Did we REALLY need more confirmation that we need to move??

Need it or not, we got it.

Read Pat's POV of this incident here.

Last night I was lying in bed attempting to go to sleep when I noticed flashing lights coming through the bedroom window in between the cracks in the curtain and landing on the ceiling. I went out to the kitchen to look outside and investigate and I saw a police SUV parked a couple of house down and a cop walking down the street (in front of my house) toward it. I shrugged and went back to bed.

A couple of minutes later I hear KNOCK KNOCK KNOCK KNOCK KNOCK. Now that's a police knock if I've ever heard one. Which I haven't. Unless maybe on TV. Still, I knew who was on the other side of the door. They knocked once more before I was able to get my glasses and get out of bed and to the front door. Pat was right behind me. I opened it up and two police officers told me that they were having everyone in the neighborhood go down to the Wal-mart down the street because there was an explosive device at the park. Not "there may be an explosive device" or "a possible explosive device." That is definitely not what they said.

So, I'm like in immediate action mode and I say to Pat, "Get the kids," and we did. Saren was upset about the cats and I told her we couldn't worry about them. The girls put on shoes (but not their normal ones and let this be a lesson to put your shoes on the shoe shelf every time you come in the house because then you know where they are (sorry, can't resist momming out there)) and we left.

We walked because I didn't want to take the time to find Silas's recently pooped on and then washed but not replaced car seat cover and put it back on the seat. The cop had said we could take our van but that was why we didn't. I regretted it later because we could have spent all that time hanging out in our van, nice and warm. But I'm getting ahead of myself.

So we got to Wal-mart and we figured we must have been the first people who were notified because we were all alone for a long time. Makes sense since we are the closest to the park. I was wishing I had asked if we had time for me to get some stuff because I surely would have loved to have an elastic for my hair and a bra. Please don't ask me to go out in public without a bra because that is all I will think about the whole time I am out. I AM NOT WEARING A BRA. I WISH I WAS WEARING A BRA. Plus Saren and Harper had both been sleeping in shorts and t-shirts and I only grabbed one light jacket on the way out for them (let this be a lesson to put your jackets blah blah blah...). Later on a few more people showed up and they were all in jackets and scarves and not pajamas and I felt stupid, like these people must get evacuated from their homes all the time and for them it's all just la-de-dah, and I must look like such a newbie, me with my bedraggled hair, braless under my shirt, with my ragamuffin kids.

In fact, some woman at Wal-mart handed us $9 as she was leaving and I feel almost certain it was because she thought we were a poor homeless family seeking shelter in the Wal-mart. Possibly not, because the Wal-mart greeter knew exactly what was going on because we told her and she offered us some money on her McDonald's tab to get some food while we were waiting (which was incredibly nice and Saren gave her a hug for it). So I'm pretty sure there was some sort of connection there. I think that nine dollars may have been the change from the greeter-lady's offer, and it kept getting passed around by people saying "no, no, you have it". Or something.

Anyway, eventually a bus came for us to sit in and wait and it wasn't too long after that that we were given the all-clear to go back home. Walking back we saw a whole bunch of people driving back. Which made me think that we were definitely the first people to be told because that original police officer had to ask whether we were allowed to drive out or not and must have just told subsequent people that it was fine from the get-go.

We passed a police officer who was rolling up yellow tape and I said, "So what was it?" He laughed and said, "A smoking bong." IT WAS A BONG. Sure, I am glad that there was not an actual explosive device right next to our house, but DUDE. IT WAS A BONG. Not a BOMB. Someone needs to get their ears cleaned out.

I was originally going to blog about how we all got sick, but totally not at trick-or-treating time, just before and after, but the trick-or-treating sucked a lot because half the houses were empty (foreclosed), half of them weren't participating, and half of them were handing out hershey's kisses from 1985 (that's 150% of the houses right there!), but all that got pre-empted by A BONG.

Later on I need to blog about my October reading choices and what's going on with the foreclosure and such. Don't let me forget.