Weird...

Last night I was laying awake in bed, listening to the dog door open and close (it's mechanical). This is not an unusual occurence... Apollo is always up and about at all hours of the night. Suddenly I realized that the dog was in fact snoring in the corner of our bedroom, so the door was opening on its own, presumably.

I woke Jeremy up, and he went downstairs to check it out. He turned the door off in case it was some kind of internal motor problem. He came back to bed, but then started worrying about whether or not the fence gate was locked. He went out to lock the gate.

This morning, we noticed that our BBQ grill was not in it's usual place. Someone had moved it to the edge of the patio. I say someone instead of something because it's way too heavy to be moved by wind. The dog wouldn't have moved it, either. Also, the doghouse was moved away from the house.

Weird.

The dog door has a magnetic sensor, which is how it operates. Apollo wears a little magnet on his collar, which is how he gets in an out. The door is sensitive to metal and to electronics - i.e. if you move your cell phone by the sensor, the door opens.

Ten bucks says someone was trying to steal our grill in the dark of the night. They may have had a cell phone or other electronic device on their person which set off the door. This probably startled them and they fled.

I can't think of any other explanation. I wouldn't be surprised . . . I don't generally feel unsafe in our neighborhood, but our friends and neighbors had their car stolen out of their closed garage in broad daylight, afterall.....

Kinda creepy.