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Ok, so it was a hardcore beautiful day outside yesterday (today is also hardcore beautiful, but this is irrelevant), and I had just enough time after work before it got too dark to take a walk downtown. I wanted to get me some good coffee drink, but since money's getting a little tight here lately I decided it would be best to go to the Front Porch ($2.50) rather than the Mudhouse ($4) like usual. So lights are on, it looks pleasantly inviting, I walk through the door...and the room is totally void of persons other than myself.

There has to be someone around somewhere, if only in the back. Again, lights are on, door is unlocked, steam is issuing from the big coffee urns, there's a computer running with no screen saver or anything, but it's still so very empty. Well, there was obviously someone in the back, so I just start to make my way in and chill for a minute. There's this beeping that starts - apparently a timer indicating that something is done brewing or cooking, and someone will surely emerge from the back in just a moment to check on it. It speeds up momentarily, then stops, and I shrug and I begin looking at the artwork on the wall.

After a moment, the beeping starts again...except with a different pattern and...slightly louder.

This time I make my way toward the source of the beeping to see if I can't figure out exactly where it's coming from, because I'm starting to get a slightly ominous feeling about it. I head towards the end of the counter where the computer/soundboard/other random equipment is located, really desperately hoping it's coming from one of those and not from the little white box on the wall with the keypad and the glowy green screen...

But there is no fooling myself. I have set off the security alarm.

My first thought is "WTF?? The door was unlocked! The coffee is steaming! I DON'T UNDERSTAND!!!" For a split second I wonder whether I should hang around and explain, but it doesn't take long (for there obviously is nobody in the back) for my imagination to go crazy with all the interrogations and mistrust that I might have to face if I wait until the owners - or worse, the police - show up.

I would just have to pay the extra buck-fifty and get my coffee from the Mudhouse.

Besides, it was going to be dark soon. I couldn't just wait around for someone to show up. Incidentally, I went back to the Front Porch a few hours later (when it was in fact, quite hoppin') and told my friend who works there what had happened. So I got to tell a fun story and the owners got the relief of knowing that it was an accident and I didn't do anything bad.

I just wanted coffee!