Tweet
Thieves are rarely the clever sort you see on your cop dramas. In fact, if one day one were ever to lower himself from the skylight with black nylon cables, disabling the security cameras remotely with a device he constructed out of tin-foil and a car antenna, I would probably let him steal me blind out of admiration to his dedication.
Instead, we had this fellow, in the middle of summer dressed in a knee-length parka, loitering around my bakery.
I've been watching him for a while, and it's obvious something's up. It's obvious to people asleep in Ecuador something is up. The ceiling tiles are suspicious. He shuffles from foot to foot in his baggy pants, occasionally hitching them up, always keeping his back to me and his head down.
I make a discreet call to the Boss. At six feet, I'm no wilting flower, but store policy forbids us from attempting to stop a shoplifter ourselves. Instead we make management do it. I suppose corporate feels if a manager is to fall in battle, they can always make more in their labs.
The Boss arrives, actually looking a little intimidating. He's a nice guy, extremely high-energy, but a bit of a muscle-head. Less frightening is M, trailing behind him, second-in-command, a short, curly-headed Italian with Harry Potter spectacles who, stopping by on his day off, is wearing his golfing outfit, on his way to the course.
I point. They move in. Later, I will be yelled at by several other employees for not possessing a video camera on my cellphone to record what ensues.
The man in the parka sees them coming and bolts. I mean, this fucker can MOVE. I, unencumbered by his weighty-looking parka, could not have been as fleet of foot as this guy is. M and the Boss, both smokers, certainly are not. But they try, bless their hearts.
Myself and the nearby Produce department pursue them to the front door to partake in the spectacle, even after the Boss yells breathlessly for us all to stay put. Hell with that.
Because now our parka-wearing friend is shedding himself of his extra weight. By that I do not mean the coat itself, no; that was apparently too precious. Suddenly, the air around him as he flees through the parking lot is filled with not only a good portion of today's freshly baked hamburger and hotdog buns, but packaged ground beef, a side of ribs, and a long rope of hotdogs that uncoils magnificently in the air like a fleshy streamer.
Well, I guess you had to be there to appreciate the visual.
And he's still running! It's the most amazing thing I've ever seen as he continues to pull more things out of the inside of his parka, tossing them behind him. A bottle of ketchup shatters on the pavement. Other customers are stopping to simply stare. The rest of us are gathered at the store entrance shrieking like a pack of baboons, shouting encouragement to our daring management and brilliant ideas like, "RUN FASTER" and "DON'T LET HIM GET AWAY".
Someone is cheering the criminal himself, which I think we all also were, secretly, because damn if this isn't the most exciting thing to happen here in the last month.
At the edge of the parking lot, M and the Boss give up. They lean over, panting, hands on their knees, watching in disbelief as the fellow keeps going, sprinting out into traffic and vanishing behind a 7-11. The parking lot is littered with the entire requirements for a barbecue. There are napkins (Mickey Mouse, stolen from the party favor aisle), paper plates, relish, mustard, and even a disposable camera to go with the aforementioned meat and baked goods. I can't help but wonder if there was a Mrs Parka waiting back home, angry that he won't arrive with her shopping list.
M and the Boss call the police, of course, who are more amused than anything else as they take statements. Most of them involve asking us if we'd seen anything, and the response is inevitably, "Yes. And it was fucking AWESOME."
They never catch the guy, but I remember very clearly that the thing that upset the Boss the most was that the guy had taken both ketchup AND mustard. "Who puts both of those on something?" he asks in genuine disgust. "That's just wrong."
Instead, we had this fellow, in the middle of summer dressed in a knee-length parka, loitering around my bakery.
I've been watching him for a while, and it's obvious something's up. It's obvious to people asleep in Ecuador something is up. The ceiling tiles are suspicious. He shuffles from foot to foot in his baggy pants, occasionally hitching them up, always keeping his back to me and his head down.
I make a discreet call to the Boss. At six feet, I'm no wilting flower, but store policy forbids us from attempting to stop a shoplifter ourselves. Instead we make management do it. I suppose corporate feels if a manager is to fall in battle, they can always make more in their labs.
The Boss arrives, actually looking a little intimidating. He's a nice guy, extremely high-energy, but a bit of a muscle-head. Less frightening is M, trailing behind him, second-in-command, a short, curly-headed Italian with Harry Potter spectacles who, stopping by on his day off, is wearing his golfing outfit, on his way to the course.
I point. They move in. Later, I will be yelled at by several other employees for not possessing a video camera on my cellphone to record what ensues.
The man in the parka sees them coming and bolts. I mean, this fucker can MOVE. I, unencumbered by his weighty-looking parka, could not have been as fleet of foot as this guy is. M and the Boss, both smokers, certainly are not. But they try, bless their hearts.
Myself and the nearby Produce department pursue them to the front door to partake in the spectacle, even after the Boss yells breathlessly for us all to stay put. Hell with that.
Because now our parka-wearing friend is shedding himself of his extra weight. By that I do not mean the coat itself, no; that was apparently too precious. Suddenly, the air around him as he flees through the parking lot is filled with not only a good portion of today's freshly baked hamburger and hotdog buns, but packaged ground beef, a side of ribs, and a long rope of hotdogs that uncoils magnificently in the air like a fleshy streamer.
Well, I guess you had to be there to appreciate the visual.
And he's still running! It's the most amazing thing I've ever seen as he continues to pull more things out of the inside of his parka, tossing them behind him. A bottle of ketchup shatters on the pavement. Other customers are stopping to simply stare. The rest of us are gathered at the store entrance shrieking like a pack of baboons, shouting encouragement to our daring management and brilliant ideas like, "RUN FASTER" and "DON'T LET HIM GET AWAY".
Someone is cheering the criminal himself, which I think we all also were, secretly, because damn if this isn't the most exciting thing to happen here in the last month.
At the edge of the parking lot, M and the Boss give up. They lean over, panting, hands on their knees, watching in disbelief as the fellow keeps going, sprinting out into traffic and vanishing behind a 7-11. The parking lot is littered with the entire requirements for a barbecue. There are napkins (Mickey Mouse, stolen from the party favor aisle), paper plates, relish, mustard, and even a disposable camera to go with the aforementioned meat and baked goods. I can't help but wonder if there was a Mrs Parka waiting back home, angry that he won't arrive with her shopping list.
M and the Boss call the police, of course, who are more amused than anything else as they take statements. Most of them involve asking us if we'd seen anything, and the response is inevitably, "Yes. And it was fucking AWESOME."
They never catch the guy, but I remember very clearly that the thing that upset the Boss the most was that the guy had taken both ketchup AND mustard. "Who puts both of those on something?" he asks in genuine disgust. "That's just wrong."
How does someone CARRY that much stuff inside a parka??
Comment