Tuesday, February 23, 2010

Pound Foolish

Sunday I was walking among the underground shops of Crystal City, which is an area in Arlington, Virginia, which has underground shops. As I moved down the corridor, I saw a penny on the floor. Even though pennies are worth almost nothing, I bent down to picture it up, because I have a deep-seated appreciation for free money. When I stood up I saw another penny a few feet in front of me, so I picked that one up too, and congratulated myself on having made a profit of $0.02 on my visit to Crystal City. And then I saw a third penny, a few more feet away. When I went to get that one, I saw a fourth penny.


Some instinct kicked on in my mind: You're being led into a trap!


I stopped picking up pennies at that point. But I counted four more, evenly spread about five feet apart, immediately in front of me. I walked on and found a solitary penny, then went around a corner and ran into a line of three more.


Had a prankster painstakingly laid out a trail of evenly-spaced pennies running through all the corridors of Crystal City, and I found the scattered remnants hours or days later? Was I being observed from afar to see how many coins I picked up? Or had someone walked by with a bag full of money, leaking out one penny at a time at a constant rate?


I have no explanation.

1 comment:

  1. You're lucky four kids didn't jump on your back and force you down a corridor.

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