C.S.I. Grizzbabe's World

I had gotten to work at my normal time that morning carrying my usual breakfast that I have on workdays that follow a night of babysitting - a sausage biscuit and a large orange juice. Nothing about the morning seemed unusual. The sun was shining, the birds were chirping. Everything pointed toward a typical start to a typical day.

Even the front door of the office being unlocked and slightly ajar didn't immediately strike me as odd. The graphic artists have been known to leave the back door unlocked after a late night at the office. I just figured that this time they decided to change things up a bit by leaving the front door unsecured.

After rolling my eyes at the absentmindedness of our staff, I walked through the door, sat down at my desk and proceeded to consume my breakfast, just like I do every morning. Little did I know that this would not be a typical morning.

About 15 minutes later, my co-worker, Martha, called. I recount to her my experience of finding the office door unlocked and we both reasoned that the graphic artists, having spent an exhausting night of production trying to make deadline, must have inadvertently left the door open.

As I'm talking to Martha, I get a funny feeling. It was a familiar sensation similar to the one I had when I lost my house key as a kid and got a hunch to open the freezer door. To my amazement, I found the key suspended in a small block of ice in an ice cube tray.

This time the hunch was telling me to open my right desk drawer and look in the petty cash bin. I obeyed because my intuition has yet to steer me wrong.

The bin was empty. The only thing that was left were some receipts.

I spin my chair around and opened the left desk drawer. The cash for the payment of several small ads was missing as well.

I sunk in my chair as the realization set in. We had been burgled.

I said goodbye to Martha and immediately called the local police department. They arrived surprisingly quickly. At first I thought it was because the police station is so close to our office but in actuality they were already in the office complex investigating other burglaries.

Despite the fact that there were multiple burglaries in the area that occurred on the same night, I felt rather uneasy. Our burglary seemed to differ from the other burglaries because there appeared to be no sign of forced entry. Entrance to the other offices had been gained by prying open the door. It was obvious by looking at our door that no prying had taken place.

I began to fear that The Controller, who already looks at me suspiciously, would blame me for the missing money. After all, I'm the one who controls the petty cash bin and accepts money for ads. Couple that with the accounting-gate incident and I felt like I would be a prime suspect.

Fortunately, once the crime scene investigator got there and did a more thorough examination of the premises, it was discovered that entry had been gained through a window. The window was open and there were pry marks on the outside sash.

We didn't immediately notice the open window because the purps had returned the blinds to the down position - just as they had found them. In addition there was a huge desk in front of that window that had to be moved in order to enter the building. The desk had been returned to it's rightful place as well. We are so fortunate to have had such considerate burglars.

We are also fortunate that only about $100 in cash was taken. It could have been a lot worse. They could have chosen to wipe us out completely by taking our computers as well. Not only would that have been a bigger financial loss but it also would have created an administrative nightmare. It's even possible that the paper may not have been printed that week.

The incident was good for adding a little excitement to our day though. We watched as the detectives dusted the window for fingerprints and took photographs. I also got to yell, "Don't touch anything!" to everyone who walked through the door. It was all very CSI.

Despite the diligence of the investigators, I doubt they will find the people who broke into our building and 4 other offices in our complex. There's simply not much information to go on and I'm sure they have bigger fish to fry (not to mention lots of donuts to eat).

The burglary did serve as a not-so-subtle reminder that there's never a dull moment at my company. Whether it's financial scandals, tawdry affairs, conspiracies or criminal activity, there's always excitement to be had in Grizzbabe's World.