Day in the Life of an Idiot

Okay, I'm going to admit something here that I probably shouldn't. If I'm flipping past it, I'll watch "Inner Beauty," which is a reality show wherein the contestants think they're being judged for their outward appearance, but in reality are being rated for qualities that make one a good, "beautiful" soul. Shawn and I will get stuck on this because, inevitably, there's a moment on the show where I think to myself, "Huh, would I be nice? Would *I* do the right thing?"

For instance, Shawn and I both admitted that there was one episode we'd have failed. The test was to see if the contestants would be sympathetic to a costumer who was having boyfriend problems. Supposed calls from this guy kept interrupting her work, and eventually she ran from the room in tears. Shawn and I both HATE bad customer service. In our opinion, the costumer's behavior was rude and unprofessional. Would we have been sympathetic? Would we have told the woman we were sorry she was having a bad day? It's hard to say. I suspect I may have done what one constestant did, which was simply say, "I'm sorry your day is so crappy." But no WAY would I have comforted the woman when she went outside to cry. I probably would have made some rude comment about her unprofessionalism like so many of the other contestants did.

So today, Mason and I stopped at home after dropping Shawn off at work which is our wont now that we're basically out of latte money... and I see a whole bunch of garbage strewn on our side of the street. This is one of those things that makes me crazy. I pick up other people's garbage constantly, but I often feel personally tormented by the "garbage fairies"* that I swear live in in our neighborhood (* from an as-yet unpublished novel by Kelly McCullough). At any rate, grumbling the whole time, I went over and picked up this huge Wendy's box someone had tossed in our street.

What did I find underneath it?

A twenty dollar bill.

Talk about a moral decision. Mason is standing there watching me pick up the garbage (a good act) and then, almost at the same time as me, sees the money (taking it? bad?). What do we do? Well, I picked the money up. Thing is, though this twenty was not EXACTLY in front of my house,but neither was the garbage which had been sitting there all morning. I said to Mason, "Wow, it's like I finally got rewarded for all those years of picking up garbage!" But then I started thinking... what if there was a hidden camera? Would this be one those "FAIL" moments, like on "Inner Beauty" or not?

Mason and I talked a lot about what to do with our sudden windfall. Mason, of course, wanted to spend the whole thing on LEGOs. I reminded him that, technically it was *my* money (though was it?) and we did have bills and groceries it could help pay for. When I called Shawn she suggested we could split the money and each take five, and give five to the "house" for those essentials. We haven't decided. The twenty is drying on my windowsill waiting a verdict.

I feel like I did the right thing, but there's always something funky about finding SO MUCH money. I mean, I always think, "How would I feel if I was the one that LOST it, rather than the one that found it?"

Anyway, there's still more garbage on my street. I wonder how much money is hiding under it??