The Great Garage Door Opener Caper

"The Great Garage Door Opener Caper"

Before we begin a little background:  Sara, one of Deb's closest friends, died suddenly recently.  Sara, who lived locally, moved here from Washington state where her family and friends still live.  The only family she had here in KC was her ex-husband who remained a close friend.   Deb flew out to Washington for the funeral where she became close to the family.  After the funeral she cleaned and orgainized the apartment.  When Sara's parents and siblings came to KC to complete the vacancy of the aparmtment they packed all of Sara's things into a U-Haul to take back to Washington.

Except for the Garage Door Opener, the one Sara's dad had paid to have it professional installed, which is where our story begins....

Text message to Sara's mom, 9:40 pm, Sunday night:
Our garage door opener just died, would it inappropriate or wrong to ask if we can have Sara's?

Text message from mom to Deb: 9:43pm, Sunday night:
That would be so perfect! You rock!  I would do it tonight while the apartment office is closed - tomorow may be too late!

9:46 pm, later that night
We cruise by the target, checking out neighborhood and apartment.  Had anyone moved in yet?   Does the opener Deb have still work?  Has anyone moved in?  

Opener works, garage is empty, house is empty.  The opener is still there.  We leave.

9:52 pm Walmart
Deb goes in to buy a stepladder and a socket wrench set.  She returns with a stepladder and a NUTDRIVER SET.

9:58 pm Sara's Apartment.

We sync our watches, walk through the plan, assign parts:
Deb - you back up in the driveway.
Nathan - you with me - you hand me tools, take down the opener control panel on the wall and help me lower the unit.
Deb - you open the back hatch of the van when we open the garage door again.

Remember - we aren't really doing anything wrong but it may look like it to the neighbors and the apartment managers may not appreciate what we are doing.  We have to be quick, in and out in five minutes, very quiet and very very careful.  Above all we need to be quiet.

10:05 we back into the driveway, Deb, Nathan and I get out of the van.  For some reason Nathan opens the hatch and immediately gets into a verbal fight with Jason.  I hiss at him - close the damn HATCH!  and get inside!.  He closes the hatch but the stepladder pours out the back and clatters on the concrete.  I roll my eyes and get him inside.

I tell Nathan - you stand exactly there - pointing - and hand me tools when I need them.  Do nothing else, go no where else.

I climb the ladder to work on the 3 bolts holding the opener to the ceiling.  The GD NUTDRIVER isnt strong enough to move the bolts.   I look down - Nathan is gone. Where the hell is he?  He's back with his mother trying to work on the door opener.  I yell at him loudly - too loudly, get your ass back here and stay put.  Give me the cresent wrench.

Wrench is too weak and large to work i nthe small space.

10:17: Sara's Garage

FInally removed the 2nd bolt and lower one end of the opener down to Nathan and Deb. The track is greasy and grease gets on Nathan's hands.

I moved the stepladder to the door and begin work on the track when I hear footsteps above me.  Where is Nathan?  He went upstairs to wash his hands, says Deb.  I scream out "Nathan get your ass back down here now! "  OMG, the apartment has been cleaned by the apartment company, now he's going thorugh adding grease to handrails and fixtures,  not to mention fingerprints....

10:23 Sara's Garage

The rail comes down and we lower it to the floor.  Deb starts work on the electical eye sensors nd I remove the opener panel from the wall.  I look back and Deb's trying to feed the wiring through the mounting holes.  I am about to have a a stroke.  "wiring is cheap - don't worrry about it! We don't have time for this".  I cut all the leads loose with a knife.

10:30 Sara's Driveway

We open the door and husle the parts to the van - of course the hatch is closed.   We manhandle the opener in, I toss in the tools and close the hatch.  Of course Deb, who seems uncaring about the time or has any sense of urgency, now wants the outside keypad!   Screw that, lets get the hell out of here.   She looks at me with those eyes and I sigh, I grab the panel and rip it off the wall and get back in the van.  Deb casually sauters around and takes her time getting in - like we were at Walmart picking up groceries.  Christ!

10:37  We leave the driveway and head home.  I begni muttering about the most incompentent, bumbling robbery since the three stooges and she begins laughing.  She's breaking all the rules about robbery getaways - she's speeding, not paying attention and almosts gets t-boned by a car at an intersection.    Deb can't stop laughing...

We have the garage door opener in our garage now - it's very, very nice.