Is there a burglar hiding in my house?
Or am I just solo parenting?
"We're home baby," I say. "Time to give me the phone back, please."
My daughter Molly and I had just gotten back from dropping Nana home after she'd borrowed my car for the day.
Normally I wouldn't bring her along for something like this, especially not so close to her bedtime where there's a risk she'll fall asleep in the car...
(Hence distracting her with my phone. What a fun 45-minute drive in peak hour listening to weird YouTube videos where people LARP as Super Mario characters lol).
...But sadly my husband Steve is in Brisbane for his company's sales kickoff, so I'm flying solo this week.
We get inside, and I tell Molly we only have 10 minutes of playtime with her toys before we have to start getting ready for bed.
"I need to wee!" she announces suddenly—something she loves to do usually when we're in the middle of a supermarket with no toilet in sight.
Thankfully we've made it home, I think.
...And I watch as she bolts down the hallway to the toilet door...
Only to not actually open it??
Oh great, I think. She's not made it. Now I'm gonna have to clean up wee on top of everything else I've still gotta do tonight.
Except... I notice that she's not standing in her typical "Oh, oh," stance—and she's trying the door handle again.
"What's wrong?" I ask, frowning. I reach for the door handle myself—and it doesn't budge.
WTF.
I try a couple more times... only to conclude that the door is, in fact, locked.
Now, I'm kind of embarrassed to admit this, but my mind immediately went to: SOMEONE IS IN THERE. We've come home and a burglar was in our house and panicked and so has locked themselves in our toilet. 😅
"Hello?" I call out hesitantly. "Is someone in there?"
Of course no one is in there, Cass, you bloody idiot. You've just accidentally pressed the lock button when you were in there last and then shut the door behind you.
Molly pipes up again: "I need to wee!"
Oh yeah. Fuck.
I try to unscrew the cover on the door handle so I can reveal the safety mechanism that'll unlock the door, but the cover is on there so bloody tight I can't get any purchase.
Meanwhile, Molly is hopping from one foot to another, so I tell her: "Just go wee in the shower."
"Okay!" she says brightly, as if I'd just offered her extra screen time before bed lol.
Kids. 🤷♀️
To cut a long story short—I did manage to get the door unlocked. I used a knife to chip away at the paint that had sealed the door handle cover, and then used a skewer to pop open the lock lol.
But not before I called Steve, the property maintenance guy in my networking group, and even the carpenter—all of whom DID NOT ANSWER MY PHONE CALL BTW. Thanks guys! 😝
"Why didn't you just YouTube it?" asked Steve when he finally called back. "Or ask AI or something?"
"Because," I said with a huff. "I did not think of that."
Mate, I was a few weird noises away from ringing the police about a potential home invader, like come on—I was clearly not thinking straight. 😆
Now, here's the part where I'm supposed to very smoothly transition into a copywriting or marketing lesson.
I could say something about how your readers are distracted too, so what seems obvious to you probably isn’t obvious to them—which is why you shouldn’t rely on them making the same logical leaps you do.
I could also say that sometimes you don’t NEED a lesson. Sometimes telling a funny story is enough.
But as I mentioned, I’m kinda at capacity right now, so that’s about as much of a transition and lesson as I’ve got in me lol.
Look, I even publicly gave up on LinkedIn today:
Besides, I published a bloody insightful 5000-word edition of The Brief last week. And the launch went really well—I ended up with nearly DOUBLE the number of subscribers I’d set as my goal. Thanks guys! 🫶
Soooo I think I can afford to just tell a funny story tonight.
That said, I should let you know I'll be adding a bonus to Brief #1 next week!
I’ll be sharing a diagnostic you can use to help you rewrite some of your existing copy more persuasively. This way you've got clear, actionable steps to apply alongside the theory and principles.
If you’re already subscribed, there’s nothing you need to do—I’ll shoot you an email when it’s ready.
But if you’re not—or you’ve got no idea wtf The Brief is—you can check out the sales page here → cwh.cl/brief
Cheers,
Cass