Normally, this big-city newspaper would not follow the travails of a lone Angeleno who had his car taken from his own block.

The same is true for a car stolen twice -- that's more of a coincidence than a news story.

But as of three weeks ago, my 1989 Toyota Camry has been taken three times in six years. And because three is a go-to device in any journalistic tale, I am now a man with a story, a roving reporter who finally found a use for those leftover bus tokens.

The Los Angeles Police Department received more than 23,000 reports of stolen cars last year, cases handled largely out of the public eye. Those crime victims typically dealt with their misfortune by contacting the police, then the insurance agent, then the rental car company, and then -- if the car wasn't recovered -- some lucky auto dealer.

The only thing is, my car keeps coming back. And the third time around, I've become a bit slack about the whole routine. I don't bother with a rental car. Although I call the police immediately, I wait a few days with the insurance company. Why stress them out? To them, I am just the Boy Who Cried Theft.

The car I bought eight years ago would fetch $1,500 on a good day, according to the Kelly Blue Book. It had piles of notebooks and newspapers on the seats. Until recently, it was known for the piece of metal that dangled from the passenger side.

My mother, upon learning of the latest theft, sums up the car's worth by asking in a slightly panicked tone: "Did you leave anything valuable inside?"

And yet, the less appealing the Camry is to my friends and family, the more alluring it has become to would-be thieves.

With my car gone yet again, I play the waiting game. I call the police periodically to see if it has been found. I reacquaint myself with buses, and the obnoxious ads for retractable awnings and Farmer John meat products that blare from the onboard televisions.

When I return home each night, I foolishly scan the street for my missing car, as though it were a now-repentant border collie that had run off during a walk.

I wonder if this time my car is gone for good.

I get some helpful information during one of my calls to the LAPD's Northeast Division, where an officer points out that Camrys from the late 1980s were "made to be stolen." This, it turns out, is an understatement.

Almost any key, if shaved properly, will turn the lock of a 1989 Camry, law enforcement experts tell me. By now, the lock on my car is so abused and misshapen that an errant tree branch might do the trick.

In fact, if you Google the words "1989 Camry" and "frequently stolen," the first website that turns up identifies it as the "most frequently stolen car of 2000." By 2004, it had fallen to No. 2. Should I be relieved, or are there just a lot of Camrys that were never recovered and are therefore no longer around to steal?

LAPD Officer Gonzalez, who tells me his badge number but not his first name, gives me reason to hope. "They'll just drive it around till it runs out of gas, then they'll dump it," he says.

I know this to be the case. The first time my car was taken I had parked it curbside on 2nd Street downtown, not far from the Department of Building and Safety, where I was doing some research. At the time, that darkened parking spot under the 110 Freeway seemed much less expensive than a parking garage.

Three weeks later, the car turned up in an industrial section of downtown, a parking ticket slapped on its windshield. On top of the $200 impound fee, I had to replace the ignition.

The second time, I had parked it on the street a couple of doors away from my home in Echo Park. Within 24 hours of the theft, police said, it had been dumped in a parking lot a block away. A towing company had hauled it to their yard in Little Tokyo.