kongoboken

On September 7, 2026, two thieves made off with a pair of Renoir paintings from a museum in southern France. Each painting was estimated to be worth $10.4M. The alarm system for the Cagnes-sur-Mer’s Renoir Museum went off at around 5:48am local time, with the police arriving on the scene within five minutes. By that time, the robbers had broken a hole in the garden fence and cut through bolts holding several paintings’ frames, making off with four paintings, two of which were later recovered abandoned in the garden.

Five Minutes. $20.8 million dollars. If I’m thinking, there must be 200 million other people thinking….. Museum Directors are thinking…”Holy shit – five minutes!”

Police are thinking… “Five minutes ain’t bad!”. Security firms are thinking “ I’ve got to print some brochures”.  Steel bolt manufacturers are thinking “Maybe special SPECIAL bolts for paintings!” Garden fence suppliers are thinking, “Do we need security sensors?” Criminals are thinking, “I’ve got to get me a stop watch!”.

I’m not particularly (note unnecessary adverb) happy about this shit but frankly (yes, another fuckin adverb) it’s a sigh (sic) of the times (pun intended). Technology is at least temporarily (adverb) favoring the bad guys. Think about the French crooks – they just had to watch the premises and maybe test the police response to get their “Safe Window” – five minutes in their case. Pretty low tech. Kinda Bonnie and Clyde tactic. But it worked. It’s a good time to be a crook.

Not to say it hasn’t ALWAYS been a good time to be a crook. I give you Matthew at least 1900 years ago:

“Do not store up riches for yourselves here on earth, where moths and rust destroy, and robbers break in and steal. Instead, store up riches for yourselves in heaven, where moths and rust cannot destroy, and robbers cannot break in and steal. For your heart will always be where your riches are.”

Matthew 6:19–21

So it’s been Bugs and Water and Robbers from the beginning and it will be Bugs and Water and Robbers for evermore. Let’s just learn better ways to deal with it. Guns come to mind (for robbers at least), there is no way to defeat water (I’ve found from great experience) and bugs – well – I’d rather not go there.