Not Content With Stealing My Tools

18 May 2011

Well, I had a lovely weekend. Claire really pampered me for the whole two days. I had my favourite dinners, beer on tap, as much rubbish TV as I could handle and two kids on the sofa with me for hours on end. There is nothing like a bit of quality family time. Simply being able to sleep in without waking up feeling stressed before I even get up, felt great.

So I stepped into this week feeling ready to go. Pity about that, because life has a way of dealing out rubbish once in a while. Although with me it seems to be more often than that. I finished the kitchen I was working on last week and had planned on breaking the back of the little house over the course of this week.

So I turn up there on Monday morning, nice and early and I go round to the back door and it is open...my heart just dropped then and there. My first thought is that I must have left it open, but the realisation is quickly coming to me that we have had a break-in.

So I go inside and the first thing I notice is that some of my tools are missing. The small things like hammers, screwdrivers and so on have been left, but the bigger and more expensive items like my belt sander and the table saw have gone. So I pull out my phone to ring the police when I notice that there is a hole punched in one of the new walls downstairs.

This gets me worried – not only have they nicked my tools but they are nasty as well. So I go upstairs and all the walls which have been made ready for plastering by Claire have been completely trashed. Holes kicked in them and big sections just pulled off the walls and chucked on the floor.

I was feeling OK at this point. Angry, but I realised that the damage could be fixed and that we have insurance. But as time went on I noticed more and more which was gone. All the copper piping for the plumbing, the left over lengths oak for the floor and both of the new double glazed doors. I quickly realised that if I had taken the time to put those in, we may never have been burgled – ironic really.

So this week has been a write-off. I have been sorting out the insurance which has been complicated. They wanted to argue that I should not have left the gear at the premises, but I had specifically asked that question when I got the insurance and they finally agreed that it comes under the definition of a work site.

The money will take a while to come through, so I have had to use the credit card to buy replacement materials and tools. The police have said that they will keep an eye out in the area just in case they return for more. But they did admit that catching them was unlikely. The fingerprints were inconclusive apparently.

So I have been loading up the van each night this week with everything which is worthwhile nicking, which has added an extra hour to my day.

So that has been my week. A tale of two halves. Please let next week be more productive and a little less stressful.