Breakfast, Game of Thrones, the $100 bill, and the curse
This morning I went out for breakfast with a couple of friends. It was good. I had scrambled eggs with bacon, cherry tomatoes, and toast. I asked for the scrambled eggs 'firm' and they were just about perfect.
The place where we went was in a shopping centre so there were lots of people moving around for the two hours that we were there. I rarely (not in the last 5 to 6 years) go into shopping centres so while I was there—I got there a little early for this purpose—I picked up the new George R. R. Martin (with Elio M. Garcia and Linda Antonsson) book "The World of Ice and Fire: The Untold History of Westeros and The Game of Thrones".
Anyway, once we were all there and having coffee and breakfast we talked about the old times (about 12 - 18 months ago) when we worked together and what we are doing now.
Then about 90 minutes into our get-together one of the guys completely dropped out of the conversation with an intense look on his face; he got up and started to go somewhere. He didn't go far and then he began to bend down. Then I saw it. There was what looked to me like a folded $10 bill on the ground.
He came back and sat down and then showed us his find. It wasn't a $10 bill. It was a $100 bill. Yep. I had to have a couple of looks because I never have those babies in my wallet, but there it was; a crisp green $100 bill. The guy from the table behind us saw what was going on and he jokingly informed us that it was his and it had blown off his table and over to where it was.
Once we decided to totally ignore his claim we then had the problem of what to do. You could turn it in somewhere, but where? And then turning in unidentifiable cash is a bit dodgy. Really. How can anyone actually prove it is theirs? Anybody could just claim it.
With all of us three being people of elevated intelligence (cough) we decided to hang around for at least another 20 minutes and observe if anyone came back to that general area who seemed to be looking for their lost $100 bill. If nobody came back looking for it then, as you would expect, we would have to spend it.
Nobody came looking for it.
So then we had to decide what to spend it on. This is not as easy as it might first seem. One of the group came from a background in India where, if you find money like this, then you should spend it on something you would not normally buy. His culture says that if you do not do this then you would be cursed to something like three times the amount found.
In the end, after considering buy $100 worth of lottery entries, we decided to buy three bottles of $30 wine; a bottle each. The $10 that was left over went into the Guide Dogs for the Blind donation 'tin' at the bottle shop.
I haven't tried it yet but the wine we got was Penfold's Bin 8 2012 Cabernet Shiraz.
But what about the Indian curse?
Well later that day the person who spotted and picked up the $100 bill was out at a local hotel minding his own business when a dude who got kicked out of a nearby TAB (a betting shop, for my American readers) came over and punched him in the face. Fortunately he was shaken but not hurt. But now I am wondering what my curse punishment is going to be.
Barry.
Post S7-0011