HH Scares Up Some Trouble

HH scared the bejeebus out of me this afternoon. I had taken the #1 son to church, and, us being Even-Stevenists, decided to balance out the Sunday with a bit of shopping at The Devil's Playground. While sweating like the oldies on a Richard Simmons dvd in that roasting retail pit, I picked up a game camera for HH. You know, a game camera. It takes pictures of animals in the woods. But we're not using it for animals, we're using it for humans. Last Sunday morning, I thought I heard a 4-wheeler down in the woods around 6:30. It was the holiday weekend, so I figured maybe somebody's guest was riding, and couldn't find enough roads, and thought our 20 acres was here for everybody to use at will. Or they could have been riding up the creek, which, though environmentally frowned upon, is perfectly legal, because nobody can own a waterway. Then the plot thickened.

After the wedding rehearsal Friday night, HH granted his number one son permission to sleep in the BARn. All without informing me, mind you, which drives me batty. The dogs went wild in the early morning hours, but I figured they were after some 4-legged critter. They are NOT good watchdogs. The most I've ever heard them bark was at HH himself, walking from the BARn to the Mansion one evening at dusk. Stupid dogs. Saturday morning, after his number one son had already left, HH broke that little tidbit to me. That NOS had awoken in the BARn around 4:00 a.m. to the sound of a 4-wheeler right outside. It stopped. He put on his pants and shoes, but by the time he got downstairs, it had gone.

HH's theory on the 4-wheeler is that if it had been around 1:30 or 2:00 a.m., it was probably our down-the-hill neighbor. Driving home drunk from his buddy up the hill, he might have seen a strange truck at our BARn, and decided to investigate. That's the neighborly thing to do. But with it being at 4:00 a.m., he was ruled out. My theory is that it was somebody up to no good, scouting out the place with some thievin' in mind. After all, we've had a non-working lawnmower stolen from the BARn, and the neighbor has had two 4-wheelers stolen from his barn. That was all several years ago, though. The problem is that with the bridge construction, the county had been routing traffic through our private enclave. Though we are on a road that branches from the detour, you know how people are. People like HH. "I wonder where THAT road goes." I just don't trust people. There has been trash on our branch of the road, too. Only people that live up in here normally use this road, and we certainly don't throw fast-food trash out where we live.

So I bought a $100 game camera, which uses an infrared flash when motion triggers it, and takes digital pictures of the motion. I figured HH would mount it somewhere on the front of the BARn, up high, to get a kind of panoramic view. But no. We're talking about HH. He mounted it on the front of his tractor. What I figure will happen is that the thief will steal the game camera.

Anyhoo, the way HH scared the bejeebus out of me was after he carried in all the groceries. I put them all away while HH said he was going to burn some cardboard trash. After emptying the last bag, I realized that I hadn't unpacked the game camera. I snatched up my new phone and dialed HH. And heard his phone ringing in the living room. Luckily I had Plan B. I summoned The Pony from the depths of the basement, and sent him to find HH and ask if he had the game camera. The Pony completed his mission, reporting that indeed, HH had the camera, and needed 6 D batteries. If he had only bothered to look, I had 6 D batteries in the same bag as the game camera.

But it was a relief that I didn't have to shout at The Devil for a $100 game camera that I purchased and left at the register.