I need some advice, my parents are getting older, and I worry about them...
This is kind of long and drawn out but I'm trying to avoid the "well we need more info" post that's probably coming anyway...
I was visiting my parents who live in a small New England town of about 1900 people. They live on about 4 acres, neighbors houses are near invisible, even at night. My Dad is gone on business all the time, for days at a time. My Mom is at home most days fussing with her garden, when there isn't 4 feet of snow in the yard.
They have motion detection lights on all corners of the house, an alarm system with cell backup, and they have the loudest and quick to bark Springer Spaniel I've ever seen.
So I'm in the yard with my dad, throwing a tennis ball for the dog kinda late one afternoon. I look down to the street, and see a pick up truck with four guys, late teens twenties, shaved heads, hoodies on, driving slowly by the house. Now it's not unusual for people to be looking for addresses, could have been a shoveling crew trying to find an address, I wrote it off. 5 minutes later I saw the truck going the opposite way up the street, slowly driving by the house, and the gents in the truck were intently paying attention to my dad and I. So I said something along the lines of "That's weird, those guys were literally just going the other way." And I decided to wave at the guys in the truck. Basically one of those "Hey, I see you too" waves.
My dad mentions that he thinks he's seen one of the guys before. Hard to tell for sure but he believes it was the same truck. Some time earlier in the month, my Dad had seen a pickup truck with two guys in it sitting on the side of the road in front of their house. He watched them for a minute, and finally decided to go down the drive and ask the guys if they needed anything (like I said small town, it was either someone he knew, or a crew going to work in someone's yard and they were lost) So he asks the guys if they need any help, and the one in the passenger seat answers "No, its a free country we can sit here if we want to." My dad, being somewhat aware of how quickly this could go bad went back to the house and called the non-emergency number for the local PD just to report the guys as suspicious, plate number, good descriptions of the guys and truck. Well, the guys drive off as my dad hangs up the phone. 10minutes later, local PD drives down the street stopping and talking to neighbors and things.
SO here's the incident why I'm bringing this up. My dad's off on a trip, and my mom is settling into bed for the night (midnight or so) The dog runs out of the room barking up a storm, just the same time my mom notices that the motion lights are coming on on the driveway, and on the far corner of the house... the dog is going nuts. So my mom locks the bedroom door, grabs dad's shotgun, and locks herself in the bathroom, in the water closet (small room for just the toilet), cell phone in hand ready to hit send on the 911 call. Could have been deer, but the dog tends to just stay nice and quiet when deer are outside the house. She just looks out the window at them and lets out a little whimper every now and then...
Can my parents do anything else to keep safe?
This is kind of long and drawn out but I'm trying to avoid the "well we need more info" post that's probably coming anyway...
I was visiting my parents who live in a small New England town of about 1900 people. They live on about 4 acres, neighbors houses are near invisible, even at night. My Dad is gone on business all the time, for days at a time. My Mom is at home most days fussing with her garden, when there isn't 4 feet of snow in the yard.
They have motion detection lights on all corners of the house, an alarm system with cell backup, and they have the loudest and quick to bark Springer Spaniel I've ever seen.
So I'm in the yard with my dad, throwing a tennis ball for the dog kinda late one afternoon. I look down to the street, and see a pick up truck with four guys, late teens twenties, shaved heads, hoodies on, driving slowly by the house. Now it's not unusual for people to be looking for addresses, could have been a shoveling crew trying to find an address, I wrote it off. 5 minutes later I saw the truck going the opposite way up the street, slowly driving by the house, and the gents in the truck were intently paying attention to my dad and I. So I said something along the lines of "That's weird, those guys were literally just going the other way." And I decided to wave at the guys in the truck. Basically one of those "Hey, I see you too" waves.
My dad mentions that he thinks he's seen one of the guys before. Hard to tell for sure but he believes it was the same truck. Some time earlier in the month, my Dad had seen a pickup truck with two guys in it sitting on the side of the road in front of their house. He watched them for a minute, and finally decided to go down the drive and ask the guys if they needed anything (like I said small town, it was either someone he knew, or a crew going to work in someone's yard and they were lost) So he asks the guys if they need any help, and the one in the passenger seat answers "No, its a free country we can sit here if we want to." My dad, being somewhat aware of how quickly this could go bad went back to the house and called the non-emergency number for the local PD just to report the guys as suspicious, plate number, good descriptions of the guys and truck. Well, the guys drive off as my dad hangs up the phone. 10minutes later, local PD drives down the street stopping and talking to neighbors and things.
SO here's the incident why I'm bringing this up. My dad's off on a trip, and my mom is settling into bed for the night (midnight or so) The dog runs out of the room barking up a storm, just the same time my mom notices that the motion lights are coming on on the driveway, and on the far corner of the house... the dog is going nuts. So my mom locks the bedroom door, grabs dad's shotgun, and locks herself in the bathroom, in the water closet (small room for just the toilet), cell phone in hand ready to hit send on the 911 call. Could have been deer, but the dog tends to just stay nice and quiet when deer are outside the house. She just looks out the window at them and lets out a little whimper every now and then...
Can my parents do anything else to keep safe?
