When plans for sandwiches are interrupted by an axe-wielding lunatic.

Remember to call the comedy writers.

I’m not saying that I am getting USED to having my daily routine interrupted by crazy people. But I do live in Los Angeles and so far I have no plans to move. So actually, that is KIND of what I am saying.

Anyway, there we were, getting dressed to go to dinner at the home of our friends Max and Mira, married parents of two. There would be seven people attending. Most of us had known each other for forty years. We all met working on the first night time iteration of Late Night with David Letterman:

My husband was not as familiar with the group members as we are with each other, so he and I were in the middle of this conversation:

Does this jacket look okay? Is this one better?

Yes. Wear both. We should get going.

That’s when the text messages started:

A photo came next.

Always thinking of others first, I jumped right into the fray with a text:

ME: We haven’t gotten into the car yet. Should we not come?

Realizing that Mira is in danger, Andy B. is first with a practical solution: Secure the dinner plans for the rest of us! It makes no sense to burden Mira with the logistics of dinner for seven while she has a guy with an axe to contend with, alone.

How many movies have we all watched where we shake our heads in astonishment at the behavior of the people who have to deal with an axe wielding lunatic? Of course most of us have no way of knowing what we would do in a situation like that.

So to recap the situation as it stands: Max is at a sandwich shop. Andy B. is in an Uber, on his way to meet up with him. And I am preoccupied with finding a way not to have to drive all the way across town if the dinner party isn’t happening. In Los Angeles, traffic is a constant problem. A general rule for living here is that anything anyone can do to put off having to do even a little more driving is always the FIRST priority.

Meanwhile: Mira is alone in a house, in some kind of proximity to a lunatic with an axe.

And, unlike in any movie where this is the situation, the only people she is in touch with as she is facing down this potentially terrifying confrontation are people who have been writing comedy for a living for 45 years.

Updated recap: Mira is alone in a house on a street where an axe wielding lunatic is on the loose. Is she in the grave danger? Who can say? No one knows for sure.

Meanwhile, her long time friends and loved ones are all heading over to a near-by school because here is what everyone else is thinking:

And so, as far as we know, no one was harmed. And we all enjoyed delicious sandwiches.

CODA: It turned out that the suspect who was apprehended was a run-away teenager who had broken into the house of some people on vacation. When the owners of the house arrived home, the frightened teen bolted out the door. He scared the home-owners so badly that they called the police.

He did not have an axe.

He did have a backpack containing a live cat. The people who filed the report added the axe detail because they were afraid that otherwise the police would not take their complaint seriously. So in the last analysis, the suspect (a runaway teenager with a cat) is very lucky he did not get shot and killed.

People of Los Angeles: Do not be adding a non-existent axe to a police report. Ever. You are putting people’s lives in jeopardy. In fact, if I might recommend that the next time there is danger involving sharp edged tools, consider simply calling your local league of comedy writers . They will probably agree to compulsively make jokes at you until the crisis is resolved or averted.