You know the old saying, that thieves will take anything that "isn't nailed down?"

It turns out that even if it is nailed down, they just might try to steal it from your car.

How else do you explain a thief making off with a dozen cans of cat food from a Tri-Cities vehicle earlier this week?

Were the photos of the gravy and "chunks" on the labels so enticing a hungry prowler thought he'd found a new favourite snack?

Maybe the thief was a cat-owning criminal tired of the high prices for those fancy cans of cat food sold only in veterinary clinics, which can run over $2 for miniature containers that felines gobble down in a day.

Or maybe the prowler was so desperate for a hit of his (or her) favourite drug fix he figured he could fence the food for, what, five cents on the dollar?

We'll never know, but when a box of kitty's dinner in the back seat of your car is a temptation for thieves, the bigger question is, why would someone leave a Prada wallet, a cell-phone or a laptop visible in their vehicle?

Coquitlam RCMP report that all of these items (including the cat food) were stolen from a series of vehicles during a 24-hour period on Wednesday.

Like they always do after a rash of such thefts, they're giving the public some very common-sense advice: lock your vehicle and keep valuables out of sight, for starters.

Are there really motorists who haven't heard this advice? Or do some people just prefer to take their chances in a kind of low-level thrill-seeking activity - "Maybe my Prada wallet will be there when I get back, and maybe it won't."

The whole situation would be funny, except we're all sharing the cost of ICBC premiums that increase when rates of items stolen from vehicles rise. So lock up your vehicles, and keep things in the trunk. You never know what might whet a thief's appetite.