It Wasn't Me!

First of all, let me preface this story by saying I'm not a fan of stealing. I think I made that very clear when covering our first 'child criminal' story. 

Having said that, so many many times in the adventure that is my life, if I don't laugh I'll cry--and I'd much rather laugh.

Now, on with the story:

We have a new lady working in the kitchen. Her responsibilities are to wash dishes (no dishwasher in these parts), keep the kitchen clean, prepare food for the kids and staff, and just do what needs to be done.

A few weeks ago we had bought Halloween candy and it was stored in our large pantry. All the bags of variety candy should have been closed but the monkey had gotten into the pantry and ripped one of the bags open.

The next day, Tom mentioned to me that he thought the kitchen lady might have been snitching some candy because he had walked into the pantry while she was tidying up and she jumped in fright and her hands crinkled as if concealing candy wrappers. She was cleaning a shelf on the other side of the pantry from where the candy was stored and there was nothing around that could have made that sound.

There wasn't an opportunity to talk with her that day and then I forgot about it. That is until two days later when I returned with the weekly shopping (including more candy) and saw the opened bag of candy in the pantry. There was obviously more missing than just one piece which the monkey made off with and so I casually asked the kitchen lady if she had perhaps taken a piece or two. 

Her response was classic:

"No, I didn't take any. In fact, that day that Mr. Morrow came into the pantry I was cleaning the other shelf."

Note that I had said nothing at all about Tom.

I didn't laugh right then but afterward Tom and I had a really good chuckle. Stealing is not only universal but so is trying (however ineffectually) to cover it up.

Sadly, there was nothing I could do right then. This lady seems to have a deception problem since she's been involved in a couple other incidents but we're trying to have faith that she will learn and gain some maturity.

Related Reading: I Thought I'd Seen Everything 
(The woman in this link is a different one from the story above. We just seem to attract crazy kitchen women.....)

Exactly One Year Ago: Mayflies and....