As a theft victim myself, I couldn’t help but feel the pain of friends and acquaintances who’ve lost their precious gadgets recently.

One is my Plurk friend Pau who lost his laptop and high-end cameras at the rooftop parking lot of MC Home Depot, The Fort in a span of less than 10 minutes!

Last night, Plurk was abuzz again with news of another robbery. This time, somebody recounted how some rogue peeps broke into the trunk of a car and stole a MacBook Pro, MacBook Air and a Dell laptop amounting to more than P200,000 at the Podium parking lot in Ortigas.

Yogini Jane recounts how one lost a laptop through the clever workings of the Salisi Gang.

Earlier in our photography class, my seatmate also recounted how she lost her camera collection in her parked car inside BF Homes Paranaque.

Another (and a reporter at that!) was victimized by somebody who engaged him in a conversation in Greenbelt. He lost his MacBook because he put down his bag to talk. His bag was gone in a split second.

The common thread in all these is that it’s almost suicidal to leave valuable items in any part of the car these days… no matter how inconspicuous they are. It seems that ruthless thieves are now targetting gadgets more expensive than cellphones. And they are doing so upscale places in Makati, Taguig and Ortigas.

One part of me thinks if this is in any way related to the elections, but laptops will always be in-demand among students and the like. (Yes, even if the advent of cheap netbooks has made owning a laptop easier)

An even more dangerous trend: unscrupulous persons are cannibalizing stolen items and selling them by parts, where they’re less likely to be traced. Browse the online marketplace and you’ll see some ads being ran about Macbook LCD screens for sale, and being peddled for $200 to $400.

Here’s my thoughts on the matter:
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My Manila Bulletin column on A Blogger’s Wishlist For Christmas appeared two weeks ago, and am reprinting it here. Our peer, Melo Villareal, has an ongoing blog promotion on Christmas wishlists and am joining coz I want to win the 2009 Starbucks Planner, even though last year’s remain unused

Here it goes:

It’s the time of the year again! Christmas is synonymous with wishlists and we do this for a couple of reasons: remind ourselves in choosing which stuff to spend our bonus on, guide our loved ones as to our preferences, or serve as a raincheck for future purchases.

The difficulty with blogging is that it’s a technologically-dependent field. You’d almost always need your own computer, high-speed internet connection, cameras to aid in your photo-documentation, software as needed, and other gadgets you see your blogging contemporaries using. This is what makes blogging pressure-filled. You gotta keep up with the Joneses, so to speak.

Don’t get me wrong. One can survive in blogging by owning just the basics. There’s even talk of a blogger earning a lot of money from his site, but has to bike his way to the nearest internet cafe. Still, it’s better to be equipped with the best, and that is why I crave for the following things:

1. A new cellphone, either a Nokia E61 or the new E63. Don’t know why, but I just like the look of this mobile phone, after attending the line’s launching in Singapore this year. The fact that it has wi-fi and a decent camera is an added plus.

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