I feel like the Christmas Idiot

This evening after dinner, I was standing in the kitchen tidying up when the doorbell rang. My kids have been trained NOT to go to the door--they escape, and they get in arguments with neighbor kids etc, so I went to answer it. I opened it to find no one there. Aargh, I hate it when those rotten neighbor kids “ring and run.” I was going to find them this time. Even though I was only in slippers I headed out to the sidewalk to see if I could find the perp and give them a good tongue-lashing. I glanced one way and then headed toward the mailbox, I heard something near the side of our house and called out. “Ok, you may think it’s funny to ring the doorbell, but I don’t!” I saw movement, HA, I had them now, someone moved to hide behind my Suburban, probably thinking they could scoot around the back of my truck and then they would be home free. But I had parked it so you couldn’t get in between the garage and the garbage cans. I stood at the end of the driveway, I wasn’t going back into that inky darkness at the side of the house, I’m not a complete idiot! “Come out,” I said, in my biggest scary Mom voice. “I can see you there!” A muffled-disguised reply, “Hey lady, go check your door!” Huh? I stopped short, what was this? “I checked, there isn’t anything at my door.” “Not at your door, on your door.” Came the same muffled, somewhat familiar voice from behind the garbage. “Oh.” I said. (Oops!)
Embarrassed, I sheepishly left the confrontation at the end of the driveway and went to the door. There, right under the gaze of the porch light was a red envelope, taped to the door. Taking it inside, the “Christmas Perpetrator” slunk away in the darkness, his identity still a mystery to me. I went inside to relate the story to the family. Inside the envelope was a Wal-Mart gift card in the amount of $250, with a note that said the card would explode at the checkout if we purchased a DVD-VCR, “…so don’t do it!” More to come, I guess. That is if I can keep from blowing someone’s cover. And I thought this Christmas would be boring…