Tell me stories about breaking into your own place that ended poorly

Miscellaneous and Personal Stuff I Must Share
1

We’ve all been there.

You’ve locked yourself out of your home. You left your keys at the office, or locked the door behind you but left your keys on the coffee table, or haplessly found your way into some other set of circumstances that resulted in you standing on your doorstep lacking the bleeping key to get inside. And this is a particularly bad scenario, like you live alone, for instance, or you’re the only one who didn’t go to the family field trip, so you’re going to be SOL for a long time if you can’t MacGyver your way inside. I don’t want to hear any stories like “Well my wife gets home ten minutes after I do, so I’d just read the newspaper and wait.” No. I’m talking about being truly fucked unless you find your way in. You have two choices: call a locksmith like a pussy, or break the fuck in.

Please share tales of your feats, particularly if they ended in failure and/or embarrassment.

I had to break into my apartment just now. I’m covered in cobwebs, shame and the stench of whiskey, but goddamn it, I’m inside my apt.

My sister actually has a pretty funny story. She had to make a long drive out to a friend’s house way in the burbs and return promptly (something like an hour drive total), and when they got there, they realized they left the key back at her place. She said, “Oh fuck no,” and instead of turning back and making the trip all over again, she picked the fucking lock. No idea how she did it, but there was a will and a way, and she made it so.

So…

Anyone arrested while entering their own home? Share. The cobwebs in my hair and I need to feel like less of an ass. Thanks.

2

When roomie moved in, I offered to show her where I keep the hideaway key. She said, ‘No, you told me where it is.’ Sure enough, she eventually locked herself out. Couldn’t find the key. (In fact, I know where it is – because I put it there – and I had difficulty finding it.) Unbeknownst to me, a door to the trailer I use for storage was unlocked. She mounted the rotten stairs – and broke through them – and made her way through the connecting structure to the door to the house. The door that’s padlocked from the inside. She managed to break in, breaking the door, and was sore for days.

She could have just found a neighbour or walked to the store and called me.

3

May 1993. Hubs and I both work the graveyard shift, in opposite directions from our rented house out in the sticks.

He gets out of work at 6 am to find a BLIZZARD. In May. Welcome to Wisconsin. He decides to meet me at work and escort me home. But he doesn’t make it . . . because he goes ditch diving on the road between our house and my workplace.

Meanwhile I get out of work at 7 am and start trudging home in my car. Along the road I see a car in the ditch . . . it looks familiar. A few hundred feet later, I’m in the ditch as well.

Luckily there’s a farmhouse right there. I knock and Mr. Nice Farmer agrees to give me a ride up the road to our house. I point out my car, and then Mr. S’s, and we stop. Mr. S and Mr. Farmer agree that Mr. Farmer will give me a ride home, then come back for Mr. S and see about pulling us out of the ditch.

Mr. Farmer drops me off and leaves. I let myself into the house and change into my winter coat (I had been wearing only a light leather jacket, it being May and all), then go outside to retrieve our dog from her doghouse. (Crazy Landlord won’t allow us to let her in the house, but I’m not leaving her out in a blizzard.) When we get back up on the porch, I discover that (1) I have locked the door behind me and (2) my keys are, of course, in the pocket of my leather jacket, which is inside the house.

I figure Mr. S won’t be long, so I curl up on the porch chair. Doggie wonders why we aren’t going in. I start to get cold and say fuck it, I don’t care what Crazy Landlord says, I’m breaking in. I break the living room window and let us in.

I’m picking glass out of the carpet when Mr. S arrives courtesy of Mr. Farmer. I look up and announce that if he says one word about me locking myself out, I’ll throttle him. He wisely remains silent. After the cars are retrieved, we lay out a futon on the living room floor (the power is out and the waterbed is ice cold) and go to sleep.

We wake up around 4 pm to a sunny green afternoon. No hint of the raging whiteout blizzard of the morning. The snow has all melted and the power is back on. We drive to town for a pane of glass and a generous gift certificate for Mr. Farmer. Mr. S fixes the window so that Crazy Landlord never knows we broke it.

That was one weird-ass day.

4

Years ago, I locked myself out of my house. I was able to pry one of the cheap windows out of the bottom of it’s track, and then use a piece of wood with a nail in it to unlock the the latch. It took around 30 seconds. After that, I made sure that all the windows had extra security locks on them, and I hid a key.

I locked my keys in my F350 - with the engine running, and then found out how difficult it is to break into a modern vehicle. I finally just sighed, and smashed the vent window.

5

Worse lock out story. Where I used to work, first one in had to be there at 5:30am. The nursing supervisor on duty had to make sure the door was unlocked so we could get in. There was a bell and everything.

The lady who worked opposite of me, rang the bell, rang the bell, realized she was going to be late punching in and get written up for that, so she jimmied the break room window. She got caught crawling in the window by the nursing supervisor (after she had been ringing the bell for 25 minutes).

The nursing supervisor being a useless human being, called the cops to report a B&E, because a lady was breaking into her job to punch in on time.

That went over like a lead balloon. The cops thought it was funny too.

6

I have a magic handtruck. I don’t need ID, I don’t need paperwork. I just show up and tell people that I’m there to pick up their boxes. Actually, secured doors are often opened for me before I even say anything. Its the handtruck and delivery person attitude. Terrible security for legal offices, but anyhow.

My warehouse keys live on my hip. All of the doors lock automatically.

There was an OMG, my lack of planning is now your emergancy situation was happening when I left work for the day and when I came in the next morning and heard the phone ringing, I put my keys on my desk and answered the phone.

I grabbed up the van keys and scampered off to stomp out the fire.

Then had to call bosslady who had to call facilities to get someone to drive out to let me back in.

7

It was about 2 a.m. I was in my pajamas and decided to quickly take the garbage out back before I went to bed. Of course I accidentally locked the patio door behind me. With no other viable options at that time of the night I decided to break in and applied my ample hip to the door, splintering the frame around the lock. It was scarily easy to do actually. Fortunately the bolt was open. It cost me a new door and some embarrassment when the workmen installing it wanted to know what the heck had happened.

8

I was able to open a window. It only opened far enough to let me get a leg in. Of course I ‘high centered’ myself on the window ledge. If I went back out, I would fall to the ground. To continue in, I would fall to the floor. And my boobs were stuck, the left one on the inside of the window and the right one on the outside. God, don’t make me think about how uncomfortable the window track was jammed into my crotch. I will take cobwebs over, ‘unintentional manual clitoral stimulation window track’ anyday.

9

I was standing in the driveway looking up at my second floor apartment wondering WTF I was going to do. I must have looked highly distressed because my neighbor, a scruffy-looking guy who I’d never exchanged a single word with, came out of his apartment and asked me what was wrong. I explained about being locked out. He told me not to worry then he shimmied up the side of the building like fucking spiderman, popped my window open, slipped into my apartment and came out the front door. This took about 4 minutes…and the whole time I stood there like this: :eek:

He came back and said that he used to be a police officer and those windows were notorious for being easy to break into and recommended special locks for them. I bought the locks the next day and gave him my spare key. I figured that if he wanted in, he’d obviously find a way anyway. :smiley:

So, I guess that didn’t end poorly…hmm…

Ok. Here’s one. My friends were trying to hook me up with this really gorgeous guy that was waaay out of my league. Somehow they managed to get him to give me a ride home from their house one afternoon. I had been planning on having one of my friends give me a ride, so I’d left my keys in their car. So, when Mr Gorgeous and I pulled up in front of my house, I realized that’s where the keys still were…all the way across town. Mr. Gorgeous and I found that my roommate’s window was partially open, so I tried to make it through while he helped me by trying to shove/lift me from behind …but I am not a slender girl (remember that story about Winnie the Pooh?). So after a few humiliating minutes of that nonsense, he ended up climbing through the window himself and making his way through our disastrous house to the front door. Needless to say, we did NOT hook up.

I have more, but they are about locking my keys in my car. I am always losing my keys. It’s a sickness really.

10

I keep my keys on a small desk in my kitchen, and I grab them on my way out every morning. One day upon arriving home I realized that I had grabbed the keychain that had only my vehicle key. I had recently had my truck in the shop for some work and so I had the spare key on its chain lying on the table, and that’s what I had grabbed that morning. No house key. At least I was able to open the garage door with the Genie remote, and the door from my garage to the inside has a small window in it. I was actually able to remove some of the framing around the window and pull it out without breaking the glass, and I let myself in.

And this one–ugh–i’m really not proud of. In college once after a full night of drinking, I was dropped off at my apartment complex by a buddy. I climbed the stairs to our third-floor apartment that I shared with two roommates and unlocked the doorknob. But when I tried to open the door, I discovered that the deadlock–the one with no keyhole on the outside–was locked. One of my roommates was out of town, and the other had been out drinking with the rest of us and had returned earlier and was in a drunken slumber in his room. I hammered on the door for a long time and yelled for my roommate to wake up, but he was sleeping like a dead man. Finally, I looked at the window next to our 3rd-floor landing and saw that it was unlocked. So I climbed over the railing and stretched as far as I could and opened the window while my drunk ass dangled 20 feet above the ground below. I managed to get in the window and crawl across the dining table, knocking over all sorts of things on the way. The next day I realized that in the stumbling-drunk state I had been in, it was a minor miracle I didn’t fall and injure or kill myself.

11

I was 18 or so and had been out drinking. I staggered home about 2 am and then realised I didn’t have my door key. I didn’t want to wake my parents so I decided to try and open a ground floor window and get in that way.

My parents lived on a main road and just as I’d opened the window and started to climb in, a passing police car screeched to a halt and hit the lights and sirens.
I was hauled out of the window and before I could explain who I was my dad had come down to see what the trouble was.

The police thought it was highly amusing and offered to lock me up for the night, and my dad eventually saw the funny side, but I got stuck with a lot of chores to make up for it.

12

So how did you get out? Or are you still stuck and want us to call 911?

13

No B&Es, but I wish I had a pic of the elegant ensemble my mother was wearing that day she had to call me at school to come open the door for her. A neighbor had gone up to Mom’s to borrow our folding table (Mom lives on the 10th floor, the neighbor on the 4th), Mom had helped her bring it down and forgotten to grab the keys.

Rollers, thick quilted robe, pink nightshirt with a print of tiny flowers and a lacy edge, fluffy slippers. Definitely not streetwear.

14

I accidentally locked myself in the backyard in my pyjamas. I had to climb a fence to get out (fortunately I lived next door to a park) and go next door, introduce myself, borrow the neighbour’s phone to call my then-boyfriend who was at work (a 40+ minute drive away and not due home until late). He phoned his office and got one of his employees to go to the real estate agents and borrow the spare key (rental property) and bring it to me. I spent about 20 minutes on the front porch in my pjs. Awesome day.

15

Ugh, not sure if I really wanna share this, but…

I used to live in an old apartment in downtown St Paul. The 100+ year old building was formerly a hotel and had a lot of quirks to it and a lot of post hoc construction (and the owner is a bit of a slumlord on top of it).

So, one day I’m in the bathroom taking a shower. I lived alone and rarely shut the bathroom door but that day I did. After my shower, I toweled off, wrapped the towel around me and grabbed the doorknob to open the door. The glass knob fell into my hand while the other end slipped out the other side of the door with the long bar. After spending twenty minutes of trying different bathroom implements to get in the hole to turn the mechanism to release me, I decided to go out the bathroom window and go through the front door.

I put clothes on (thankfully) and shimmied down the wall and jumped the remaining 5 feet to the ground. My barefeet smacked hard against the pavement but I was happy to be out of the bathroom. I walk to the secured front door and my neighbor buzzed me in. I marched up the stairs to my apartment door to find it locked like it should be. :smack:

There was no caretaker/manager on site, but after getting my neighbor to take apart his doorknob and give me the long piece and then let me climb up his back to get back into my apartment to unlock the bathroom door, I was set.

16

Say no more.

Yes! Cops. These stories are always better when cops are involved.

So my story isn’t that bad. I broke into a small ground-level window and entered through my laundry room. It was late, and after waiting around for a half hour, I realized no one was going to come by and save me.

17

Hanging out with with my new girlfriend at my place, I got a call from my old girlfriend who I still see from time to time. She had locked herself out of her house and needed help. New GF and I go over (a couple of blocks) and in trying to break in I manage to put my foot through a basement window, cutting myself badly. So, new GF and old GF get to hang out together for a couple of hours in the emergency room while they sew me up. I don’t know what they talked about but the new relationship didn’t last long.

I know a woman who locked her keys in her car while it was still running and just went on to work. I saw her in the afternoon when she came out and the car was still running! She evenutally got AAA there to break in but by then her car had been idling for over 8 hours.

18

One morning back when I lived in rural Texas I locked myself out of the house. I had to get back in or be hugely delayed for work, so I figured I’d knock one panel out of the multi-panel wood-framed window in the back door, reach in and unlock the door.

Unfortunately it was not a multi-panel window, but a single-panel window with a lattice-like wood frame, so the whole damn thing shattered. I did get in though.

Years later I was watching an episode of “Cops”, in which a sheriff’s deputy was trying to get into a house to check on someone’s welfare. He committed the exact same error busting what he thought was a single panel of glass. It made me feel better. :slight_smile:

19

In college, I left my apartment to go with my fiancée somewhere. She was using my old car since she didn’t have a vehicle, and I normally took my truck. Since we were taking the car, I didn’t feel the need to lug both sets of keys around. Turns out, only my truck keys also had the key to the apartment on them. No hide-a-key.

Well, it turns out, I had a balcony that faced the parking lot. Thankfully, I didn’t have the door locked on it (I kept it open most nights for fresh air anyway). I called my buddy and he brought over a ladder and we put it up in the back of my truck (it was a short ladder) and hopped the balcony railing to get inside.

In our apartment now, we still don’t have a hide-a-key, but my wife has a key now, and thankfully we’ve never been locked out. I guess we would have to break a window if we were.

20

Years ago, I locked myself out of the house, which wouldn’t have been so bad: the landlord worked next door, it was pleasant weather, should have been no problem to wait 30-60 minutes for someone to retrieve a key and let me in. Except … the baby (age 18 months or so) was inside. Eek! Yeah, I broke a small pane on the back door and let myself in ASAP. Then went next door and admitted what I did, and why. The landlord laughed, calmed me down, and told me he would have done the same.

My sister once locked her baby in the car - while the car was running. Fortunately, back then (20 years ago) police carried “slim jims” to unlock cars.