Operation Fury: Revenge is a dish best served cold...

Words cannot describe the rage I'm feeling. Someone is messing with the wrong dude...

Lynn's car got broken into last night. I shouldn't really say broken into, as I left it unlocked. Part of my anger is directed at myself... but we had 2 play houses for my daughter to get unloaded the other night from her dad's car, and I was carrying the little one, so we spent a good deal of time focused on getting everything into the house, so the car was left unlocked.

My car is waiting on a replacement tire at her parents because it got a nail in the tire, so there is one less car in our driveway. Typically we take my car when we go places, leaving Lynn's car alone in the driveway. Last night was our anniversary, and instead of going out, we decided to order out.

Since my car wasn't there last night, someone probably thought we weren't home. The thief probably went up the driveway as the property is fenced in pretty well on all sides (high, wooden fence) and it wouldn't be the first time I've witnessed someone sauntering down my driveway after casing our garage (cops showed up within a minute or two with a canine unit, the guy was already gone by then).

He opened Lynn's car, went through the glove compartment, center console, threw stuff around. I haven't even had the chance to check the trunk (we found out this morning as we were rushing to work) to see if anything is missing there.

Fortunately, there's not a lot to take; Lynn says her insurance card and registration is missing, but we'll have to take a closer look after work.

It's the principle of the thing that makes me mad. People think they can walk up my driveway, go into my garage, go through our property, and take what they want?! Hell no. I'm not putting up with that shit.

Read on to find out my latest project to bait and catch the bastard using a high-tech solution.

So what am I going to do about it? I'll tell you. I work for the nation's largest security company (I know, tough to figure that one out, right? :-p)  My job specifically deals with security at that company's most important accounts. Banks, US courthouses, a lot of the accounts in Beverly Hills, Hollywood, all that jazz. Combine that with the fact that I'm someone with more than a little bit of tech-know-how, and I'm not really someone to mess with when it comes to security and surveillance.

This motherfucker is going down. Tonight I'm rigging an automated surveillance system and I'm going to set some bait out for this turd. This won't be the first time I've done this, pretty much all I'm going to have to do is position some webcams and fire up my little server and surveillance rig. I'll be posting an instructable when I'm done; I'm at work right now and I'd like to include some screenshots of the configuration I use.

In short, here's how it's going to work: I set up a webcam overlooking my driveway connected to a computer running Active Webcam and an email server. I will have 2 laptops with integrated webcams set up covertly looking out other windows to ensure the perpetrator does not manage to avoid detection by entering my yard by climbing a fence. I set up the cams to detect motion of a specific size or larger and set up Active Webcam to dispatch emails (via loopback address) containing photos of the cause of the motion to my Gmail account. This is paired with a text message sent to my mobile device (which I will have on soft ring and vibrate).

My driveway and back entrance are always lit, so I think my cams will be able to pick up the guy without any trouble. To be on the safe side, I'll be having the cam that will be aiming out my back window overlooking the yard and garage set extra sensitive for motion. I'll have to make sure that I cover the cam LED and properly conceal the laptops looking out of the windows.

Then I'll set the bait... I'll make sure that nothing is in the car worth stealing, and I'll leave it unlocked again. I'll throw some stuff in envelopes inside the car (still deciding what exactly to put in) that will cause the guy to spend time looking through them to give me time for the cops to show up. Maybe I'll even call the cops and tell them what happened and what I plan to do, maybe they'll work with me and keep someone close. The cops like to sit in the parking lot around the corner, and I'm guessing that's why they responded so quickly last time.

Alright... I've calmed down a little bit. I just can't wait to get home and get everything set up. Chances are, the guy will lay low for a week or two before coming back, and by then Lynn will probably want her laptop back from out of the window since she usually uses it to watch movies before falling asleep.

But I can still fantasize about it in my head... my phone buzzing in the middle of the night, emails showing up in my gmail box with photos of an intruder, seeing someone rummaging through Lynn's car, watching the dogs pin his sorry ass to my driveway as the cops slap the handcuffs on. Ah, I can almost taste sweet vindication...