Mystifying egg theft generates heightened vigilance in Odell Hall

The mystery of the Odell Hall egg thief has captivated Odell residents (myself included) for months. It began when Holden Ryu ’24, an avid egg enthusiast, awoke one morning to find that many of his eggs had gone missing. With every Odell resident being a possible suspect, Ryu could not tell anyone about the plan that had begun to formulate in his mind: buy more eggs in the hopes of catching the perpetrator in the act.

“I don’t want to admit how much money I spent on the egg thief, but I did spend a lot of money on (trying to catch them),” Ryu said. 

In the coming weeks, Ryu would hold regular stakeouts in the lower Odell kitchen, patiently waiting for the egg thief to reveal themself late at night. He soon noticed that his egg supply was dwindling despite his efforts; somehow, the stakeouts only seemed to encourage the thievery. He began to lose sleep over these high-stakes operations, recognizing that his eggs were in dire peril.

Eventually, Ryu realized that in order to save his eggs, he would have to drastically alter his approach. He decided to post a letter in the entrance of Odell Hall as a way of directly appealing to the egg thief’s sympathy and ego. As his letter described, “I can’t take our feud anymore. When my friends wonder why I have a thousand-yard stare when I’m hanging out with them, I can’t tell them that someone has been stealing eggs and it’s slowly driving me mad.”

Ryu’s letter was met with great enthusiasm from the other residents of Odell Hall, who were curious about the identity of the egg thief and willing to help in the hunt. While Ryu was also curious, he was more concerned with ending the attacks upon his eggs, which took on a regular pattern as time wore on. 

Then came the response — an intriguing letter filled with vengeance and sorrow posted directly above Ryu’s, signed by the infamous egg thief. With much more rhetorical force than you might expect, they explained why they were opposing Ryu’s egg ownership, basing it on tragic life events. 

“Mother forbade eggs from the property,” the note said. “Gone were the days of omelets, quiches, and eggs made sunnyside up. In its stead came a living nightmare of shitty breakfast foods.”

According to Odell resident Christian Gipson ’23, the new letter was so groundbreaking because it detailed the origin story of the egg thief, whose motives were previously unknown.

“I really empathize with the egg thief, being that eggs weren’t really available to them in abundance when they were younger,” Gipson said. “With that being said, I really think that this letter was crazy. This letter was absolutely insane.”   

Following the response, Ryu analyzed the letter and found its vocabulary and grandeur to be inconsistent with the behavior of the actual egg thief. As he explains, “From the beginning, I knew that the person who posted that letter was not the egg thief because the egg thief is defined by their subtlety … their modus operandi was that they just took eggs.”

However, he could not yet prove his suspicions that the writer of the letter was a fraud. All he could do was hope that the egg thief would eventually make a mistake and reveal their mysterious identity. A dejected Ryu, who took his time crafting another letter, could only watch as his precious egg supply continued to dwindle away. 

Then, things turned sunny side up: The egg thief was miraculously caught after an informant ratted out their identity. They were briefly questioned by Ryu, which led to a quick confession and an eventual reconciliation that took place over an omelet breakfast shared between the two. With the excitement all but over, the residents of Odell breathed a collective sigh of relief knowing that the hunt for this culprit was finally over. 

Yet, there was an interesting wrinkle to their conversation that remains unanswered: Who wrote the antagonizing letter? The real egg thief swears it was not them, and Ryu himself assessed it as nothing more than a writing exercise. Is it possible that the egg thief was working with somebody else and is now covering their tracks? Or was this simply a copycat?

The world may never know, but one thing remains clear according to the hero of this story, Holden Ryu.

“I’m never buying eggs again,” Ryu said. “I have spent way too much money on eggs. Enough to last several families many years.”