The Gold Standard

I think by now most people have seen the ads in our newspapers for companies that will buy your gold. Honestly, with the price of gold these days, it’s crazy not to take in your personal gold mine for some extra cash. This is for gold items that have no meaning to you anymore, and are just lying around in your drawers among your equally meaningless underwear.

My wife heard about it from her friends, so she embarked on a search through her jewelry box. She did not find a whole lot, mostly jewelry she bought for herself after high school and a few earrings that work if you only have one ear. Finally I heard her exclaim, “Eureka!” She held up a huge, chunky gold bracelet that didn’t look familiar to me in the slightest.

She said, “Ron, remember this bracelet? Well, I think it’s time that we retire it in exchange for some mad money. It’s really heavy and should give us a great return.”

Survival mode kicked in and I faked my memory of the bracelet: “Honey, how could I forget? But if you’re OK with turning it in, then I’m fine with it, too.”

When I got to the gold exchange, naturally they had to test the different pieces of gold. So far it wasn’t amounting to very much, but I had saved the best for last. I brought out the chunky bracelet. But when they ran a magnet over it, it stuck like a cockroach to a Roach Motel. That meant it wasn’t made of real gold and was virtually worthless. I couldn’t tell my wife that the precious jewelry she thought I gave her was costume junk, so I went to an ATM machine and pulled out the maximum limit of cash.

When I got home, my wife greeted me with much anticipation. She started to say something and I interrupted, throwing down the wad of cash. She then completed her thought, “That big bracelet didn’t come from you, I had bought it a long time ago as part of a Halloween costume.” She picked up the cash and counted it: “Wow, we got that much? I better look for more stuff.”

It could have been worse at least she didn’t ask me to have her wedding ring appraised.