just be on the safe side. I opened the front door to my unit, and glanced into the front stairwell. I must have been pretty groggy, because at first nothing registered as out of the ordinary. Then it registered that the big glass pane of our front door was shattered - giant shards everywhere, both inside and outside. And the stairwell was cold. I didn't see anyone outside, but I heard a man yelling somewhere down the street, and I guessed that he was probably the culprit.

So I ducked back inside and called 911 (I think this was the first time I ever dialed 911), reporting that it looked like someone had thrown himself through our front door, and waited for the police to show up. Took about five minutes, then a squad pulled up, and a lady cop told me they had apprehended a *very* drunk man (known henceforth as "the perp") down the street, and they suspected he had put his skull through our door. Another squad pulled up, this one containing 2 cops and the perp. They transferred the perp to the back seat of lady cop's car, and while doing so they were telling the perp "Look what you did to that door what were you thinking?" Perp was borderline incoherent, he didn't know what they were talking about. Now, this could have been either alcohol, or a concussion, or who knows, maybe both?

Once in the backseat of the squad, perp starts violently trying to kick his way out. By this time there were 2 more squads on the scene. Four cops pulled him out of the car and deposited him on the pavement face down. They were on top of him, because the perp was resisting pretty hard, and he kept yelling "c'mon ... let's go!" As if to goad the cops into fighting him. One of the cops starting putting some kind of secret ninja move on his leg, 'cause he started screaming to "ouch, let go, let go of my leg!" over and over. They must have finally let go of his leg as he eventually quieted down and let them throw him back in the squad.

By this time I starting picking up the worst of the glass (which was everywhere). Lady cop asked if I thought the damage was more than $300 (I said probably) which meant he could be charged with a gross misdemeanor. She asked if I actually saw him do it, which unfortunately I hadn't. This meant he would be booked as a suspect, but not actually as the perp, I guess. I don't really know the details on how this will work - I'll have to call the cops and follow up.

I was given a case number, and the squads took off, leaving me to clean up. The deal with the cops took about 1/2 hour. I picked up most of the glass, then realized I needed to seal the gaping hole, since it's cold outside and I couldn't just leave it wide open. Crap, just what I want to be doing at 3 in the morning. I dug out plastic garbage bags, taped a bunch together, and got to work.

I think it was going on 4 by the time I got back into bed. But I couldn't sleep, just tossed and turned for like an hour and a half. By this time I decided I wasn't going in to work Thursday - someone would need to stick around to get it repaired.

The irony is that I had just gone out to dinner with my friend Jeff this very night, and he was telling me about his experiences as a landlord (for the past year now) and how he hasn't had to deal with any really inconvenient emergency repairs yet. He won't be saying that if the drunks find his place.