Tuesday, July 13, 2004
"Cash or Check Only"
Yesterday Sierra and I went to a couple of antique stores about 10 minutes from home. She really wanted to get something so I told her as long as it was inexpensive, she could pick one thing. Finally she decided on some Barbie clothes after the clerk asked if she liked Barbies. She said to the clerk, "My Barbies have NO CLOTHES except for what they are wearing right now! And I don't even have a Barbie house!" I'm thinking, "geez, thanks for making me look like mother of the year!" She's probably played with her Barbies once since she has gotten them - she has never really liked dolls that much, so I have no desire to buy her all of those things. (And for the record, my mom still has my Barbie Dream House, Barbie Full-Size Camper, Barbie Remote-Control Corvette, Barbie Pool and Barbie Day Spa, so it's not like she doesn't have access to that stuff, but i digress...)
So anyway, she picks out some Barbie clothes and I have a book for Haywood. The total comes to $14.11. As I open my wallet, I see the dreaded sign "Cash or Check Only"...arghhhh. You may know, while I do enjoy stockpiling money in the bank, I rarely have cash on my person. And since the advent of online bill payment, I have probably written like 5 checks in the past 2 years, so I don't carry my checkbook either. So I apologize profusely that I'll need to go to an ATM and come right back. (now that's a business idea...installing ATMs at stores that only take cash and check and charging like a $5.00 surcharge :-) ) <--trying to incorporate smileys and parens is such a pain!
So Sierra and I leave and go back to the car. I decided to scrounge around in my car and purse to see if I possibly have $14.11 so I can just get going with the rest of our errands. I count up all the spare change, etc and I have $13.65!!! Argh again. So I look in my wallet for my ATM card. Not there. Well, I told you that I don't really use cash very often, and I still bank at the ol' credit union from work, so I haven't really even used my ATM card since November (dare i have to pay a service fee, hehe). I had downsized my George Castanza to only the cards I use very regularly and so my ATM card was sitting at home in my other purse full of seldom-used cards. So now I've been sitting in the parking lot for 15 minutes counting up loose change and I still have less than the necessary amount, so I have accomplished nothing, so we head home to grab my ATM card and an "emergency" $10 bill. We go back to the store, explain why it took us an hour to get back. Then we pay and leave. When we got home, the clerk had stuffed some extra Barbie clothes in the bag to surpise Sierra. She was really excited. I'll bet she thought we were dirt poor after Sierra's comments about her lack of Barbie items and the fact that it took me an hour to scrounge up a measly $14.11 ...geez.
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Yesterday Sierra and I went to a couple of antique stores about 10 minutes from home. She really wanted to get something so I told her as long as it was inexpensive, she could pick one thing. Finally she decided on some Barbie clothes after the clerk asked if she liked Barbies. She said to the clerk, "My Barbies have NO CLOTHES except for what they are wearing right now! And I don't even have a Barbie house!" I'm thinking, "geez, thanks for making me look like mother of the year!" She's probably played with her Barbies once since she has gotten them - she has never really liked dolls that much, so I have no desire to buy her all of those things. (And for the record, my mom still has my Barbie Dream House, Barbie Full-Size Camper, Barbie Remote-Control Corvette, Barbie Pool and Barbie Day Spa, so it's not like she doesn't have access to that stuff, but i digress...)
So anyway, she picks out some Barbie clothes and I have a book for Haywood. The total comes to $14.11. As I open my wallet, I see the dreaded sign "Cash or Check Only"...arghhhh. You may know, while I do enjoy stockpiling money in the bank, I rarely have cash on my person. And since the advent of online bill payment, I have probably written like 5 checks in the past 2 years, so I don't carry my checkbook either. So I apologize profusely that I'll need to go to an ATM and come right back. (now that's a business idea...installing ATMs at stores that only take cash and check and charging like a $5.00 surcharge :-) ) <--trying to incorporate smileys and parens is such a pain!
So Sierra and I leave and go back to the car. I decided to scrounge around in my car and purse to see if I possibly have $14.11 so I can just get going with the rest of our errands. I count up all the spare change, etc and I have $13.65!!! Argh again. So I look in my wallet for my ATM card. Not there. Well, I told you that I don't really use cash very often, and I still bank at the ol' credit union from work, so I haven't really even used my ATM card since November (dare i have to pay a service fee, hehe). I had downsized my George Castanza to only the cards I use very regularly and so my ATM card was sitting at home in my other purse full of seldom-used cards. So now I've been sitting in the parking lot for 15 minutes counting up loose change and I still have less than the necessary amount, so I have accomplished nothing, so we head home to grab my ATM card and an "emergency" $10 bill. We go back to the store, explain why it took us an hour to get back. Then we pay and leave. When we got home, the clerk had stuffed some extra Barbie clothes in the bag to surpise Sierra. She was really excited. I'll bet she thought we were dirt poor after Sierra's comments about her lack of Barbie items and the fact that it took me an hour to scrounge up a measly $14.11 ...geez.
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