#change

That'll be $4.59.
Here's a five.
See the sign? We need exact change. Or cc or dc.
What's cc or dc?
Credit card or debit card.
I don't got none of that.
How much for three donuts, not four?
There's people waiting in line.
I have a mask on, calm down.
I ain't talkin' 'bout no mask. Exact change.
What about three?
Three what?
Donuts.
$3.29.
These are weird-ass prices, yo.
Which is it?
Which is what?
Three or four donuts?
How about five for five dollars.
Sorry. Nope. I told you, people are in line.
And I told you, I got a mask.
We're not talking about that. I told you, c'mon. Next!
Next? What?
Exact change, man.
Why exact change?
Coin shortage.
I don't believe that fake news.
That's what the sign say.
I can read. The mask ain't covering my fuckin eyes.
You don't gotta talk like that.
Like what?
Like that. Next.
Here. Just take the five. I don't need no change. Just take it. Gimme my damn cinnamon donuts.
I don't have no change. I told you.
Any.
Any what?
Any change. You don't have any change.
Correct. No change.
But you do. I just saw it in the drawer. Don't lie about it.
I ain't lying. Exact change.
Take the fuckin five. Here.
Next.
Have a fuckin nice day.
Next.
 

A Penny for Your Thoughts, Redux

Two days in a row I walked by a penny on the sidewalk. I did not pick it up. Time was, out of a sense of good sense (and cents) and savings, one would pick up a penny, even if for good luck. I did not bother. This disappoints me. Not that I harbor sentimental illusions about how much I am missing out on, how much my savings potential is diminished. (On that note, I am diligent. I have a large change jar, sometimes two. The resultant savings have paid for trips. I have also started a savings envelope, to which I contribute sometimes more than once a day: for fun and emergencies. I highly recommend these pecuniary practices.) Would I stoop to retrieve a dollar bill? Yes. But my inaction reflects a mindset, a way of thinking that got us into this economic morass. Many would pass up a dollar, I'd wager (though wagering is against the spirit of saving). Would they sneeze at a five or a ten? Walking on the sidewalk, when I was in first grade or so, I found a five-dollar bill, on the grass, moored there waiting for me on a windy day, if memory serves. What a thrill! What would that translate to in today's dollars, or euros? There are unwritten conventions, or used to be, regarding such findings. If you are in a hallway of a building and you find, say, a benjamin, are you honor-bound to inquire if anyone has lost one? Is that naive? What do you do next: invite claimants to recite the serial number? Funny thing is, I don't know if the penny is still there, waiting. Maybe it's a 1909 S VDB penny.

Coin of the Realm

In the U.S., there's talk of Congress (no, not that kind of congress, Puss) changing the rules, so to speak, for the abysmally unsuccessful Sacagawea gold coins. (By unsuccessful, I don't mean lacking in profitable or revenue-producing or collectible attributes. I mean: Dude, does anybody use them? Same goes for the new Presidential coins gimmick.)

Somehow, the Powers-That-Would-Be think and feel that adding ever-changing designs to the coin will work.

Listen up, boys and girls in the Halls of Power:

It ain't going to work unless you end, delete, stop printing, cease from production the paper dollar bill of the same denomination. Nobody will care, not even if you depict sequential scenes from Pamela Anderson and Tommy Lee's infamous alleged honeymoon video.

Wake up.

Take a look at what Canada does. They not only don't use paper for singles; they also have no paper for two-dollar currency, instead relying on the "loonie" and "twonie" coins respectively.

Euros? They use coins for one's and two's, not paper.

Certainly not both paper and coins for those denominations.

It is moronic. (And we're not even discussing the lack of variable colors for variable denominations.)

Hey, I love the coins (well, not exactly; some of the artwork is atrocious), but it is hideously stupid to think the coins will work while the paper dollar bills continue.

Idiotic bureaucrats and politicians making idiotic decisions.

Metaphor, anyone?

p.s. I just figured it out. The strippers' and lapdancers' lobbies are so powerful they don't want to phase out US$1 bills because of their popularity for tips [the antecedent for the pronoun "their" is the noun "bills"] (incidentally, did you American folks know there are $2 bills?). C'mon, Strippers and Lapdancers Amalgamated Interest Group: Coins will work just fine. Ca-ching.