Each year, starting January 1st, Sherry and I have an ongoing rivalry to see who can find the most coins (money) during the year.  You would be surprised how much money is laying around in parking lots and store isles.

This tradition has actually been in the family for over 20 years, with almost every one of us participating in the “find the coins” game.  You will often see us wandering aimlessly through parking lots, convenience stores and even in old camp grounds, looking for that one penny that someone flipped out of their pocket as they pulled the car keys out.  Penny’s now days don’t let you know when they hit the pavement…they are rather dull sounding.

Add to that the fact that high school kids have a problem with penny’s…they toss them left and right when they get them as change!  I love to see that happen!  If you don’t believe me, check the ground the next time you pull into a McDonalds drive through!  Lots of coins laying on the ground there.

My biggest find this year was a $10 bill that floated on the wind in front of my car while I was leaving a WalMart store!  I scarfed that bad boy up really quick and I’d have given it back to the one who lost it, but when I looked around there was nobody who was looking like they had just lost it…so…into my pocket it went!

Another of our traditions is that when you find a “lucky coin”, you get to scratch off a scratch ticket from the Idaho lottery!  We usually buy 10 to 20 of them when we go get our lottery tickets.  So, Sherry and I have been keeping track of who scratched the most winners as well.

It’s all meant to be in fun and we are all about fun!

How did we fair this year?  Well, had it not been for that ten dollars, Sherry would have kicked my butt big time!  She found $7.28 and scratched a total of  $27 worth of winning tickets!  That is wonderful!  My take was $13.10 and $21 respectfully!

You can see either she has her head down too much as she walks, or my eyes are just getting bad.  Take the $10 away from mine and she found WAY OVER twice as much as I did!!!  But collectively we found over $20!  Not a bad year!

This coin finding is not always fun and games, especially with Sherry, I’ve been knocked into some pretty solid objects as she dashed to pick up a shining coin!  Not just once either!  As we get older we may have to modify the rules!  Things like, no knocking the other ones cane out from under them, or no using your cane to hold the other one back and for sure, no putting your cane on top of the coin and pressing down!  That said, I might have to come up with a coin picking up cane tip!

Happy NEW Year everyone!

Bears Butt

January 2, 2013