Monday Meanderings - 4.3.2017

Our new video-equipped/motion-detector/super-whizbang doorbell continues to keep us entertained. About once a day, even though the motion detection range has been dialed back to its lowest setting, it notifies us that "There is motion at your front door." And when we check, it is a passing truck, or most often, nothing at all. I usually blame poltergeists for setting off the alarm.

But Thursday evening late - at 10:53pm, to be exact - the notification went off, and when I checked there was a young woman standing at our door.

The complete video shows her approach the door, cell phone in hand, look around in apparent confusion, look at her phone, utter an expletive, then turn and leave. She stopped on the sidewalk and checked her phone again, then she walked away up the street.

Our neighborhood is relatively safe, and the neighbors look out for one another (before her passing, Sally, next door. would call me when out walking her dog out late and let me know that I had left the garage door open), but 11pm is no time for a young woman to be out walking alone. I hope she quickly found the address she was looking for.

A follow-up on the comfort dog conversation that I heard in passing. Turns out that the dogs are part of a service ministry carried out by members of that congregation - at nursing homes, care facilities, etc., not that the dogs were employed during church services. Makes sense, but still.

As I was leaving the church building the other day, I met a police officer on a motorcycle coming toward me, moving slowly, but with flashing lights. I pulled over, expecting a funeral procession, but saw instead a large, open bed truck (with a half-dozen people sitting in back) pulling a trailer upon which was strapped an automobile. There was a "driver" and companion in the automobile, and all sorts of camera and lighting gear attached at various places on the truck and trailer. Not unusual to see film crews at work in ATX, but seldom this far from downtown or the University area. Maybe that footage is going to show up as a sermon illustration some Sunday.