Cash Is Indeed King

I have been consciously going back to using cash, at least on smaller purchases. The libertarian in me has come to suspect the increasing use of credit and debit cards because, yes, the government could use that against me if I'm a bad boy. China is the obvious example. Yet Canada used it recently against COVID protesters, and Canada is supposed to believe in freedom.

But I digress. While I carry a debit and a credit card, cash is becoming king, and it should. I've stopped taking cards at the Shop because I see no reason to pay someone three percent or so for a service I simply don't need. Every single customer whom I've told bring me cash has brought it, and with no debate. I think more and more of them see the advantage too. 

I do see where, based on a supposed penny shortage, some businesses round change. The tendency is to round up, I suppose to avoid argument, yet many places do give me exactly what I'm owed. I don't argue when they round down; it's a nuisance, and perhaps wrong, I'll say, yet not worth the fight. But I have begun keeping track of whether I am ahead on such transactions, or the stores and shops I deal with.

In calendar 2026, I'm $1.64 in front. A pittance, but, well, my pittance. I wouldn't get it using a card.

Money Talks

Old TV shows can seem quaint about things like money. What they regard as significant we might actually laugh at.

An episode I stumbled upon of Our Miss Brooks, a sitcom from the middle Fifties, was centered on the 'safeguarding' of forty cents. That's right, four whole dimes. On The Andy Griffith Show, a litterer was upset over a four dollar fine and vowed to extract revenge on Barney Fife for having issued the ticket which cost him so dearly. Vengeance was sworn over four bucks. It sounded downright absurd for a man to be mad over such a paltry amount.

Of course, I remember me Pops talking about making $100 a week in 1963 and feeling it was good money. And when I had my first $50 dollar bill at age 16 it felt like I had struck gold. I was in total awe of General Grant. I kept a guard on it as though I were Fort Knox. Still, I don't think twice about four dollars let alone 40 cents these days. And when you think about it, maybe that's a shame on me.

Show Me the Money

Old TV shows can seem quaint about things like money. What they regard as significant we might actually laugh at.

An episode I stumbled upon of Our Miss Brooks, a sitcom from the middle Fifties, was centered on the 'safeguarding' of forty cents. That's right, four whole dimes. On The Andy Griffith Show, a litterer was upset over a four dollar fine and vowed to extract revenge on Barney Fife for having issued the ticket which cost him so dearly. Vengeance was sworn over four bucks. It sounded downright absurd for a man to be mad over such a paltry amount.

Of course, I remember me Pops talking about making $100 a week in 1963 and feeling it was good money. And when I had my first $50 dollar bill at age 16 it felt like I had struck gold. I was in total awe of General Grant. I kept a guard on it as though I were Fort Knox. Still, I don't think twice about four dollars let alone 40 cents these days. And when you think about it, maybe that's a shame on me.

Hangin' Marty

Jury duty is a drag. Yes, yes, yes, I know how important of a right trial by jury is, although I'm not that sure how many of the people I sat with in the jury room yesterday I would want on a panel where I was in the dock. But so it goes...

The coffee was free but weaker than a skip's sweeping. The magazines were about what you'd find in a doctor's office: I read a Golf Digest article about whether Rory McIlroy would win the Masters...in 2014. And as if jury service wasn't tedious enough, the movie they had us watch was Maid in Manhattan. I tried to doze, but that's difficult in a room with the least comfortable chairs imaginable. It was a long six (or so) hours.

Still, they paid us cash as we left, so that's something. We were given vouchers as we left the jury room, presented them to a cashier down the hall, and got forty bucks cash money on the spot. I never imagined that. Sure, that forty is already long gone. But at least I didn't have to wait eight weeks for it. And I didn't have to hang anybody for it either.