Dry Run

 Tuesday morning at about 4:00am the Redhead woke me.  Someone, she said, had just knocked on the front door.

  Our front door isn't the easiest, most direct front door to find, though it is the main door.  It's down a twisting narrow sidewalk.  There are other doors to choose from.  It's up a spiral staircase.  I kill the lights after midnight to save electricity, so it's damn dark.

  I HEAVILY tip the pizza delivery guy who can find it in daylight, much less after sundown.  

  Since I raised a teenager, I'm cranky about phone calls after 9:30, much less visitors.  This neighborhood isn't the best, so we are careful.  And don't nose this around, but I've got a gun in here as well.  Big gun.  Maybe more than one.  And the Redhead will shoot your ass as well.

  So I roll out of bed, grab a good flashlight and pistol.........

  But I loaned the Good Doctor Sneed my pistola so he could shoot his CCL with a .45.  No 220 on the nightstand.

  I'm armed with the Band of Brothers paperback, a remote control, a Midway catalog and a coffee cup full of pens.  There's a glass of water the cat has been drinking out of.  Maybe some toenail clippers.

  I COMPLETELY forget there is a AR Carbine with 30 round loaded clip UNDER the bed.  Completely.  It's wiped from my mind like an old girlfriends birthday.  I think Garand.  I think shotgun.  I rumage around in a pistol box for my match 1911 Les Baer.  No loaded clips, no ammo.  I look out the peephole.  Dark.  Finally I remember my computer room rifle, a Standard Products M1 Carbine with clip on the shelf next to it.  (who could object to being shot with such a fine rifle?)  I stand next to the door, slap the magazine, drop the bolt, hit the outside lights, look, open the door and start sweeping.   Nobody on the landing.  Corner clear.  Yard clear.  Side yard clear, back corner clear.  Treeline clear.  Yard exits clear.

  Nobody nowhere.

  Of course I am doing this a la carte.  No clothes.  Knock on the door at 4:00am and you get a naked, angry man with a metal flashlight zestfully searching the ornamental shrubbery so he can shoot your nocturnal butt with an antique Nazi killer.

  I circle the cars, I orbit the house, I peruse the neighbors holdings.

  Nothing.

  The front door is metal.  Knocks on it are distinct.  The Redhead is about as prone to fantasy as a sensible man.