!@#$%^&*!!!!

On Wednesday, June 10, 2010, at about a quarter to 7 in the evening, I was in my research lab getting ready to leave for the day. As I was shutting down my lil sis's netbook that I borrowed, I went into the backroom to check on the last data spectra that I had taken and shut down all the equipment, which takes less than 5 mins. But then I heard a noise outside and went to see if there was somebody there and there was! A black man with a blue and white stripes t-shirt and blue jeans was walking out the room when I emerged from the backroom. Then I looked at my desk and saw that my netbook had disappeared!!!! O_O Then I immediately ran after that guy who just left and I had to run to catch up to him for such a big guy like him. I was about 4-5 meters away from him and asked him why he was in the room. He turned around and answered that he was looking for someone named Cathy and I kept staring at his hands and pocket and didn't see him carrying anything. So I ran back to the lab to see if there was anything else missing cuz my bag was just sitting on the chair. Thank goodness everything else was still in place except the netbook. So I ran back to see if I could catch up to that stranger to ask him if he saw anybody else in the room within the last 5 mins. But he was no where to be found and ran around the 11th Fl feeling so frantic and scared. I saw 2 guys, who I knew from other labs, heading to the elevator and asked them if they saw the man that I just saw, and they said no. But when i described to them the situation, one of them went back to their labs to check if any of their stuff was missing too. I thought I was about to hyperventilate by then...but all I could do was go to the security guards and they directed me to the public safety office to report the stolen item. It was then that I lost all hope in getting the netbook back. I even cried as I called my lil sis if she could give further descriptions of the netbook for me to report.

As the security guard brought me to the 26th precint, all I could do was kick myself in my mind. I wanted to beat up myself so badly, but I also felt so much HATE at that thief. The police and the public safety ppl told me that getting my netbook back was almost impossible since I didnt place any safety measures on the netbook. Apparently, I could have a blue marking etched on the netbook, which would signal to whoever tries to the buy the item that it was a stolen item or I could have set up something so that if a thief opened the netbook, a quick snapshot can be taken of the thief (if there's a built-in webcam) and it can be detected where it was located at the time when the thief opened the netbook. I feel so STUPID! I just couldn't say it enough to myself. It was drizzling that day too. By the time I left school, it was already 9pm. Only 2 hrs has passed after the event, and I felt like the netbook was already lightyears away. As I went home, I just got more paranoid about my surroundings. It was the first time I felt this much hate that it almost didn't seem right not holding a knife in my hand as I walked the street. It was like....nothing really mattered anymore.

The only thing that I could take away from this is too be more cautious next time. I was too naive in thinking that I could leave my netbook outside on my desk w/o anyone taking it as I stayed in the backroom cuz my desk faces the door. But the door was almost closed, not locked, but nobody could have seen me in my room w/o opening the door first. The scary thing is how could any random person walking thru the hallway pick the moment when I walked into the back room to take my netbook within those 5 mins w/o opening the door first. That made me think that the thief must have looked inside the room while I was still in front of my netbook without me knowing cuz my back faces the door and was waiting for me to leave my netbook alone before taking action! GAWDDDDD, I AM A STUPID-MORONIC-BUTTHEAD! It just didn't feel safe anymore.

I wanted to suspect that black guy who came into the room, but I didn't see him carry anything! But I heard something scary the next morning and made me 99% sure it must have been him, and made me want to turn into the Hulk. One of the two guys who I encountered as I frantically looked around the 11th fl for that black guys had apparently met the same guy too. He also said that he saw a black dude already inside their lab and when he asked why the black guy was there, he also said that he was looking for Cathy. But this occured a week ago. So how could he be looking for the same person a week apart?? Omg, at that moment when I heard that, I felt like raging again, but also a little relief cuz now I know who I can direct my anger at. Other ppl on the 11th fl started coming into the lab cuz they also heard the story too. It was pretty humiliating for me cuz I feel like I put everybody in danger and made my mentor look bad, but at least they're on alert now and it was only my property that was stolen. But my mentor said that if the grant that he applied for gets through, he would compensate it for me =I

my lil sis didn't yell at me, but she was still in shock and worried that I had lost all my data, but thankfully I had pulled out my usb drive before shutting down the netbook or that would have been another headache....but my lil sis and I had been planning to use that netbook for our trip to china....i feel like such a let down and a big disappointment to anybody who knows me now

well that pretty much bummed me out for the rest of the week