Security

Random fact for the day: I just ate 4 jumbo marshmallows before writing this post :)

I knew that it would be difficult if not nearly impossible for me to post on the blog EVERY. SINGLE. day, which is absolutely why I offered no promises in the beginning. For those of you faithful followers, I am sorry that the past few days of your life have not been entertained by my ridiculous ramblings...and well..."ponderings." :)

So we've decided to invest in a security system for the house...and I'm pretty excited. Actually...I'm stoked. And yes, invest is the appropriate word, because these suckers sure don't come for free! I didn't grow up with a security system in my parent's house, and my first encounter with one was actually only a little over a year ago. I was here (at Nolan's house...now our house...weird) for the weekend and around 2 a.m. the stupid thing starts "talking" with beeps and buzzes going off like mad! Initially it was scary...and after approximately 5 seconds it became oh-so-annoying! Anyways...after an hour and a half spent on the phone with ADT in the middle of the night, we were able to stop the obscene sounds coming from our wall. Turns out it was nothing more than the internal battery was dying (we didn't have the system "activated" at that time).

We've been talking about getting a new system for a while now, especially with all the traveling that we do between South Carolina and Georgia. I don't know why, but the fact that our house was "alone" particularly lingered on my mind this year at Christmas when we went home for a few days. You see, back in the summer (actually the night before our engagement pictures) Nolan's truck was broken into...while it sat in our driveway...while we slept inside!!! SCARY!!! I guess they got what they wanted from him, because they didn't even go so far as to touch my truck, which was parked right next to his. The only thing we could think that might have deterred them was the oh-so-small sticker on my window that states: "This vehicle is protected by anti-theft detection devices." (YAY Toyota!) I even had the GPS mounting bracket hanging on the windshield....oh geez. At this point you might be wondering why park in the driveway versus the garage?? That's another post for another day, but basically our garage wasn't designed large enough to accommodate one truck, much less two. SWEET. (Whatever happened to the day when you could leave your car windows down and house doors open without fearing that something might happen??) So that is reason number one...

This new system will also feature a fancy-dancy fire alarm monitoring thingy. The guy told us that statistically you are 4 times more likely to have your house burn to the ground than to have someone break-in...SCARY! Now he could just be blowing smoke up our butts (no pun intended) but I can't imagine anything more devastating that going away for the weekend and returning to your used-to-be-house in nothing but a pile of ashes. Surely our neighbors would call, but we haven't really been around the neighborhood handing out our number and the dates of when we'll be out of town...and as it currently stands, only one neighbor actually has our cell phone numbers. When Nolan was about 2 or 3 years old, his parents house burnt to the ground and they lost everything. And I mean EVERYTHING. They were able to rebuild and start over (because "things" don't make a house a home) but all that remains of the years before the house they rebuilt are memories. So there's reason number 2.

And reason number 3 is this: I am a 25 year old grown baby that hates being alone in the middle of the night and am able to "hear" and "see" anything...or at least convince myself that I do. I stayed alone in the house last Saturday night for the first time since I moved in and hated every minute of it!! As soon as it gets dark outside, my senses are heightened, and I become really AWESOME at freaking myself out. I often times find it difficult to "talk myself down" once I think I have heard something, and find going to bed nearly impossible. It probably doesn't help that I love watching (no laughing, please) Cops, America's Most Wanted and nearly every other show that involves cops, criminals and the outstanding citizens of this country...but that's beside the point! (I definitely don't watch shows like that when I'm by myself at night!) So that is reason three...I hate being alone in the house.

So there you have it...my own personal rationalization for getting a security system. Like I said, whether someone steals our "things" or they burn up in smoke, that is NOT what makes a house a home, because essentially things can be replaced. A security system doesn't guarantee or promise that someone still won't break in, or that our house will never catch on fire. But one thing it will provide me with is peace of mind. And to me, that peace and "security" is much like pictures and heirlooms...priceless.