The Pain of Change

Thanks!! (Really)?

  It was a fine spring day downtown Aiken around 11 o'clock. I was playing my banjo in front of  New Moon Cafe (a local restaurant), with a generous sum of $17 in my banjo case. I had 10 minutes of playing left before I packed up and moved to another restaurant. That was when SHE drove up in her Cadillac. Who, you might ask, was this particular "she"? This "she" was a elderly lady that stopped and smiled sweetly at me. That was when she came over to tip me. She shuffled over to me and put her purse on the ground. Right about now I wondering what the heck was going on. Then she laid her sunglasses on the sidewalk. Followed by her mascara, lipstick, cosmetic mirror, Ibuprofen, Nexium, and a whole host of items that most males couldn't identify. Then she grabbed..... a gun!! No, not really, but it was just as deadly. The Change Purse. As she was unzipping it I thought, "Perhaps she is going to give me a quarter or two." My supposition was supported by the fact that she opened her change purse and picked out all the quarters in it.  Then she proceeded to empty all of her pennies into my banjo case. That was rather..... unexpected. Then she smiled and I said," Thank you so much." 

   The short and long of it was that I had to carry close to $100 in pennies for two blocks until I could get to my vehicle. If you take anything away from this story (other then don't carry $100 in pennies in your pockets without an industrial belt), it should be to spare your local musician the pain of change.