Gasoline and Italian Food

This past weekend, Joy and I discovered something quite nice: Joy's debit card had been stolen and was making purchases. I noticed a few days prior that there were some purchases at gas stations, but I just didn't think much about it. Looking back, if I had looked closely, I would have seen that there had been about $150 worth of gas, which, as high as prices may be, is still a lot more than it takes to fill the Jetta. Anyway, I didn't look closely, and then two days later I was online at our account again (doing what Joy and I call a "drive-by," where we drive by Panera in order to have internet access) and noticed that someone had been to Go Roma and spent $33.10. Well, I was dang sure that I hadn't had any chicken marsala any time recently, and I was pretty sure Joy hadn't either. So I asked her, and indeed, that is when we realized that Joy's debit card was missing and being used.

All in all, we don't think it should be a big deal. We've already talked to our bank (who shall remain anonymous, just in case others out there have pertinent account information) and we should get reimbursed for everything. The total amount charged was about $275, all of it gasoline and the one Italian meal.

We did call the police to report it and we were immediately told to call 9-1-1. This was when Joy started freaking out. Yes, freaking. She kept going on about how she's never called 9-1-1, she just couldn't call 9-1-1, etc., etc. It really was amusing. Well she pressed the buttons, hung up before she hit send, and then tried again. This time she allowed herself to make the call, and Joy's first words to the operator were, "This is not an emergency." Well, Joy explained why we were calling and the operator then confirmed our address (also undisclosed at this moment to the general public) and said she was sending over a police officer. You better believe Joy freaked out this time. I did a little bit too. We ran around the apartment cleaning up, trying to put away baskets of clean clothes, making the bed (I said we had to make the bed just in case there was a routine check under the bed for bodies), and I even changed out of the old t-shirt I was wearing to a respectable polo. Appearance is everything, right?

The officer came and got the information, wrote a report, and pretty much said it wasn't worth their leg-work to try to catch the culprits. We figured as much, but we were bummed, because let's just say, we had worked out some pretty dang good plans and strategies and even had a wall of suspects made. We are so Law & Order. Perhaps our favorite part of our entire time with the cop was when he said, "So, how do you like living here?" (For those of you who don't know, our apartment area is...well...just a little sketchy.) Joy and I both kinda laughed, rolled our eyes, and said that it was fine. Then the cop said, "Yeah, whenever I meet normal people living here I wonder what they must think." We took that as a compliment.

So it could be the world is out to get us. In two weeks we've taken on both TB and banking fraud. But we are not down. Oh no. If anything, we are ready for battle. Well, I should say that we'll be ready for battle just as soon as they refund our money and we're ready to open up.