Thank you for your great stories and presence in the Writers' Block! It's easy to miss a shout out on here lol. Steemit definitely needs some better way of communicating peer to peer.

As for the rat bastard, despite him having stolen a definitively identifiable, custom made, and expensive tool (which could easily have been tracked down at whatever local pawn shop he hocked it to) the police displayed a revolting lack of motivation to do a damn thing about it so I contented myself with outing him on social media and he'll never live in peace, or work around here again. The house happens to be locally 'famous' and over a hundred people in town are following the restoration on a little FB group I set up for them. That many people aren't going to get me an HGTV show or anything but in a small village like this it's enough for everyone to have heard what a scumbag this guy is overnight. He's been gone and no one's heard from him for two years. I say "good riddance." I don't want to contemplate what me or my husband might do if he were accessible.