The Magrilless Blog: Good Citizens' Report

Our first order of business was to find a set of keys in a car trunk. The car was sitting in the driveway with all the doors shut, and the house was similarly not showing signs of departure preparations. The gentleman who answered the doorbell was grateful when he heard where we had found his keys, although I think he might have checked the trunk after we were out of sight.

Several times there have been dogs that ran into the street with traffic approaching (once the owner was totally oblivious--too busy fiddling with his giant earphones). I've stepped into the street with my hand extended in universal "Halt!" signal and led the dogs back to safety.

This morning we found three separate sets of keys in the street or in lawns. With no identifying keyrings, nothing to do except set them in the middle of the sidewalk where they're hopefully more visible.

Our most dramatic effort at being helpful neighbors came when we put out a fire in someone's front yard. As we ran past, there was the unmistakable odor of burning (which I interpreted as cozy fireplace smells and thought "mmmm") and Bill noticed puffs of smoke hovering near the sidewalk (and thought "danger!"). Closer inspection revealed slowly smoldering mulch (becoming bright red sparks before our very eyes) around a cigarette butt. Even though the door and windows were open, no one answered the doorbell, knocks, or bellowed hellos. So we availed ourselves of the watering can on the back porch and the visible hose next door. Two full buckets later, it was still smoking and super hot to the touch, so we told a neighbor across the street who said he'd call the owner (on her morning constitutional) to let her know the situation. Six minutes out of our run to save a house's life. (We think. We haven't repeated that route, actually. )