Kind of Like Shooting Fish in a Barrel

So, Zombiegrrl sent out a call to all of her west coast friends to help her and her husband complete their collection of quarters from all of the states. So, a) being a good friend, b) slightly OCD, and c) in desperate need of a break from all the other stuff I should be doing, I sat down with all of the jars of loose change we had around the house.

We have 4 milk jars full of change. Actually there used to be 5, but one was recently turned in at the bank, and the other 4 were queued up to go in as well, so her timing is pretty good. Anyhow, I dumped them out on the dining room table and went to town. I ended up finding 8 out of the 9 she needed, so I was feeling pretty good ('cause everything is a competition for me.)

After I'd dug out all her quarters, I realized we had a lot right there on the table -- how close to a full set did we have on our own? So I went through the pile a second time (even raided Mags' piggy bank!) and came up with 43 states, all in one sitting. It felt a bit odd; Z said she and hubby had been collecting them since 1999, and here I was, after they'd all been released, going through 5 years of change in one fell swoop and nailing more than 80% of them all at once.

Ironically, I'd only be *2 quarters* short of having a full set if I hadn't been helping friends. Yep, 5 of them I'll be shipping across the country to my poor, poor friends who have been struggling for so long and fighting the good (quarter) fight. And I'm irritated all right. No, not 'cause the

And random coin trivia: pennies are made almost entirely out of zinc, not copper.