This is a funny one (thanks Dana!):
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Monthly Archives for December 2008
Cracker Barrel / Cracker Box
In two recent unrelated incidents coincidentally linked by “crackers”, honest people returned large sums of found money to their rightful owners. I think these stories are amazing.
Woman Returns $100,000 found at Cracker Barrel
MURFREESBORO, Tenn. – A Murfreesboro, Tenn., woman chose not to follow the old saying “Finders keepers, losers weepers” when she discovered nearly $100,000 in a bag at a local Cracker Barrel restaurant. But it wasn’t that the thought didn’t cross her mind.
“Satan will tempt you,” said Billie Watts, 75. “I have been having real bad teeth problems. I thought, ‘I’ll get my teeth fixed.’ “
She ultimately decided to return the money she found in a bag in the women’s restroom to its
Watts had to be coaxed by Michael Peralta, one of her 12 grandchildren, to tell her story.
“I’m proud of her because if anyone in the world deserved to find $97,000 it was them,” Peralta, 31, said of his grandparents, who live in an apartment and depend on their Social Security checks.
The excitement began when Watts stopped by the Cracker Barrel Old Country Store with her husband, Malcolm, Thursday afternoon. In the bathroom, she found a tapestry bag hanging on a hook on one of the stall doors.
“It had a Manila envelope that was sticking out of the bag,” she said. “It couldn’t zip up; it was too full.”
She searched the bag for the identity of its owner. Inside the envelope was a picture of two women and a child, but no names. Then she spotted the money.
“I said ‘Oh my goodness,’ ” Watts recalled Monday. “I have never seen that much money in my whole life. I counted the money. There was $97,000 in $1,000 bills. They were neatly stacked inside the bag. “
Watts decided to leave the restaurant with the money.
“I was afraid to go to the counter,” she said. “Maybe the wrong person could get ahold of it.”
After the couple returned home, Watts called the Cracker Barrel restaurant.
“I told them I found something in the bathroom. I just left my number and asked them to call me.”
In 10 to 15 minutes, a woman called.
“I knew it was the right person when she called. She identified the picture, the envelope and the money,” said Watts. “I met her in front of the Cracker Barrel about 15 to 20 minutes after she called me.”
In the restaurant’s parking lot, the woman who left the money got out of her car and approached Watts.
“She run up and hugged me. She got excited and didn’t even look at the bag except to pull out the picture to show it to me,” said Watts. “She said it was the only picture she had of her daughter and her daughter’s child, who are both deceased.”
The money, the woman told Watts, was the proceeds from the sale of her home and all the belongings in it.
“She was going to start her new life in Florida with her son,” said Watts.
The woman offered to pay Watts $1,000, but Watts refused it.
“(The woman) told me she needed every penny she could to start over,” said Watts. “(The money) wasn’t mine. I had no right to it. My mom and dad told me never to take anything that didn’t belong to me.”
Family Finds $10G in Box of Crackers
IRVINE, California — The box of crackers Debra Rogoff bought from the grocery store had some crackerjack in it — an envelope stuffed with $10,000.
Yet the Irvine woman was more curious than ecstatic about her daughter’s find. After all, who would leave money in such a place?
“We just thought, ‘This is someone’s money,”‘ she said. “We would never feel good about spending it.”
Rather than go on a shopping spree, the family called police and was initially told the money could be part of a drug drop.
Police later heard from store managers at Whole Foods in Tustin that an elderly woman had come in a few days earlier, hysterical because she had mistakenly returned a box of crackers with her life savings inside. In a mix-up the store restocked the box rather than composting it.
The Lake Forest woman, whose identity was not released, had lost faith in her bank and decided the box would be a safer place for the money.
Luckily for her, the box of Annie’s Sour Cream and Onion Cheddar Bunny crackers were bought by the Rogoffs, who discovered the crisp $100 bills in an unmarked white envelope on Oct. 10.
The Rogoffs never heard from the woman and didn’t receive a reward, but Rogoff did return to Whole Foods a couple weeks later.
“I asked them if I could have another box of crackers,” she said with a laugh. The store obliged.
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Need vs. Want
This exercise that Aliya brought home from school cracked me up. Apparently our family NEEDS jeans, cereal, sneakers, and an argyle sweater, and we WANT thigh-high black boots, a gold lamé purse, a sparkly silver dress, two digital cameras, a diamond ring, and a chihuahua. I’m starting to wonder if she’s my kid or another Hilton sister. I think I’m going to have to hook the classroom up with some Martha Stewart Living, Real Simple, and O.
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Doctor Bob
After my 24 hours on the couch I was still in a lot of pain, so I hobbled over to my favorite chiropractor, Doctor Bob. He fixed me up and said that my lower back, pelvis, hips, knees, and ankles were all out of alignment. I felt so much better after my adjustment, and the best news was that he thinks he can help with my plantar fasciitis.
I had a follow-up adjustment today and I ended up with all three kids there playing with Doctor Bob’s cool stuff. He’s got a full-scale model of a spine and a real whale vertebra. I told them that Doctor Bob is a magician, so they were transfixed during the adjustment, waiting for him to levitate me. Afterward Adlani said, “That wasn’t magic…that was just a lot of rubbing.” Works for me.
He IS a magician though. When Norah was two months old she had an ear infection, and most exams after that showed fluid in her ears. It couldn’t drain because she was so little. Her pediatrician sent her for a hearing test, which was very unscientific and unconvincing for me, but the ear doctor said that I had to decide immediately whether to have surgery for tubes in her ears, or to buy hearing aids. She was 7 months old at the time. I took her to Doctor Bob for 4 adjustments. She had an appointment with her pedi on the day of the 4th visit and had no fluid in her ears. When I told the pedi that I had taken her to the chiropractor, he said, “Well, maybe it was just time for the fluid to drain on its own.” Ugh!
Random Happenings
On Tuesday I waited in a line reminiscent of the line for Grateful Dead tickets I stood in back in the early 90’s. The difference was that when I finally reached the front of the line they didn’t hand me my tickets for the nosebleed section…they gave me the opportunity to sign Aliya up with the Park and Rec Department’s Learn to Skate Program. The length of the line is testament to what people will do to sign their kid up for 6 lessons for the low-low price of $30 total. Well worth the wait.
Last week a guy came down our street walking his dogs, and he noticed someone in the adjacent parking lot putting trash into the dumpster. He whipped out his cell phone and made it very obvious that he was taking a photo of the dumpster violator. I couldn’t believe he felt so strongly about someone taking advantage of someone else’s dumpster that he was willing to risk getting beat to crap to make his point.
The other day I was at the local Starbucks and was shocked that I didn’t run into Ted, Larry, any of the posse, or anyone from Barbieri. I think it’s been months since I’ve gone there without seeing someone I know. Anyway, I had to occupy myself somehow while I waited for my $4 coffee drink, so I watched what was obviously two people meeting for a blind date. When the man arrived, the woman stood up to greet him and her gigantic 
purse fell off the chair and dumped upside down all over the floor. Stuff was rolling everywhere. It reminded me of some of my dating mishaps. One time I met this guy from Africa and he asked if he could cook me lunch. It turned out to be a traditional dish from his homeland and right in the middle was a big hoof. I left abruptly and went home to vomit. Ick.
Today at my favorite bagel store (Cafe Fresh Bagel), a guy came in and ordered a coffee and a bagel sandwich with lox spread. Then he realized that he didn’t have his wallet. He went to the car to get the wallet and realized he didn’t have his credit card. The bagel guy told him that the only take cash anyway. He said to take the food and come back and pay for it some other time. I thought that was really great.
Yesterday I got an email from an architect that’s got to go in the Smile File…”Knowing your vast expertise in all things relating to everything, I thought that you could perhaps offer an opinion…” It cracked me up.
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