The Buddha placed that ad on CL, he was trying to do that man a favor.

Every day I lose a little more faith in humanity. not that there’s much left to lose.

What on earth makes me think they wouldn’t have taken my gun?

How about the fact that it is not something I leave at home. If my gun is in my house then I am almost certainly in there as well.

In my casual survey of the masses, more people were driven by dvesha, revulsion, than by raga, attachment. So avoidance is a bigger source of unhappiness than desire.

Basically a “stupidity” clause for walking into someone’s house and taking their things, based on an online advertisement alone.

In this day and age, you can’t be too careful, and I don’t think it would be that much of a problem to sign a quick piece of paper that says “I give so and so permission to take anything permission from my house” and slap your signature on it.

There, your butt is covered in a court of law.

Frankly, I think he should take these people to court for theft.

Chalk the Buddha up as enlightened.

(chalk me up as not yet so)

-abs

Also, did his evil niece state a date and time when she knew he wouldn’t be there, or did she think it would just be a hassling prank for him to answer the door 100 times?

I had the opposite happen, once. I was picking up a dresser from someone, and they kept offering extra stuff I didn’t need.

Looks like the people behind the fake posting were trying to cover up an earlier burglary.

Slash the tires on each vehicle on the property – it keeps the person and your stuff there till the police arrive – while giving you some sense of satisfaction for being robbed.

How would you report this to your insurance? Or was that the scam to get better stuff…

What on earth makes you think they wouldn’t have taken your gun? It’d have been first thing gone, bye. You’d be lucky if, had you caught the guy walking away with it, you had not been shot for trying to take “his” new shiny second amendment right.

Greed, like faith, is a powerful force for causing people to overlook rationality.

This is ridiculous. If anyone here has ever had a garage sale (if you do, don’t forget your permit, der polizei can seize all goods if you don’t get one), you’ll know that people buying cheap items are like this too.

Once had someone try to walk off with a small garden statue (well, not so small. the size and likeness of a four year old child.)

Had to bodily restrain them (and yes, I’m still the seventeen year old female Tenn) and demand that they set it down. The person looked at me like I was crazy and told me that it had a ‘free’ sticker on it.

My little brother ran up and informed me that he’d just put it on there himself. Which made sense, since we didn’t make ‘free’ stickers, and the ‘free’ sticker was a post-it note with free scratched quickly on it.

I can only come to two conclusions:

A: Someone was playing a juvenile prank;

B: Someone was righteously pissed off at that fellow and put some thought into their revenge.

I can’t blame the people who responded to the advertisement. Many years of such adverts being placed in local papers – and dutifully checked for authenticity by the editorial staff – has primed a large swath of the older population to take such advertisements at face value.

I also cannot blame them for blowing off the owner. For all they knew, he was just another person responding to the advertisement, and trying to swindle them out of what was ‘rightfully theirs’.

I can only come to two conclusions:

A: Someone was playing a juvenile prank;

B: Someone was righteously pissed off at that fellow and put some thought into their revenge.

I can’t blame the people who responded to the advertisement. Many years of such adverts being placed in local papers – and dutifully checked for authenticity by the editorial staff – has primed a large swath of the older population to take such advertisements at face value.

I also cannot blame them for blowing off the owner. For all they knew, he was just another person responding to the advertisement, and trying to swindle them out of what was ‘rightfully theirs’.