What’s in your car?

Reading the police blotter has given me a new outlook on what people keep in their cars: wallets, checkbooks, cash, credit cards, collections of CDs and DVDs, and every manner of electronic equipment including computers loaded with all the information needed to steal enough identities to populate a small country.

And they keep their cars parked outside and unlocked.

Not that my own automobile is empty. One look inside finds my one-of-a-kind collection of towels, blankets, sweatshirts, old newspapers and magazines, umbrellas, empty food wrappers, dog bones, leashes, nonworking flashlights, baseball caps, a snow shovel, gloves, and other debris. And it is safely parked in my garage to protect its contents.

It would take me a while to figure out that anything had been stolen, but any self-respecting thief would bypass my car anyway.

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Another vehicle security tip: check your back seat for intruders before you get in your car. Of course, it would only take seconds for a would-be intruder to realize he either couldn’t fit in my back seat or was too proud to get in with all the useful stuff accumulated there.

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By the way, I was just talking to a friend who has retired to Colorado and tells me that the local police blotter is called "Busted in Butte." Don't you love a police department with a sense of humor?