11/21/02’s illustrious band:

Let Them Eat Cash

Next time you stick your money in your mouth because you need your hands free, just think about how many hands have touched those bills before they reached your lips. Yark! I won’t take the last piece of pizza if even one person has touched it, but I think nothing of fondling dollars and dimes that may have belonged to a leper just a few days ago, then reaching for a sandwich. There could be anything from routine dirt to [use your imagination] crawling across my cash! And yours too!

I have no idea how many hands a dollar passes through in its life, but I'm sure it's plenty. If one new person per week touched your dollar bill in the last year (a conservative estimate), at least 52 grubby mitts have pawed it. Wait, no, it’s 104 — one mitt to spend bill and one to receive it.

According to the Bureau of Engraving and Printing (www.moneyfactory.gov,), the life span of various denominations is as follows.

$ 1 .............. 22 months

$ 5 ................ 2 Years

$ 10................ 3 Years

$ 20 ............... 4 Years

$ 50 ............... 9 Years

$100 .............. 9 Years

Guess it's called filthy lucre for a reason.