Kindness of Strangers

Yesterday was an exercise in resource management. I am not good at resource management.

I had planned to visit a good friend and her fresh new baby in the afternoon. Of course, the standard mom time handicap had me running a good twenty minutes late. Amazingly, I remembered to bring the gift, though I forgot the card. I also forgot to eat lunch and actually managed to do Insanity (first time in a week-rough) so I was starvation central. I wanted to pick up some of these awesome cookies for my friend and then grab some lunch on the way. As I was standing in line at the cookie shop (and helping myself to some samples, thankyouverymuch), I realized that I didn't have my wallet. Scrounging through my purse, I found $8 and a million pennies. At that point, I was all in on the cookies and too lazy/late to head home. The woman pushed out a baby, I thought she deserved some good cookies.

Minus the $6 spent on the half dozen, I had $2 left to get myself some grub. After driving around for a few minutes and consulting with a homeless person for advice, I stopped at a taqueria, thinking that they must sell dollar tacos. Apparently, non-Taco Bell Mexican restaurants charge at least three whole dollars per taco. Eek! I was starving and noticed that a side of rice was only 95 cents and a side of beans was the same. Unfortunately, when I went to pay there was a difference between the prices of the sides when they are in addition to a meal and when they are the meal itself. The tally was $2.85. Ruh roh. I stood there sheepishly and handed over my $2 and a fistful of pennies and apologized saying, "that's all I have." The two women minding the counter were so kind and told me not to worry. One said I just have to come back and order more next time. How sweet is that? I need to head over there later to drop off a big tip.

And maybe, just maybe, I should stick an emergency $20 in my car like a 16-year-old.

But, at least my friend got her cookies and I got to hold her sweet little babe.

My not so little babe...here comes trouble