Streetlight Manifesto trombonist Nadav Nirenberg is this week’s mini-internet celebrity, after he cleverly and uh, uniquely caught the thief of his cell phone red-handed.
Nirenberg told story, which has been picked up by The New York Times and VHI, a couple of days ago on his Facebook page:
“Last night I accidentally left my phone in the cab to the gig, and it was immediately turned off when I called it. Multiple calls/emails to myself (the phone) offering a reward for the following 12 hours were deleted, this dude was clearly keeping it. Damn.
This morning I woke up to see that the thief had been on my old OKCupid account sending weird messages to girls at 6 in the morning! Not only is he stealing my phone, he’s creepy and disturbing, and gave me an idea: I created a fake email and a half-believable OKCupid account as “Jennifer Rodriguez” – a 24-year-old girl who just moved to Brooklyn and is looking for a man to take her out. I sent a message to the thief (my account) and chatted him up as Jennifer…weird. A few hours later he was headed to “Jennifer’s apartment” for a relaxing bottle of wine and a good time. What a lucky night for him!” (Read the full story here)
Streetlight Manifesto is allegedly working on an album that may or may not ever be released via Pentimento Music Co.
Little did he know that on his way up the stairs I would pop out behind him, calmly give him $20 for my phone (it was in his hand) and tell him the cops were on the way (with a hammer in my hand). RETRIBUTION! The look of immediate shame on his face was priceless, homie was shook and must feel like an idiot.
YES! Here’s some of my favorite parts: Dude thought that a 24-year-old girl who lives alone would invite a complete stranger over for wine. He also believed “Jennifer” wouldn’t care about “Hay the pic u see on my profile it not my pic it my friend pic.” Also, “Jennifer” has gotten 30+ OKCupid messages from dudes in the ~5 hours that she’s existed, gotta delete it NOW. My apologies to the girl whose picture I used.