Worm
slimy ninja
I will start by saying that I enjoyed remembering the background to this story and I thought it was fun, so I typed it out. Though most of it is not needed to understand our current predicament. Skip to the TLDR if you desire.
This background for this story starts out a couple years ago. My now live-in girlfriend and I were not yet living together… with our 7 kids. Yes, we have 7 kids from our two previous marriages. Four girls for me, 2 boys and a girl for her. This will be relevant later. The night this story began was a New Years Eve. And on this particular New Years Eve the stars had aligned as they sometimes do in a blended family, and we had a night to ourselves, sans kids and responsibilities. So we decided we would do a New Years Eve in a hotel, by ourselves, away from the craziness of our lives.
We book dinner at a local gastro pub and a hotel room nearby, with no other particular plans for the evening. That is how we roll, and it always seems to work out. Dinner is fantastic, the drinks are flowing, and afterwards we make our way over to the hotel and get checked in. We head down to the lobby to check out the bar and see what’s going on. Lo and behold the hotel is holding one of those in-house New Years Eve parties where you dress up and pay way too much per person for an open bar and a terrible DJ. But, there is still the regular bar for us and an open courtyard with fire pits and awesome outdoor seating. We decide there are great options here for the night.
It’s early, maybe 8 or so, and we settle in for a couple drinks at the bar. Side note - hotel bars can be the worst or the absolute best. This was one of the latter - interesting people, great bartender, reasonable drinks, and a great atmosphere. We are having a blast just hanging out. At some point, after reaching a definite yes on the tipsy scale, one of us (still not sure who) suggests that we take an unexpected evening detour to a local store. This particular store has consumer items of the… adult variety. (Aha! Your first glimpse as to where this story is going)
We uber over as to not contribute to the drunk drivers on New Years Eve problem. It’s been a while since I’ve been in a store of this nature and honestly, you people are into some crazy ####. But we have a great time perusing and make some weird friends along the way. My lovely lady decides on an a small, cuddly friend - a Rabbit.
Back at the hotel, we drop our friend off to charge his engines and head down to the courtyard for more drinks! The night is awesome. We have a couple more drinks from the bar and from the courtyard we watch the paid party get kicked into high gear. At some point we decide they are not checking wristbands or ID’s and decide to crash the party. It was a good decision. We make more friends, drink lots of drinks, and count down the New Year in style. At some point find the photo booth. The photo booth guys is checking people off an attendee list so we slip him a ten spot to let us partake. Yes, we were having a good time.
More drinks at the fire pits with our new friends and we are now both drunk. Things get a little crazy in the courtyard, shots abound, and we eventually leave the hard core partying to the youngsters. We retire to our room to hang out with our new friend we brought home from the store. Yada yada yada. I’d give it a 5/5 Amazon rating with a glowing review. Fun times.
TLDR starts here-ish:
Fast forward to about a year and a half ago, we buy a house together and form our own little Brady Bunch. Our friend, the Rabbit, has a cozy spot in an extra pencil pouch type container in the nightstand. He’s fun, and although we have a very healthy relationship in the bedroom, he doesn’t get used all that often. As of the writing of this post I can’t remember when the last time was. At least 6 months if not more. But as of about a few months to a month ago my girlfriend remembers looking around for something in the nightstand and noticeably feeling him in the little pouch.
Well… last night, I am sitting on the couch and she comes over to me and says I have to tell you something. Our oldest daughter is in the room so she has to whisper. “It’s gone” she says. “the Rabbit.” She asks me if I threw it away. Of course not, I tell her. She gives me a look of “Welp”, and pans her eyes over to her 15 year old daughter.
So here we are. The Rabbit is missing. There is no way either of us did anything with it. And we live with 7 kids (1 is back and forth from college). Who could it be? There was other stuff in the drawer, nothing else missing. Interestingly, after a Vegas trip in September I had probably $600 cash left over that was stuck in the same drawer. I have kept track of how much was in there over time and used it for various things. No cash ever went missing and there has been a single $100 bill in there for at least a couple months. It was still in the drawer in plain view when the missing Rabbit discovery was made. So, on to:
The Suspects
Our kids:
18 y.o. son - Lives at college, comes home fairly often. Has been alone in the house recently. There was some sex awareness week at school recently and based on the local Town angry facebook page there are reports of boys on campus “shaking sex toys in the faces of college girls”. Makes you wonder.
16 y.o. son - Literally the perfect kid. Plays a lot of video games but has a 100 average in all his honors classes. Polite. Respectful. Never comes out of his room never mind into someone else’s. Not a suspect.
15 y.o. daughter - Would be voted ‘most likely to get into mischief and lie about it’ out of all the kids. Definite opportunity, being home alone often. Motive? Not sure.
13 y.o. daughter - 2nd most likely kid to get into trouble. Maybe more likely to lie about it. Very little opportunity as she’s not home much alone. Can’t come up with a motive unless it’s to put a video on Tik Tok for some laughs.
11 y.o. daughter - Sweetest kid you’d ever meet. Couldn’t see her going in our room without asking never mind in the nightstand.
8 y.o. daughter #1 - Innocent, awesome kid. She would not start mischief but is susceptible to peer pressure and would join in if pushed. Which leads to…
8 y.o. daughter #2 - Could definitely see this one snooping around where she doesn’t belong and being a little sneaky. Why she would take it I have no idea. I guess it does look like a toy of some sort. She’s also a budding magician so maybe she will pull it out of a hat someday.
Other Suspects
The Cleaning Lady - We don’t really have a cleaning lady but decided to have someone come before Christmas because there was a ton of family coming to town and we didn’t have time to clean. She’d been to the house once before. No one was home while she was here this time, but the $100 was left seemingly untouched.
Uncle Bubba - Uncle Bubba (my girlfriend’s brother) was here with the family over the holidays. Uncle Bubba is the most awesome guy you’ll ever meet. But has Williams Syndrome and functions like an early teenager, and has a penchant for sneakily snatching things that don’t belong to him. He once took a vase full of those decorative marbles when no one was home and when he was caught defeatedly said “I thought they were pretty”. Could he have been snooping and found something that was a pretty color?
The Nephew - 16 y.o. and in town over the holidays as well. Generally a good kid. Only on the list because according to his parents, he has a porn problem. Makes you think.
Friends - Could a friend, at the house for one of our many parties, have been snooping and snatched it for ####s and giggles? @Idiot Boxer and @Foosball God I’m looking at you.
So there we have it. Where is the Rabbit? And what do I do about it? Do we have a family meeting and instruct the perpetrator to ‘return whatever object they took back to the place they took it from’? Do we wait for a picture of it on social media or a ransom note in the mail? Will this mystery ever be solved?
This background for this story starts out a couple years ago. My now live-in girlfriend and I were not yet living together… with our 7 kids. Yes, we have 7 kids from our two previous marriages. Four girls for me, 2 boys and a girl for her. This will be relevant later. The night this story began was a New Years Eve. And on this particular New Years Eve the stars had aligned as they sometimes do in a blended family, and we had a night to ourselves, sans kids and responsibilities. So we decided we would do a New Years Eve in a hotel, by ourselves, away from the craziness of our lives.
We book dinner at a local gastro pub and a hotel room nearby, with no other particular plans for the evening. That is how we roll, and it always seems to work out. Dinner is fantastic, the drinks are flowing, and afterwards we make our way over to the hotel and get checked in. We head down to the lobby to check out the bar and see what’s going on. Lo and behold the hotel is holding one of those in-house New Years Eve parties where you dress up and pay way too much per person for an open bar and a terrible DJ. But, there is still the regular bar for us and an open courtyard with fire pits and awesome outdoor seating. We decide there are great options here for the night.
It’s early, maybe 8 or so, and we settle in for a couple drinks at the bar. Side note - hotel bars can be the worst or the absolute best. This was one of the latter - interesting people, great bartender, reasonable drinks, and a great atmosphere. We are having a blast just hanging out. At some point, after reaching a definite yes on the tipsy scale, one of us (still not sure who) suggests that we take an unexpected evening detour to a local store. This particular store has consumer items of the… adult variety. (Aha! Your first glimpse as to where this story is going)
We uber over as to not contribute to the drunk drivers on New Years Eve problem. It’s been a while since I’ve been in a store of this nature and honestly, you people are into some crazy ####. But we have a great time perusing and make some weird friends along the way. My lovely lady decides on an a small, cuddly friend - a Rabbit.
Back at the hotel, we drop our friend off to charge his engines and head down to the courtyard for more drinks! The night is awesome. We have a couple more drinks from the bar and from the courtyard we watch the paid party get kicked into high gear. At some point we decide they are not checking wristbands or ID’s and decide to crash the party. It was a good decision. We make more friends, drink lots of drinks, and count down the New Year in style. At some point find the photo booth. The photo booth guys is checking people off an attendee list so we slip him a ten spot to let us partake. Yes, we were having a good time.
More drinks at the fire pits with our new friends and we are now both drunk. Things get a little crazy in the courtyard, shots abound, and we eventually leave the hard core partying to the youngsters. We retire to our room to hang out with our new friend we brought home from the store. Yada yada yada. I’d give it a 5/5 Amazon rating with a glowing review. Fun times.
TLDR starts here-ish:
Fast forward to about a year and a half ago, we buy a house together and form our own little Brady Bunch. Our friend, the Rabbit, has a cozy spot in an extra pencil pouch type container in the nightstand. He’s fun, and although we have a very healthy relationship in the bedroom, he doesn’t get used all that often. As of the writing of this post I can’t remember when the last time was. At least 6 months if not more. But as of about a few months to a month ago my girlfriend remembers looking around for something in the nightstand and noticeably feeling him in the little pouch.
Well… last night, I am sitting on the couch and she comes over to me and says I have to tell you something. Our oldest daughter is in the room so she has to whisper. “It’s gone” she says. “the Rabbit.” She asks me if I threw it away. Of course not, I tell her. She gives me a look of “Welp”, and pans her eyes over to her 15 year old daughter.
So here we are. The Rabbit is missing. There is no way either of us did anything with it. And we live with 7 kids (1 is back and forth from college). Who could it be? There was other stuff in the drawer, nothing else missing. Interestingly, after a Vegas trip in September I had probably $600 cash left over that was stuck in the same drawer. I have kept track of how much was in there over time and used it for various things. No cash ever went missing and there has been a single $100 bill in there for at least a couple months. It was still in the drawer in plain view when the missing Rabbit discovery was made. So, on to:
The Suspects
Our kids:
18 y.o. son - Lives at college, comes home fairly often. Has been alone in the house recently. There was some sex awareness week at school recently and based on the local Town angry facebook page there are reports of boys on campus “shaking sex toys in the faces of college girls”. Makes you wonder.
16 y.o. son - Literally the perfect kid. Plays a lot of video games but has a 100 average in all his honors classes. Polite. Respectful. Never comes out of his room never mind into someone else’s. Not a suspect.
15 y.o. daughter - Would be voted ‘most likely to get into mischief and lie about it’ out of all the kids. Definite opportunity, being home alone often. Motive? Not sure.
13 y.o. daughter - 2nd most likely kid to get into trouble. Maybe more likely to lie about it. Very little opportunity as she’s not home much alone. Can’t come up with a motive unless it’s to put a video on Tik Tok for some laughs.
11 y.o. daughter - Sweetest kid you’d ever meet. Couldn’t see her going in our room without asking never mind in the nightstand.
8 y.o. daughter #1 - Innocent, awesome kid. She would not start mischief but is susceptible to peer pressure and would join in if pushed. Which leads to…
8 y.o. daughter #2 - Could definitely see this one snooping around where she doesn’t belong and being a little sneaky. Why she would take it I have no idea. I guess it does look like a toy of some sort. She’s also a budding magician so maybe she will pull it out of a hat someday.
Other Suspects
The Cleaning Lady - We don’t really have a cleaning lady but decided to have someone come before Christmas because there was a ton of family coming to town and we didn’t have time to clean. She’d been to the house once before. No one was home while she was here this time, but the $100 was left seemingly untouched.
Uncle Bubba - Uncle Bubba (my girlfriend’s brother) was here with the family over the holidays. Uncle Bubba is the most awesome guy you’ll ever meet. But has Williams Syndrome and functions like an early teenager, and has a penchant for sneakily snatching things that don’t belong to him. He once took a vase full of those decorative marbles when no one was home and when he was caught defeatedly said “I thought they were pretty”. Could he have been snooping and found something that was a pretty color?
The Nephew - 16 y.o. and in town over the holidays as well. Generally a good kid. Only on the list because according to his parents, he has a porn problem. Makes you think.
Friends - Could a friend, at the house for one of our many parties, have been snooping and snatched it for ####s and giggles? @Idiot Boxer and @Foosball God I’m looking at you.
So there we have it. Where is the Rabbit? And what do I do about it? Do we have a family meeting and instruct the perpetrator to ‘return whatever object they took back to the place they took it from’? Do we wait for a picture of it on social media or a ransom note in the mail? Will this mystery ever be solved?