Pretty in pink.

To violate even one of Robert's Rules is to court disaster; multiple violations are just plain stupid. Lazarus Long posited (or is it will posit?) that stupidity is the only universally capital crime, and he knew (will know?) whereof he spoke (will speak?). And yet, despite the force of the Rules, and in flagrant disregard of all the cemeteries, jails and bottom tier graduate schools populated with those sad souls who ignored the them, Meghan Brown and Robert Planthaber walk among us still.

Here’s the story. Meghan – who, we are relentlessly informed, was Miss Tierra Verde of 2009 – and Robert – an arborist who is dating way out of his league if you ask me – were at their home in “a very prominent area” when ne’er-do-well and erstwhile pizza delivery guy Albert Franklin Hill* entered their home uninvited. A struggle ensued, with Albert Franklin Hill first grabbing Meghan – who looks a lot like that cute nurse on “Parks and Recreation” – and then turning his malevolent attention on Robert. Megahn ran to the place where her revolver is kept and returned to dispatch Albert Franklin Hill.

Why were Meghan -- have we mentioned she's pretty? -- and Robert targeted? Well Robert has a theory:

We live in a very prominent area and my fiancee wears a $60,000 engagement ring. The pizza man knew we had money because sometimes we needed change for a $100 bill when he came to deliver pizza.

He could have put it more succinctly. He could have said, "We were idiots." (And, not for nothing Robert, but regularly giving the poor delivery guy a Benjy to pay for a pizza makes you a jerk, too.)

I'm not going to cover all the ways in which Miss Tierra Verde 2009 and her consort are lucky** to be alive. But let's look at just two of the Rules they violated:

Limit ostentatious displays of wealth to the red carpet. You say you are never asked to walk the red carpet? Exactly. A $60,000 engagement ring?*** Unless you are so tremendously wealthy that your ostentatious display of wealth includes a complement of armed guards, showing off your wealth is a bit like the antelope making sure the juiciest haunch faces the lion. Indeed, even with the armed attendants, ostentation may get you uncomfortable attention.

Do not open the door to a stranger at three in the morning. (OK, I confess. This is not really one of Robert's Rules. Neither is "Do not dip daiquiris from a running blender with your bare hand." Bacardi owns that one.) That said, I think I may have a clue about what would induce someone -- even a beauty queen -- to open the door at that hour:

KNOCK KNOCK.

"Who is it?"

"Hi there Miss Tierra Verde, it's me, Albert Franklin Hill."

"Who?"

"Albert Franklin Hill, ma'am, the erstwhile pizza guy."

"What do you want? It's three in the morning. I may have been the prettiest girl in Tierra Verde**** in 2009, but I'm no fool -- you already delivered our pizza last night."

"Yes ma'am, that's just it. I finally rounded up the change for that hundo you gave me for the large veggie lovers."

"Oh. In that case . . . "

*What is about bad guys and three names? I spent a large part of my journalism career on fellow named Frank Athen Walls. Plenty of others come to mind. John Wayne Gacey. Mark David Chapman.  John Walker Lindh. I suppose the lesson is to pick your child's middle name with great care if you think there is a the least possibility of him becoming a serial killer, an assassin or a terrorist.


** As a Presbyterian, I do not, strictly speaking, believe in luck. But you know what I mean.

***Am I alone in wondering how a 42-year-old arborist affords a $60,000 ring? A friend said this entire story got his "spidey sense" tingling and I don't disagree. The vast majority of home invasions don't have anything to do with pizza.


**** Located at 27°40′53″N 82°43′28″W / 27.68139°N 82.72444°W / 27.68139; -82.72444; population 3,574 per the 2000 census.