Damn, all the good corny ones are already taken.
I’ll have to go with “a woman’s innocence”, then. 
A copy of George Carlin’s “Brainfarts”. I had a HUGE purse that I was carrying and went into the B.Dalton’s at a crappy mall near my mom’s house. It wasn’t a paperback either…it was a big, heavy hardback copy. Why did I do it? To see if I could. And I got away with it!
IDBB
I stole a gumball once.
I used to shoplift CDs and videos, so probably the most expensive thing I’ve stolen was maybe $30 Canadian. But when you add up everything, it would come to hundreds of dollars. I was careful only to steal from big chains, so I don’t feel guilty about it, but I don’t do it anymore–mostly because I don’t have that unquenchable teenage longing to own crappy music.
Does this count as a legal confession? Could I be convicted based on this statement?
I just stole Mars.
I haven’t had it appraised yet.
I’ve never worked for a company that considered modest personal use of office supplies as stealing. I doubt my current employer cares whether or not I use their pens at home.
When I owned my own company, I encouraged my employees to feel free to use an envelope when they needed one. One of the cheapest bennie programs one could have. I suppose you could run into a serial abuser, but I never did.
I’ve currently got, uh, let’s see here, eight pens from the office lying on my table. Sheez, the mistakes they let me get away with cost thousands of times more than those pens. Scale, I guess.
Juanita:
So THAT’S where the Cooler of Death came from!
I stole a Cessna once. I was driving around near Bandera at 3am, and saw it just parked there on the tarmac at a little private strip with nobody around, so I went up and tried the door on a whim. It was open, so I got in, started her up, and took off. I flew south, intending to sell the plane to a friend of a friend in Tijuana, but I got lost, ran out of fuel, and crash-landed in a clearing somewhere in the jungles of Central America, in the middle of an indian village, right on top of the tribal warlord’s hut, killing him. I awed them with my “magic” – I happened to have my Zippo on me, and there was a battery-powered boombox in the plane, and I did fall from the sky and crush their leader – and then they made me their chief.
Several traffic cones/barrels.
Signs from above doors that say things like “Authorized Personnel Only” etc.
A can of Cherry Coke.
A pepper grinder, not on purpose though. My dad wanted one for christmas and I’d been at the mall all day shopping when I found one at a department store. I held onto it while I looked around a bit more. Since I didn’t find anything I needed and was so loaded down with bags I didn’t even notice the extra box in my hand, I just walked out of the store. Half an hour later, miles from the store I go to put everything in the trunk of my car. I was sure I’d be arrested if I tried to explain I hadn’t meant to take it, so I just went home and hid it in the closet.
A friend and I once temporarily misdirected four sheep and a pig, back in highschool. But that’s not stealing because they all got back home. Eventually.
In college, I met a guy who stole a grand piano.
Seriously.
He had gone into this shop that sold nothing but grand pianos and he had always wanted one (he was a music major).
He went there almost every day and started to pick up on how they were sold. A customer would buy one, the salesman would go to the front desk, fill out the paperwork and then put a tag on the piano for delivery. This guy noticed that there was no paperwork as to which piano.
One day he stole one of the tags, wrote his name and address, attached it to a piano, and sure enough, two weeks later it was delivered to his house.
He lived there for two years, moved (with piano) and last I heard (many. many years ago), he still had the piano and was giving free piano lessons to a few kids from the local high school.
A friend and I ‘borrowed’ two cars from his uncle to go joyriding when we were 15. If we had gotten caught, I’m sure the uncle would have pressed charges against me, so…
I stole a few radios from a Toyota dealership I worked for…then gave them back a few weeks later to get rid of the guilt.
One night (around midnight) when I got booted from my house at age 16 I went to get some gas at the local Circle-K (7-11 type store). I sorta knew the guy behind the counter and since it was late and dead we started talking. He took pity on me, I guess, and said that he had to go in the back to do something for “5 minutes. hint hint” So…I filled up my car with gas, grabbed a few cartons of cigarettes, filled a large cardboard box with canned food and snacks, took about 3 cases of Pepsi and then left. I lived out of my car for about a week on all of that. Total haul: around $150?
Here’s one for y’all: How many of you are using/ have used pirated software? I once used some illegal software that had a HUGE price tag on it. Probably close to $10,000 with all of the add-ons. That’s probably the most expensive.
It took awhile to get my karma cleansed of these things, and I lead a ‘good’ life now. I try not to lie (even white lies make me uncomfortable) and I don’t steal. I even return money to cashiers when they overpay me.
-Tcat
As a freshman in college, I pilfered an aqua push up bra from Victoria’s Secret.
Pens and box cutters from work. Dozens of them. Other than that, nothing.
I “rescued” a 4x5 photo enlarger at work, which I suppose is technically theft. It was marked for disposal because our lab was running out of space and we were no longer using film. As far as I can tell it’s still a current model selling for $3000. It’s sitting in my apartment and I still don’t know what I’m going to do with it, since I don’t have a darkroom…
Absolutely nothing tangible, ever. Not because I have a highly developed sense of right and wrong - just because I’m terrified of being caught. I have stolen train journeys, though, when it’s just been a five minute journey and the ticket seller hasn’t reached my carriage (actual value: £1.20).
Back before our Wal-Mart became a Supercenter (and therefore got all the new security equipment) I stole tons of stuff. I usually had something in my pocket everytime I left the store.
I stole CDs, VHS tapes, polaroid film, lip gloss, makeup, pens, pencils, candy, keychains, fingernail polish, you name it. If I was to try and total it up I wouldn’t even have the slightest clue. I’d say at least $250-300 total.
I have a family member that is a department manager at a Walmart. She says it’s not unusual to catch kids (most between the ages of 12-16) stealing $300 in merchandise at a SINGLE TIME.
I think she said the biggest catch of theft from her department (cosmetics) was two girls about 13 or 14. They calculated at least $500 of cosmetics between the two of them. :eek:
Couple of grand cash from a former employee when I was young and stupid.
Got away with it luckily enough.
yojimbo, I hope you mean former employer…
I kept my laptop when my company went bankrupt.
I also ran my car for free when I worked in a gas station.