Burst my bubble

Somewhat impractical but amusing calendar idea for 2009:

The things we did and didn't buy

I finally got myself this Prince-worthy umbrella:

I want these shoes:

Consumption, and I don't mean TB

I am cursed with a love of pretty things. I want:

1. tea towels, tea towels
2. pillows, pillows
3. pears (as said with an R. Kelly voice)
4. sunshine
5. people
6. bag
7. etc.

In related news:

Nickeled and Dimed

I got a ride home from work last night, and we stopped at a grocery store to use a Coinstar machine. My friend is moving out of the country, so he needed to get rid of a year's worth of coins. I'd never used one of these machines before, but I knew there'd be a fee. The machine charged 8 9/10 cents for every dollar they counted. Oh well.

The weird thing was that the machine refused most of his nickels. Maybe it was because the weight or size was off, but what gives? It turned down at least $5 in nickels. The machine kept spitting them out at us, which admittedly was fun the first few times because it felt like we were getting money, slot style. (In the end I did make a very marginal profit, because he got fed up and gave me the envelope full of reject nickels.)

Also...since my friend and I had bet on how much money was in each envelope, and I had lost, the experience reminded me that I'm grossly inept at judging quantities. I can never tell you how many people were at an event, for example, and I always lost at those dumb "guess how many jelly beans" contests. My aversion to math is a definite corollary.