Every year or so, when finances grow slightly tight, Americans turn to that big bowl of change on the dresser. The annual pilgrimage to Coinstar! America! It is like all the money ran out for another country. So let's have a little guessing game. How much change is in The Awl's Big Bowl O' Change? The winning guess will... win something. Not sure what. Undying loyalty? A portion of the profits? A small amount of Awl equity?
$110 US, $3 Canadian and 1 random washer.
+ 2 tacks and 5 paper clips.
My guess: $120.00
Doesn't Coinstar charge a fee? Your nearest TD Bank (formerly known as Commerce Bank) branch has a machine that will turn it into cash for free, and you might even win a water bottle or something if you guess right.
Oh yeah, I am totally NOT going to Coinstar. I am going to that free happy bank where they let you pull this shit for free and then are like "Don't you want to open an account?" And you're like NO GIVE ME MY MONEY!
TD Bank is awesome, I will also laud it with praise whenever it comes up.
also = always (coffee!!!)
Free dog biscuits! Free pens! Their ATMs dispense stamps!
/this comment brought to you by TD Bank
I have only once paid a like ten dollar fee for bouncing a check.
Bank of America can suck it.
69.99 not a penny more...
Also you are all way low, I think.
Do you just wish that we are all way low, or is the bowl really, really big? It's hard to tell from the video. Pretend it's a footprint at a crime scene and put a dollar bill next to it for a sense of perspective.
is it all pennies on the bottom? $41.32
Does the guess have to be exact-or is the closest guess the winning guess? Are AWL employees and their families exempt? $116.58.
NEAREST WITHOUT GOING OVER.
$211.44.
After waiting tables for a calendar year and saving the change in my apron, I had a similar mound, and it came in around $300.00.
I say $266.66---
I'm going to say $210.00 and not hold out any hope for a prize because we know how the logo submissions went.
$268.47. No, wait, $268.78.
$311.56
Annual!? Okay Mr. Fancypants Richie Rich.
Showing us the change bowl in video form was a really nice touch.
Also.
I hate both of you for being flush enough to amass all those quarters. Tell me, do you use a laundry service or are you the type of lucky jerks who have their own washer & dryer?
My domestic dream is to have a washer & dryer, and a separate bedroom from my living and working space.
I have a card with an embedded microchip - the facilities of my laundromat do not warrant such a thing, believe me.
Ha, yeah, I'm poor, but I'm not HOMELESS, so no I sure do not do my own laundry.
And by "poor" I mean "by per local per capita" poor. Not like, Real America Poor.
Can I take mine back!? Is it too late!?!?
i can't see it. 265.34. i want to win a gyro, pls.
$155.72. And I know, because I am named after an economist.
As for the prize: Coinstar would take 9.1%--give that to the winner.
$133.37. I'll have a piece of the Awl.
The DRA is drooling, fingers twitching in involuntary fire-button and joystick maneuvering motions. That's enough right there to turn over the entire leaders board on Gorph.
I'll guess $178.63.
That is $216.75, on the dot. Will accept payment in WIC.
Is this Price is Right rules?
I'll go with $312, Bob.
My guess is, uh...
$87.25!
I'd say that's about 75 million pageviews at that place across town.
Amount in bowl = George W. Bush's IQ x net worth of awl.
197.63
I am drooling over the quarters.
$163.66
density of quarters, volume of bowl....$212.08
Hmm. So many quarters! $234.79.
Good God, there is a reason I never applied to consulting interviews.
$291.24
$181.24, and it is killing me to have Americans (I presume) saying so many nice things about TD Bank. :-)
[They are the only Canadian bank--here too, Northside of the 49th parallel--that even bothers being nice, without quotation marks, and they won some customer service thing like 4 years in a row. But their staff, don't get me started on what working there all day must be like...]
$83.21
Those nickels are killer, taking up far more volume than they should.
See in the US they actually have this thing called "competition" unlike Canada where 5 banks rule by handshake agreement.
I say the prize should be an autographed webpage in hardcover format.
The Awl's sharpest points, perhaps?
MP:
I'm sorry I brought it up; it was an off-the-cuff observation. I had no idea it would trigger so much animosity.
[And how's that "competition" thing working out for you? I would tell you more about our desolate, frighteningly lovely country, except I am enjoying a delicious frozen caribou slurpee.]
Which makes your post doubly ironic as I'm coming from you live from British Cannabis.
Once again my irony intake is exceeding my recommended daily limits.
I imagine caribou slurpee's are one of those disgusting things that haven't made out of the GTA, but are assumed to be Canadian.
$148.33 Boom. Also, does TD have cherry lollipops like Commerce used to?
Were those cherry? I always thought of them as "purple" flavor, and based on the last time I went, yeah they still have them.
I carry most of my change around until I spend it or it falls out of my pocket when I'm sitting in my car. I guess I'm like Barney Fife or somebody.
$183.64 US
Ha! So funny because in my mind I've always imagined that when he walks around you hear all this jingling change....
Choire or Barney? Because, yes, when I thought of someone who would always try to pay with exact change, I thought of Barney Fife. I'm not sure if there is any actual television evidence of this.
Actually, Barney Fife AND Barney Frank.
$70.01 I say this because everytime I go to the coin machine I get $70.01 no matter how much I think it will be in advance.
$268.79
And now I am forced to change mine again, this time to $268.80.
92.73.
And for my prize, I want to start receiving my daily Choire email again.
TELL CHO TO FIX OUR BUSTED ASS SERVER so the MAILY THINGIE WORKS.
$317!
$270. I need to bring my change jar(s) in. Buy myself something shiny (like rent!).
PS HERE IS SOME CAT-RELATED SCALE TO HELP IN YOUR GUESSING.
http://www.theawl.com/wp-content/uploads/2009/09/21-490x367.jpg
how much does the car weigh? this will affect my answer greatly
gah, *cat
nice. white and black cats rock.
Risen Lord Jesus' Peace!
e.t./sue > *:D (: +
The equivalent of one Marc Jacobs man purse.
$96.70
$75.35
$278.00
$211.46, pippy pappy
Damn, I think I pulled the Helen Keller plagiarism -- in light of which, I'd like to revise my guess downwards to $139.85.
Does it matter? You're just going to spend it all on this hip new Miracle Whip.
$202.51
The more rational of us would like a weight of the stash - cash only of course. Last time emptied and annual cash expenses.
$135.61, and I would like my prize paid out in a DRA-like publishing deal with the AWL, wherein I explicate on my collection of (over 500) plastic figurines that I collected when I when I were young. Did anyone else have a plastic, two-inch Smurfette yet secretly hate her and put in her in precarious situations during play, because deep down inside we felt she was already insidiously indoctrinating us into the Beauty Myth? Hells yeah.
$320
oooh $368.
two hundred fifty six oh three
Risen Lord Jesus' Peace!
e.t./sue > *:D (: +
p.s. meow
kitty looks a little like my old guy RIP