Murder. When I was about seven years old, I watched a show about people whose guardian angels were their pets. This was where I was introduced to the concept of house intruders, murder and other violent crimes. The concept terrified me even though I slept with my dog Libby at the foot of my bed every night. The thing is, Libby weighs about ten pounds and would never be able to fend off a murderous intruder. I remember long, tearful screaming sessions with my mom about why we didn’t have a house alarm…I did all of the screaming and crying and flailing and my mom did all of the “we live in a good neighborhood”-ing and “we can’t afford it”-ing. If you don’t have a dog big enough to stop your assassination and you live in Toronto, your chance of being murdered by your spouse is about 1 in 13500. Your chance of being killed randomly by strangers is 1 in 22000.
I now understand the motives of my mother when she refused to pay for a house alarm. It was 50% likelier that my murderer was already inside of my house. An alarm would have been pointless (Loriggio).