house of blair

You wouldn’t be able to tell based on the neighbourhood we live in, but Thousand Oaks ranked as the eleventh safest city in the U.S. But OUR neighbourhood is a little different. A few examples from recent memory:

Last week Heidi witnessed one of our “neighbours” returning my mountain bike back to our garage after he had, presumably, taken the thing to work. Granted, he did return the bike, so no permanent harm done. Nevertheless, he had no right to take it in the first place.

And then there was that gang-related shooting/murder four or five months back just caddy-corner to our place.

And then there was that brutal stabbing murder in the apartment complex right next to us a number of months back.

And then there are all the minor things like the fist-fights or the public drunkenness.

But tonight is certainly the most interesting by far. Why, only three doors down the tenant was found dead in his home for some length of time. The circumstances, according to sources, surrounding the death appear “suspicious.” Uh-huh. It’s a little unclear as to how long he’s been dead in there — semi-reliable sources seem to indicate that he’s been in there awhile (more than a week). The street is crawling with detectives, police, coroners and news people right now.

Since very few people speak any English in this neigbourhood, and I have since stopped trying to speak Spanish, I didn’t bother to ask what happened. So here’s a little something from Santa Barbara’s local station. (Hey, that’s OUR house in the background!)

When, oh, when will those housing prices hit bottom? I think it’s time to go now.

Update Acorn’s short take on homicide next door