Gadget Lab's Charlie Sorrel vs. Psychopathic, Bike-Thieving Junkie
Gadget Lab's Charlie Sorrel knows a thing or two about getting stolen property back from thieving mutant junkies. He'd have to. Charlie is a roaming exile from the streets of Nottingham, the Chernobyl of the East Midlands: a town so nightmarishly violent that it has more guns per capita than South Africa, so inbred that all its residents can trace a half-equine "Mitochondrial Eve" back to the mid 17th century, and so impoverished that its main export was pig iron until 2005 (which was then exceeded by Crazy Frog Ringtones).
So when Charlie's €280 bicycle was stolen in Barcelona by the local "king of the junkies", Mad Man Chuck knew just what to do: confront the junkie in front of said junkie's aged mother, then (after some masterful negotiation) happily agree to pay €40... despite the fact that he'd already paid the junkie €40 for the bike back!
A tribute to the benefits of alcohol and perseverance, the 18 day saga came to end when I spotted the jerk wheeling the bike past my local bar, where I was drinking a beer. He was walking with his mother, and there was a rather nice looking houseplant hanging from my handlebars...When I grabbed the handlebars, some vague recognition swam into his eyes. I told him he had my bike, and he told me not to say anything in front of his mother, a short sturdy battle-axe of a woman in a floral print tent of a dress. Then he started ranting:
"Fifty euros. Pay me or I will slit your throat."
This was an improvement, I think, on the last offer, which was "a stab in the heart."
Eventually, an amenable deal was reached by both parties, and Charlie got his bike then-and there, with a free wheel thrown in to boot. Never say junkie bike thieves have no sense of customer service.
While I love teasing my favorite Wired drinking buddy on his perceived wussiness, his post on getting his bike back is actually a fantastic look at the inside politics of trying to reclaim property in a crime-ridden Spanish barrio. In this case, the junkie was furious that Charlie had called the police during the initial theft, thereby making Charlie a persistent target... by agreeing to pay more money, Charlie hopes that he wiped the slate clean.
The effect may well be the opposite, but the First Blood wishful thinking of Wired's commenters — to the last of them, a bunch of loutish, half-sentient turdlings — would be just as disastrous. After all, who would you bet on in a physical confrontation? A sunken-chested tech writer with the upper body strength of a consumptive pre-teen? Or a vicious crack junkie so desperate for a rock that he'd threaten to cut your throat in front of his own septuagenarian mother? Charlie, you made the right choice. Congrats on the proud reclamation of your steed!
Junkie Bike Thief Update: Busted [Gadget Lab]
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I know we're supposed to be all anti-taser... at least when cops use them.
But as a "sunken-chested tech writer with the upper body strength of a consumptive pre-teen", isn't that exactly when you pull out the 900,000 volt stun gun and immobilize him like Garth Algar did at the Gasworks.
Isn't augmenting yourself to overcome your innate disadvantages what being a tech writer is all about?
Zuzu, you really did just hit on the tack Charlie should have taken: he should have pitched Wired an entire series about beefing up with technological weaponry to "get even."
Not that there isn't also something to be said for that scene in Once Upon a Time in the West where the banker tells Henry Fonda that the only weapon that can beat a gun is a wad of money.
But I thought the point of the stun gun wasn't to "get even", but just to be able to get away with repo'ing the bicycle back.
Although Charlie's next article in the series could be about exoskeletons.
It would have been a different story if they'd had Gary throw down on them.
I would have hunted the B@57@&# down and beaten him to the ground with a baseball bat, and took the bike back, leaving a trail of blood and teeth as a warning to other would-be thieves.
Being psychotic does come in handy.
This one time, around midnight in the middle of the week, I caught a really tall skinny white guy with died red dreadlocks (I mention all this to set the scene) in the process of stealing my bike, outside of the Royal Albert Arms Hotel, a turn of the century hotel/bar (home to the down and out, as well as Winnipeg's punk scene) in Winnipeg's downtown exchange district. I'd seen the fella inside earlier chatting with a waitress and one of the local gents that lived upstairs, both of whom were now outside watching as the dude worked on my kryptonite flexi chain thing with a pair of industrial wire cutters. As we exited the bar, my companion was the first to notice him crouched beside my bike, and as we walked briskly towards him, I called out "Hey, that's my bike!" He must not have heard me, as he continued to work at the chain, until we were both standing directly over him. I again stated "Hey, that's my bike" at which point he looked up and said, "Oh, this is your bike?", to which I replied, "Yes". He then stood up, untangled his clippers which had remarkably done only peripheral damage to the rubber coating of the chain, and made a "Here you go gesture" before jogging off across the street and dissapearing down an alley. I like to think that it was the casual way in which I confronted him that lead to him simply running away, as if I had attempted to hold him back or anything I probably would have wound up with a pair of clippers sticking out of me.
How hard is it to take a bottle, or a glass beer mug with you when you exit a pub? Fuck, a pool cue would have to have been around somewhere.
I've seen about a hundred episodes of The Rocky & Bullwinkle Show and there is a guy who make a lion back down with a damn chair. Lions are way tougher than junkies.
I guess I'm some kind of primitive or something but unless I thought he might have a gun or a gang who would come after me later on I know I would have gotten my bike and the 40 Euros back. And I'm not an ITG or anything, but this guy was described as a "junkie", that does not call to mind a physically intimidating person; I know I could beat up a junkie if I had a pool cue or a bottle.
I'd be more worried about his mother than him.
"I guess I'm some kind of primitive or something but unless I thought he might have a gun or a gang who would come after me later on I know I would have gotten my bike and the 40 Euros back"
Ninja, please.
Rob Beschizza:
If I were a ninja I wouldn't worry about taking some sort of club or bludgeon out there with me. Unless he was a pirate junkie.
It's not like The Boondocks where everyone knows kung-fu, if you've got a pool cue any knife he's concealing shouldn't mean dick as long as you're willing to actually swing the stick.
Hey! Nottingham isn't /that/ bad! (Unless there's some crazy other Nottingham in Americaland or somewhere which I don't know about.)
I mean sure, it's not Bath or Cambridge, but London has a far worse gun and knife record than it, and what violence there is which takes place is mostly wrapped up in the gang wars. Honestly, I lived there for a few years til recently but I felt far less safe in places such as Manchester than I ever did there. It's just a question of knowing which areas to avoid.
To those suggesting he should have taken a bottle, pool cue etc, a friend of mine who really is a ninja (okay, ninjitsu brown belt) is fond of pointing out that there's no point having a weapon you do not know how to use.
If your enemy is more adept than you, you are taking a weapon into the fray for him *and* pissing him off.
What happened to the good old days when folks just threw acid on one another?
CitizenJohnJohn:
Life is not lived unless you take a chance now and again. And did you fail to read the article(s)? The guy in question is the town junkie.
You don't need to be Jet Li to swing a fucking stick, if you can swing a hammer you can hit someone with a pool cue.
Maybe you could hit him with your keyboard? You sure do look brave when you're holding it, you know, on the mean streets of your quiet office.
Charlie Sorrel:
I could possibly have taken him out, but I really don't want to be looking over my shoulder for the next few years. Plus, as soon as he sees the bike locked up, he'd just kick the wheels in.
Plus, the guy is tattooed (badly) and a junkie. If he straightens up, he'll never get a job, and if he stays a junkie, he'll probably die anyway, sooner rather than later.
Either way, I don't need to do anything to fuck him up.
And sadly, there were no pool cues to hand.
If once you pay the Dane-Geld, the Dane is ever at your door.
Also, speaking from experience, pool-sticks aren't very good weapons.
--Charlie
I think you've been a victim of 'The Hitcha'.
He's a green cockney bitch with a peppermint lifesavers where his left eye should be. He likes to go on about eels and Victorian nonsense. If you don't agree with him, he'll jab you in the gums with a screwdriver. Mean bastard.
I have to agree with posting #5. Leave that bitch in a puddel of blood and teeth. Shit, he almost deserves that just for talking like that in front of his mom. Come to think of it his mom should have left him in a puddel of blood and teeth years ago and maybe he would have never even thought about stealing anyones bike let alone yours. But since all of this was unavoidable thanks to him, I would make him know that it is a privlege that he is even able to return my ride and for showing him the light it would be an insult if he didn't find away to donate to my collection basket of course I would let him gather up his teeth and pride for another day when he truely finds the wrong bike to steal from the wrong guy who isn't so nice as to give him the guidence that I tried to instill in him.