Worked another long day yesterday, though not quite as lookit-the-horse long as the day before, and at the end of it had several small, distracting tasks to get out of the way. Very distracting tasks, it would seem: I packed up the scooter, buzzed home, popped open the garage door, unpacked, and had made it as far as the (well-fenced) back yard when I went looking for my house keys.
404: keys not found.
Not to worry, purse has many compartments, search, search... Nada. Did I lock the garage...? Yep. Back door? Locked. Gate? Padlocked. Prisoner Of The Back Yard! ("You are Number Six"[1]) Oh, poo. Doorbell? No response. Aw, ratters.
Celphone, then, I'll just telephone. Tam's car was in the garage, after all, and so was her bicycle... Dialing. Ringing. Ringing, ringing. Distant door slam, then, "Hellllooh?"
"Tam? RX. Kinda, well, kinda locked in the back yard."
"Hmmm? I'll let you in."
I checked the garage, the various compartments of my scooter, the driveway, took my purse just about apart and came to the conclusion my keys were at work. Called down there, nobody'd seen 'em. (Hot-pink lanyard with a black bead in the form of a tiny skull, they're hard to overlook).
At this point, I'm fallin' asleep but fretful. Bribed Tam ("I'll buy Boogie Burgers!") to take me back to work, where a careful search turned up nothing, at which point I turned up at my locker, big[2] bolt cutters in hand. It took five tries -- I would go and buy a decent padlock -- and when the door was opened, there, next to my coffee cup and spare quad-ruled steno pad[3], were my keys.
I know how I did it; I even know why. What I can't account for is why I never put a spare padlock key on another key ring, as is my usual rule for items[4] I might lock keys in while away from home.
Oh, the excitement! --Still, those Boogie Burgers were good; I had a New York, New York (big wonderful hamburger with lettuce, purple onion, tomato and pastrami and Swiss!) with a vanilla malt while Tam enjoyed grilled Ahi Tuna. And the freshest fries on the planet, arriving almost too hot to eat.
______________________
1. I should not have to explain this.
2. No, bigger than that, even. Way bigger.
3. My fave!
4. Automobiles, for example.
"404: Keys not found" = geek genius! I love it!
ReplyDeleteI also had to use my bolt-cutters yesterday, for the first time, to cut some copper buss-wire for the radio station grounding. Or earthing. Damned things are nearly a meter long; oughta have their own wheels.
ReplyDeleteCrew-served bolt cutters!
ReplyDeleteYou are the new number 2.
ReplyDelete"The Prisoner" fan. Something else to add to the gun blogger check list.
BTW, where do you get a quad ruled steno pad?
ReplyDeleteWow! I knew pizza was a bad choice for dinner last night.
ReplyDeleteM
And old CW4 of my acquaintance referred to bold cutters as the master key.
ReplyDeleteI am NOT a NUMBER
ReplyDeleteI am a free man!
ReplyDeleteI've heard rumours of a remake.
I need to splain a few things to you offline in meatspace someday. As someone who has done locksmithing work there is no need to be ever locked out of anything.
ReplyDeleteAnd I love a girl with a big pair of........
ReplyDelete.....bolt cutters.
Og: Picture a business with a long row of lockers along a hallway that connects two busy halls, each with an entry door from the outside; picture an employer that adopted tiered-access keying early and exensively, now supplemented with cardreaders. Then you'll know why even if I could pick my own lock (and I'd love to learn!), I'd use bolt cutters to get into my locker.
ReplyDeleteCounterclckwise: thank my aged-geek friends, brainwarped by mainframes into forever muttering "[noun] NOT FOUND" when unsuccessfully searching for items like car keys or the cat. I just restyled it for Our Modern Age.
Turk: earthing? Kewlness! Hamshack improvements?
And that leads us to D. W. Drang for the win! "Crew-served bolt cutters." Want!
Rob K (and the other fans of The Prisoner): a remake? Oh, please, please, please not. I had to watch Hollyweird trash The Avengers and Wild, Wild West; what they'd do to The Prisoner would undoubtably bugger description.
Alan: 9" x 6" quad-ruled steno pads: Ampad #42034, which I cannot find at all online. I'm lookin' at one in meatspace right now! (Bought at Staples, FATGTD) I have a newer one by Ampad, 8.5x11, top spiral, heavy paper (20#!), ruled on front and grid on back; the grid shows through the front kind of like engineering-form paper. I think there is a smaller version but can't find it online, either. I blame Sarte for this.
Og, not big enough! Took 5 - 6 tries to chew through the hasp.
ReplyDeleteLess about work than home. I fully understand the reasons why not at work.
ReplyDeleteLearn? Ten seconds. You can't believe it.
Oh yeah, Og's right, not hard at all. I've gotten through keyed pad locks in no time flat with a simple "tool set" and I've only done it a few times. Once you understand the principle, it's so simple.
ReplyDeleteA mini-series of The Prisoner is shooting says io9. And just `cause it's made doesn't mean you have to watch it. I never saw the Wild Wild West movie because I could tell it was going to suck from the commercials. But this could be good.
48" bolt cutters will handle #8 (3/4") rebar, never tried them on a hardened lock shackle, tho...
ReplyDeleteAnymore my handbag is the Black Hole of Calcutta.
ReplyDeleteEr, more like just a black hole. Anyway, if that'd been me in the story, it would have ended with the discovery of keys in purse on about the 37th search. Have been meaning to clean it out for yonks. Maybe today?
Roberta, don't feel too bad, I locked the keys to one of my Kennedy boxes inside it(Don't ask), luckily the box is empty. I don't want to drill the lock cylinder, because the replacement ones from Kennedy are like $70, and I don't know if they're a standard size, so those cheapo jobs at Home Depot may not fit. One of these days I've got to make some picks and pick the lock.
ReplyDeleteOh, Dear God. NOT a remake of The Prisoner. Not, not, not. Please. They'll screw it up. Royally. They will not be able to resist politicizing it.
ReplyDeleteHow about a breaching barrel on a 12 gauge shotgun? (If I lived in a state where I had the ghost of a chance at owning a short-barreled shotgun, I'd want a Remington 870 with about a 14" breaching barrel and an M4 style buttstock.)
Any excuse to see a movie where a guy drives a Lotus Super Seven, even for a few seconds.
ReplyDelete