up before noon
i went to the bank to deposit $131.50 in coins. the coins were all rolled and counted (twice) by me. the coins are heavy, and it is a pain in the ass to haul them to the bank. i entered the bank with the box and, i don’t know if the banker guy standing there at the door thought that this was an attempted terrorist attack, but i suspected that on account of the destruction of the twin towers at the world trade center site on september 11, 2001, this banker was simply acting with an abundance of caution by asking me what i wanted to do at the bank today. i opened the box, revealing the couple of dozen rolls of quarters, dimes, nickels, and pennies, and i said that i had a bunch of coins to deposit. he waved his hand toward the bulletproof windows and said that one of the tellers would be happy to assist me in this matter. i began to fill out a deposit slip when this guy said to wait, no need for that, this banker will be happy to help you. it seemed rather dramatic to sit at a table with a banker for to deposit $131.50 worth of coins, but everyone seemed friendly enough, and on account of hte destruction of the twin towers at the world trade center site, i wanted to make sure everyone involved had every confidence that i was on the up and up. so i sat down with the banker and handed over the box of coins to the other guy, who told me he would take it to the back and have it deposited straightaway. alas, it turned out this was just a sales trap. they tried to get me to swtich my credit card over to a new thing of their, a rewards program, a program which i told them had nothing on the rewards program i already use. blahblah. i was perfectly courteous about it when the first guy came back from the back room and said “you only have $129 in here.” he handed me the desposit slip to initialize with the correction, but i said “i counted those coins twice, it’s $131.50. it’s $100 in quarters, $25 in dimes, 5$ in nickels, and $2.50 in pennies.” i was surprised at yet strangely proud of myself for remembering the exact amoun
ts for each coin. this was not a major financial transaction, and the difference of $1.50 seemed insignificant, but i did not appreciate being accused of shorting the bank on this deposit. the gentleman took the deposit slip back, returned to the fabled back room, and returned a minute later saying “you were right. it’s $131.50. we didn’t count the pennies.” i was just like, okay, then, can you give me the box back so i can get the fuck outta here? i didn’t say that out loud but i communicated these feelings in generically bankerly fashion.
that was the most interesting event in my fascinating day.
well there was another incident. but it is a 2-day story involving yesterday’s debacled walk to west maspeth. i’ll save it for another time.
