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Mistress of the Mix: Locked Out

Not that I’m bragging (mainly because I don’t want anyone to try to prove me wrong), but potential burglars would have a hard time breaking into my house.

Now I’ve known this for a long time, but my husband, who just moved in a few weeks ago, is just finding this out now. Twice in the past week, my guy has locked himself out of the house. In both instances, he walked out of the kitchen door and onto the back porch, forgetting that when the door knob turns on the inside, it’s actually locked from the outside.
Fools him every time.

Fortunately, he’s had two important things on him both times…his clothes and his phone.

If you’re familiar with my husband, you know it’s not that farfetched that he’d end up naked in the backyard with no way to reach me at work.
Of course he tried to find another way into the house before calling me, but short of throwing a deck chair through the kitchen door, he quickly realized that it just wasn’t gonna happen.
He was hopelessly locked out, and needed someone to let him back in.

The first time I was able to drive home and let him back in the house, but the second time he had to walk all the way from home to my office so I could give him the key.
All this reminded me of the one and only time I ever locked my self out of the house and learned for myself just how difficult it would be to get back in.

It was a cool December evening right about this time of year. Sophia was invited to an afterschool  Christmas cookie baking party at a friend’s house. We were already buckled into our seatbelts with the motor running when I remembered that I’d left a gift inside on the counter. I took my house key off the ring so that Sophia could stay in the warm car while I ran back in the house. I was back in a flash, and we headed off to the party.
We returned home a few hours later (when it was pitch black and really cold), and after looking through every pocket, my purse and under the seats in the car, I realized that my key was gone. It was not on my person. It was not in my car.

I drove back to the party, and soon all the moms there were looking through their purses, wondering if one of them might’ve somehow accidentally swiped my house key. I started to get a little panicky. I’m a little surprised I didn’t take a bite out of each Christmas cookie we’d made to see if maybe, possibly, perchance my key was dropped into the batter. Eventually, the man of the house, Adam, followed me back, positive that he could get me back into my house in a few short minutes.

A few minutes turned into a few hours. We tried credit cards. We tried removing the hinges from a door that opened outward. We tried prying open the garage door. We tried peeling back the rubber insulation piping from around the front door. We went into the backyard (which required maneuvering a combination lock in the dark because all my flashlights were inside the house), and worked on all the doors and windows. Then we worked on shimmying the sliding glass door out of its track. Nothing worked. The place was locked tight.

Adam hated to give up. We’d been so sure that he could save the day. But finally, he admitted defeat, and I called the locksmith. He showed up around 9pm, and after trying for 45 minutes to get in through all the same doors that Adam had been working on, announced that I had the hardest house to break into that he’d ever come across. The locks were expensive. The doors were solid. Most of them had high quality deadbolts in addition to doorknob locks. All my windows and glass doors had locks plus wooden rods for an added protective measure. Finally, the locksmith resorted to a method that might (he warned me) destroy my front door.

It worked. He got in, and I started running around the house looking for my key, which I thought for sure had to be somewhere inside. But it wasn’t. We were all freezing, so I made a quick pot of coffee as the locksmith removed my lockset, telling me that he was going to go down to his van and make me a new set of keys. I grabbed a flashlight (because this was before I added security lights that come on when anyone gets within 50 feet of my house) and headed down the front steps to bring him a mug of coffee. As I walked across the driveway, the beam of light picked up a silver flash. Right there, in between my car and the front steps. Right where Adam, the locksmith and I had all tromped by no less than 6 times apiece during the ordeal. Right where I had dropped it running back out of the house when I ran in for the gift. My key.

Today’s playlist is dedicated to my husband, my friend Adam, and everybody else who has been locked out, locked up or somehow found themselves without the key on the outside looking in (or the inside looking out, I suppose). And here’s hoping you don’t find yourself out in the cold without a way back in, or someone to call.

Check out today’s Locked Out Playlist directly at Grooveshark, or hit the play button on the embedded streaming playlist below.

  1. Let My Love Open The Door – Pete Townshend
  2. Lookin’ Out My Back Door – Creedence Clearwater Revival
  3. Locked Out – Freelance Whales
  4. Open The Door – Otis Redding
  5. Locked Up – Ingrid Michaelson
  6. She Holds A Key – Gavin DeGraw
  7. Picking The Same Lock – Alias & Tarsier
  8. Locked Out Boogie – Leroy Foster
  9. Lock ‘Em Up – Charles Mingus
  10. I’m Gonna Lock My Heart – Billie Holliday
  11. Lock, Stock & Teardrop – k.d. Lang
  12. Somebody Done Changed The Lock – B.B. King
  13. Knockin’ On Heaven’s Door – Bob Dylan
  14. Skeleton Key – Margot & The Nuclear So & So’s
  15. Lock You Up – The Love Dogs
  16. Key To Your Door – Magic Slim & The Teardrops
  17. Key Signator – David Grisman Quintet
  18. Key To The Highway – Steve Miller Band
  19. Secret Door – Arctic Monkeys
  20. Back At Your Door – Maroon 5
  21. Stitched Up – John Mayer & Herbie Hancock
  22. Out The Door – The All-American Rejects
  23. Pop That Lock – Adam Lambert
  24. Under Lock & Key – MxPx
  25. Get Out The Door – Velvet Revolver
  26. Knock Knock – MacMiller

Valerie Ing-Miller has been the Northern California Program Coordinator for Jefferson Public Radio in Redding for nine years and can often be found serving as Mistress of Ceremonies at the Cascade Theatre. For her, ultimate satisfaction comes from a perfect segue. She’s the mother of a teenage daughter and a 7-year-old West Highland Terrier, and can’t imagine life without them or music. Valerie wakes up with a song in her head, she sings in the shower and at the top of her lungs in the car.

Valerie Ing

Valerie Ing has been the Northern California Program Coordinator for Jefferson Public Radio in Redding for 14 years and can often be found serving as Mistress of Ceremonies at the Cascade Theatre. For her, ultimate satisfaction comes from a perfect segue. She and her husband are parents to a couple of college students and a pair of West Highland Terriers, and Valerie can’t imagine life without them or music. The Mistress of the Mix wakes up every day with a song in her head, she sings in the shower and at the top of her lungs in the car.

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