My Wallet

When I was a child, my grandmother was putting money back in her wallet, and she told me that the bills should always be in value order from the front of the wallet to the back of the wallet. I didn't know any better, but this turned out to be the ONLY way to put money in a wallet.

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I don't think she meant for me to take it as far as I do, but obviously I have come to adore this method for storing money. I put my singles in the front, then fives, tens, and twenties. Now in men's wallets there is often a divider in the wallet (for whatever reason) and I like to use that to separate the twenties from the larger bills (when I have them.) Fifties and hundsvilles go behind the separator. This is obviously to make sure I don't accidentally spend one in place of a twenty. (I am way to diligent for that to ever happen, but it's better to be safe than sorry, right?)

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As if this wasn't organized enough, I have to flatten out the edges of my bills so that they are perfect rectangles, and then the order of the bills of each individual denomination is determined by the crispness of the bill. The really wrinkly ones are in the front (to be used first) and the better, crispier ones are in the back. So at any one time, I will have the worst of the singles in the front of all the singles, then the worst of the fives in front of all the fives, and so on and so forth. If this isn't organized enough for you, I make it so the colored bills (the new ones that look like play money) are always in the back of their respective denominations regardless of the crispy factor. If I have more than one of the colored bills, we revert back to the crisp factor to determine placement. Think of the colored ones as a separate denomination in and of themselves, worth a tad more than their face value.

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So to recap, bills go from least to most, wrinkliest to crispiest, least colorful to most colorful, and all of that within their denominations as well. Sounds like a lot of thinking, but it's second nature to me at this point. Thanks grandma!

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As an aside, I can't stand it when people stuff their money in their pockets or in their wallet, all folded and wrinkled up. How can you keep track of it? How do you know if it's all there? I guarantee that when you find money on the ground when you are out in public it is one of those people who dropped it. They went into their pocket for some keys or a piece of gum, and the wadded up, sweaty twenty accidentally plopped out in the process. Then, observant OCDers like myself, see it, unwrinkle it, and put it in the appropriate spot in our neatly organized wallets...twenty dollars richer.