Right after we were married, the Hubby and I lived in an apartment in downtown Portland. It was located right across the street from huge Catholic church. And, in the morning, if you got up early enough, you could see/hear the local prostitutes getting picked up for their final job of the night. It was an interesting place, to say the least.

Our first Christmas as husband and wife was great. We went out and hunted our own wild Christmas tree. We had our own Christmas dinner. We hung lights in our windows. It was great.

And on Christmas morning, Santa had come. Under the tree was a mountain bike – something I had mentioned looking into buying in the spring, but had never expected to receive. And, as the Hubby likes to recount, for a moment, I believed in Santa again.

What I didn’t know until later is that I caused Santa a lot of havoc. The Hubby had enlisted his parents to aid in this surprise. We lived in a secure apartment which means we had an apartment building key and an apartment key. The Hubby had stowed the bike with them and gave them a key to the apartment building. The plan was for them to deliver the bike to the apartment in the middle of the night. The idea was for our apartment door to be unlocked, and the Hubby being awake when they came to deliver it.

The problem with the plan was me. As was my habit, I would check the door before going to bed to make sure it was locked. And, I would lock it. And put the chain on. The Hubby would then go to unlock it, but then I’d lock it again. I guess this went on all night. Except, I got the final lock in before bed. He didn’t realize that.

My in-laws came to deliver the bike, only to find the apartment locked. From what I heard, there was a lot of attempts made to get the Hubby’s attention (but not mine). The simple middle-of-the-night delivery turned into an exercise in problem solving. If I recall correctly, the Hubby finally got up and checked on where they were at because it was past the time they were supposed to be there. When he got up to check, he saw them starting to drive away, so he flashed the Christmas tree lights on and off which got their attention. It was his only hope because he couldn’t make noise and wake me up. It worked and the bike was delivered.

Who knew you could keep Santa out with a locked door?