<human>: Can you condense the text into a few key points?

So today someone was very determined to get into my apartment and rob the place.  He probably saw the box for my new XBox 360 sitting by the sliding-glass door and thought that looked pretty choice. Anyway, he started with the sliding glass door, but couldn't get through that because we put a dowel on the track to stop would-be xbox thieves.  Score one, us!

Next he tried prying the front door.  He *almost* got through this.  Finally he tried the bedroom window and managed to get through that, but my girlfriend (who works nights) finally woke up and scared the guy away.

Naturally my girlfriend is now freaked out, so we'll be investing in self defense.  But the fact remains that the kid would have cleaned us out if she hadn't been there, or would have done worse if he hadn't been surprised.

Someday there won't be someone here to scare away would-be thieves.  So what would you do to protect yourselves?  Surveillance cameras?  Tracking software on laptops?  Traps? :-)  And also, do you think it's best to own a weapon like a gun, or would you go the taser/mace route?
<bot>: Robber breaks into apartment; sees my girlfriend is home; girlfriend and robber simultaneously scared poopless; robber flees.  Now what?