At a few minutes before midnight on Christmas Eve, in what can only be described as a major mid-air scuffle, Santa Claus and his team of faithful reindeer were intercepted by the Tooth Fairy in the moonlit (or was the glow caused by the blinding holiday lights decorating the houses below?) and cold, clear skies above Hampden, a somewhat quirky neighbourhood in Baltimore, Maryland.

According to riveting eyewitness accounts of the event, the Tooth Fairy (who was described by one very puzzled witness as a gravity defying, large, hairy man with a tiny wing span, and wearing a torn but frilly, pink dress. The police took this description with a grain of salt, calling it "preposterous!", "inaccurate!" and "highly unlikely!", and saying things like "we all KNOW the Tooth Fairy is a dainty and very aerodynamic little girl". At first police ascribed the inaccurate eyewitness account to the witness suffering from what is clearly a case of Post Traumatic Stress disorder (a common affliction among eyewitnesses), but the department quickly retracted most of the above statements (it's hard to tell which ones) when a few other eyewitnesses nervously came forward, one even delivering a very grainy and blurry but undisputably credible (even though it had no sound) video tape recording - which shall henceforth be known as Exhibit A - of the whole affair)... now where was I?

Oh, yes. According to the wildly different (but variety is the spice of life) eyewitness accounts, as well as the blurry but soundless images amateurishly captured on Exhibit A, the Tooth Fairy (who from that angle did indeed look very much like a large man in a dress) in a shrewd (but despicable!) manoeuvre, derailed the reindeer from their high speed gift delivery path by spanning dental floss across it, thereby causing the first two reindeer (Rudolph, Dancer and Prancer. Yes, I know I wrote "two", but the eyewitnesses swore that Rudolph, Dancer AND Prancer were the two reindeer in question. Apparently eyewitnesses don't have to be highly skilled in mathematics) to trip over it. This resulted in an unpleasant chain reaction crash and dominoe effect topple of the whole lot of them.

Poor Santa was tossed from his wrecked sleigh, catapulting through the sky as if he was a weightless entity, and gifts of various sizes were scattered everywhere, the wrapping torn to shreds and the bows askew.

"It was utter carnage!" The police spokesperson declared in a solemn tone. (Even though there were no known fatalities among the victims.)

According to more conflicting eyewitness reports, the Tooth Fairy then ransacked the gift bags, looting several home dental care and tooth whitening products.

Even after hearing this, (and Santa's Elves later confirming the conspicuous absence of those objects from the salvaged gifts) the police maintained that there was still no known motive for "what can only be described as a very unfortunate accident." (Even though the Tooth Fairy was captured in close-range on Exhibit A and can be clearly seen (it was actually the only bit on the whole video tape that was in focus) mouthing the word (and this was later confirmed by a hearing, lip-reading expert) "Sabotage!"* while sporting a wicked and - as can be expected - toothy grin.)

* The lip-reading expert would later reluctantly admit - but only after increasing pressure - that there may have been a teensy tiny, itty BITTY chance that he could've misunderstood, and that what he had interpreted as "Sabotage" may very well have been "Open the Garage" or "See That Mirage" or, in the unlikely event that the Tooth Fairy is French Canadian or even just French, he may have an accent and so he could've said: "Take out the garbage", because his pronunciation would've caused "garbage" to sound more like "gar-baaaaaahge", thereby rhyming with "garage" and "mirage". The moral of this bit of the story is that one should really never trust in a hearing lip-reading expert. Unless of course you have absolutely NO other alternative.

Anyway, the police claim that they are still working hard to solve the case, but - if you will forgive me editorializing for just a moment - I think they're only saying that because the Elves have been withholding all the gifts that were supposed to go to all the members of the Baltimore City Police and their immediate families, refusing to hand it out until the case is solved and the stolen goods recovered. So the police are much more interested in appeasing the Elves in order to get the gift embargo lifted, so that "our poor kids and wives can finally get their presents and stop driving us crazy. You can't blame them though, because it's almost January!*"

* Of course, that was said on December 31st. So then it WAS just almost, but not quite yet, January. Of course, now it IS January.

But all of that aside...

Back to Christmas Eve, when Hampden children small and a bit larger (like me) were fighting sleep while eagerly awaiting Santa's arrival, oblivious to the pandemonium carrying on in the skies high above their neighbourhood.

I myself was drifting off when I was suddenly jolted awake by a loud bang on the roof of our house.

I bravely ran downstairs (away from the sound). Honestly though, I wasn't just going to cower in a corner, I was really going to cower and peek out from behind my teddy bear (tightly clutched and held up in front of me like body armour) to investigate.

It was during this time, as I was peeking out from behind my teddy, that I happened to look out the window and see something flash and fall from the sky.

(To be continued...)