Stay in School

During the evening of the 23rd, someone broke into four large storage containers we have at church. The containers are the type you see on cargo ships. I made the discovery when I went out to one of the containers to get a sawhorse. I noticed all four doors open and then saw all the locks laying on the ground. The locks were all inside steel boxes designed to protect the lock from shenanigans such as this. But they must have used a small bolt cutter to get inside the boxes. I opened the first container and noticed the weed-wacker that is always in the way was missing. I called the local police department. I knew this would be an exciting day.

Our initial guess at the amount of the loss was over $2000. The tool container was a mess as they tipped over everything and rummaged through the tools we use for relief and missions work. It was hard to tell what was missing in all that mess. I made my way through all the containers and what upset me most was that they took four of our inflatable jump houses and slides. We were missing several other big ticket items but come on, steal jump houses from a church?

Be sure to click on the following links to see related photos.

I began to look around outside and noticed that they filled a shopping cart with the blowers used to inflate the games. At least three blowers were missing. Then I saw they took out a couple of kiddie pools. I started walking toward the fence at the back of our property. Halfway to the fence I noticed three tents they took.

Our back property borders a freeway and a converted railroad bed now paved called the Joe Rodota trail. It’s a popular place for children, families and meth addicts. When I got to our back gate, I saw it had been pried open and one of our inflatable games was sitting next to the gate. I had found the getaway route. I suspected a neighbor.

Yesterday we received a call from the Sonoma County Sheriff. It seems that on an unrelated arrest warrant they found our name written on several items and they wanted us to come and identify the goods. On the porch we saw an angry young man in handcuffs looking a bit upset and a lot like meth addict. He seemed to be angry with us. The cuffs and all the questions were making him late for something.

Immediately we found several of the missing items outside, including one of the water slides they had in their front yard. Please remember that crime is stupid and so are the people who commit them. The water slide was plugged in using one of our extension cords. A quick look on the patio revealed tons of our stuff. Then the police let us into the house to see if anything in there was ours.

It was my first time inside a real meth home. My wife, who is a social worker, goes into these houses all the time, often with a police escort. It was sparsely furnished and a bit untidy. Inside the gentleman's room I found our nacho cheese pump, the tortilla chip warmer, and one of our tents. His cell phone was on the bed and it kept ringing. He had a line of brand new shoes, about 8 pair. He didn’t seem like the shoe type. I suspect they were prizes from local stores.

After spending a couple hours of quality time as guests in this fine home we were told that we could pack up our goods. As we rolled up one of our extension cords, the nice meth addict man got upset with the officer and told him that the cord was his, "Hey, they're stealing my cord." Had I known he said this I would have asked the man, "Have you ever of the word, 'Irony?'"

Speaking of irony. Please look at the following photo. Take note of the house number on the post near the back of the fridge (another newly acquired appliance). That’s right. The house number of the man who robbed the church was 666.

Then the officers had us take a walk around the property. It was very overgrown. Hiding in the brush were all kinds of pot plants. The estate looked like a campground. It was filled with ratty tents. Next to many of the tents were deep holes. Next to most of these holes was people poop. I guess meth addicts have a hard time hitting the hole, unless they stand inside the hole and poop outside the hole. I guess the latter would make sense if strung out on meth. The tents were filled with half bottles of Gatorade and Red Bull. I didn’t find anything but I did acquire a severe case of the heebie-jeebies.

As we started to leave I decided to walk the bike trail back to church in case they dropped anything. I didn't go far when I found the lid to the nacho machine, our blue wheelbarrow, and one of our inflatable water slides on the corner of their property. We loaded that stuff up and I headed back down the trail. I found nothing on the trail other than more meth tents, more human poopy, a lot more Gatorade and power drinks, misc. clothing items and more poop next to the sides of deep holes.

We brought everything back to church. An hour later a police technician showed up and dusted everything for fingerprints. It was a long process but he got several prints. We tucked everything away using our new super-sized hardened locks. I am certain this story is not over. We will probably get called into court. I am certain I will have more to share after that experience.


I recalled the words of one of the officers. He said, “Someday I’m going to bring my children to a house like this and tell them, ‘Stay in school.’”

Heart Surgery

After a few weeks of waiting, I was summoned to a hospital in Santa Clara, CA. That’s about a two hour drive south from where we live. My original surgical appointment was for 8:30 am. A couple days before they bumped it up to 6:30 am. No problem since traffic would be nothing at that time in the morning. We awoke at 3:30 am, hopped in the van and Sheri slept the entire way.

I checked in and got my hospital bracelet. They brought me to my bed and I changed into my hospital gown leaving me free and breezy. After a little problem finding a vein (they forgot I was dehydrated from asking me not to drink anything since 10 pm the night before), they stuck me good and I was all set. Then they informed me that another doctor took “my” surgery room without permission and that I would have to wait 2 hours for it to open up. So, we got up two hours early for nothing.

At 9:30 the nice nurses informed me the room was ready and that it was time. My wife gave me a kiss (in case I died) then ran off to find some breakfast and do some shopping. The hospital was brand new and still smelled of paint. I was transferred to a very thin bed on wheels. They hooked me up to an IV and started giving me a series of injections meant to put me asleep. Nothing worked but I did feel a little light-headed. I could hear them talking about being amazed I wasn’t asleep and wondering if was safe to give me more. They decided to play it safe and leave me awake but groggy. I knew the next couple of hours would be real interesting.

Now comes the part not safe for children or conservative Victorians. Because they were entering my heart thru my femoral artery, my “region” needed to be prepared. This was a first for me, but since I was drugged, I didn’t care. I could feel them moving the furniture around and could hear and feel a Norelco working away. I knew this would lead to an interesting recovery.

My Stanford and Harvard trained doctor then gave me a painful and stinging shot of Novocain right in the groin. I thought that stuff wasn’t supposed to hurt. Again, the numbing medicine was not enough so when he started to stab me I must have reacted and he gave me a double dose. Then he pressed some sort of disk very hard onto the site. Shortly thereafter, I could feel a wire snaking up my torso and into my heart. It didn’t hurt but I could feel it. He then put two more leads in. The first wire was a pacemaker, the second was an electrical sensor, and the third had a microwave tip on it.

Then the real fun began. We warned me that my heart would start doing strange things. He was right. It started beating quickly, strangely, and in odd rhythms. Twice, they flat-line me and I passed out. Each time a nice nurse woke me up by digging her knuckles into my chest, “Scott, are you alright?” On the outside the Minnesota Nice part of me said, “Yes, I’m doing great!” But the in-your-face-honest Californian part of me was thinking, “Dear God, you just pressed a couple of keys on your computer and stopped my heart. That means dead! I wonder what my wife is buying at Target?” During parts of the procedure I was able to place my head at an angle where I would see the monitor that displayed my heart and the three wires inside. I could see the doctor was moving them around, sitting at his desk, with the use of a joystick. And the buttons he was hitting made my heart dance.

The entire procedure took a couple of hours. The doctor finished then the nurses took over. They cleaned me up, bandaged me, then scooted me over onto my recovery bed. They took me back to recovery and told me that they had been trying to call my wife but she wasn’t answering her phone. My wife still does not understand how to answer a cell phone or retrieve messages. She only knows how to call out and ask me, “Why didn’t you call me?”

I decided to take a little nap. An hour later my wife arrived wondering why she hadn’t been called. I looked at her, smiled, then fell back to sleep. They made me lay there, completely flat and immobile for 4 hours. They fed me a chicken croissant and two cans of cranberry juice. I kept waking up as about every 30 minutes they lifted my gown for a peek.

When my four hours were up a nurse took me for a little walk. She made sure I was stable enough to go home after all that sedative they gave me. I thanked the crew and they took me outside in a wheelchair. Game over.

I’ve now been in bed for a couple of days. I’ve discovered the joys of Gold Bond Medicated Powder. My heart hasn’t run any marathons without me and my leg and incision site are really sore. But all is well until the next medical adventure.