Alleged Coin Counting

Tuesday, 11 January 2011

Know what I’m sick of hearing? That Jared Loughner is an “alleged” shooter in last weekend’s Tuscon massacre. Here’s an article that hits you with that clunker right off the bat.

I know, I know, his actions have not been proven in a court of law yet. Kind of reminds me of how we didn’t know for sure if OJ killed his wife or not until the courts told us that, no, he didn’t. Or, at least they told us that no, we don’t know.

As the alleged author of this blog, I’m going to allege that Loughner was the killer in all six cases. I know I’m really going out on a limb here, but since I’m not a politician or a lawyer, I don’t have to couch my writing in all sorts of silly caveats.

I’m going to go get something to eat now. Food, allegedly, keeps me alive. Whatever. I ain’t buyin’ it ’til the courts say so.

Wednesday, 12 January 2011

Today I added to Owen’s college fund. Well, I guess I’m always adding to it in that he has a porcelain piggy bank that I drop coins into almost daily, but today I brought in all the coins and paper money and deposited them into his account.

This is a bigger to-do than you might think. For one thing, in order to keep Owen’s money in a high-interest account, I have it in a special certificate (I think that’s what it’s called) that renews yearly. That means I can’t withdraw or deposit from the account for 12 months. The withdrawl part is fine, because I have never withdrawn from the account. But for deposits, I wait until a letter arrives in the mail telling me the certificate is expiring. I then have 30 days to go in and renew the certificate and (if I desire) add more money to it.

However! The credit union does not have a coin counting machine, and they won’t accept ten pounds of coins being dumped on their counter, either. So, for the fifth year in a row now, I’ve ventured over to TCF Bank and used their coin counter. But there’s a problem with this, too: TCF charges almost 10% of the proceeds if you’re not a member. I am not a member.

“But wait,” you ask, “Why not just get an account at TCF and then you can deposit the money right there with no fees?”

That’s a good question. The answer is: Because TCF is a lousy company and I do not wish to do business with them. Also, one reason why I make myself rare at Cub is because TCF employees annoy the crap out of me even when I’m at Cub.

Anyway, I’ve never had to pay their coin-counting extortionist fees. Here’s how I beat the system (this time): I rely on the good graces of a co-worker. He’s a TCF member, and he has generously tagged along with me so that, should they ask for a member signature (and they did this time), he can provide it and we get away with no loss of cash. He even made the coin counting a little funner this time by having us first guess how many items would not be accept by the counter (e.g., Canadian coins) and estimating how much money was in the jar I brought with me.

Oh – and that brings me to my next point: There wasn’t a heck of a lot of coins in the jar. Around 30 bucks, actually. Of course, I deposited more than that, because Owen also had some paper money, but, still…I wish it would’ve racked up a little higher than that. Living in an apartment means my wife and I funnel off all quarters (for laundry) before they make it into his piggy bank, and this year we began setting aside money for Isla’s college fund. My wife figures that, at the rate we’re going, Owen and Isla will each be able to take one college course one day. Her estimate did not take inflation or interest into account (wow, an unintentional pun), but I still see her point.

Hey, at least we’re trying. Owen and Isla already have far more (= an infinite) money set aside for college than we did when we were that age.

Want to read more about the Zimmermans? Read my wife’s recent blog post HERE.

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