what the hell are you talking about?

ooohhhhhh you mean my ass pennies?
well sir, that's a habit that doesn't die. i need to stick each and every penny up my ass before handing it to a cashier. its my right dammit.

VIVA LOS ASS PENNIES!!

Hey, I have a cocaine allergy and you don't see me whining about all the coke use with bills. Do you know how much blow I had to do in order to figure that it was actually blow that was killing me? I also happen to have a fixation with swiping my credit card up and down my ass crack. Is that a problem for you? Well, it feels good and warms up the magnetic strip so it can be better read by your register.

VIVAN LAS TERJETAS DE CREDITO DE LOS CULOS!!!

@4: Tarjetas.

When I was a cashier in high school, I got to know the phenomenon of women who kept all of their important stuff in their bras. This was especially horrific in the summer, when they'd plunge their hands deep into those barely constrained crevasses to retrieve a damp rectangle of compressed bills, which I'd then get to count out.

Dear pantsmakers: please, please remember to put pockets on women's pants. Please.

the scenario is:

there's no counter, you're walking up to a person just standing at a cash register.
you have more than two or three items, something like a sandwich a soda and a cookie
your credit card is in your wallet in your pants pocket
there is a line of people

you wave the items at the person at the register, who punches the little buttons on the machine, then you stick them in your armpit so you don't drop them, fish out your wallet one-handed, wiggle the credit card out somehow, stick the credit card gingerly between your (dry) lips, so you can fold the wallet up and put it away and have the correct number of hands for your task.

Then you hand the card to the cashier (you could wear gloves, we don't mind) take the card back, stick it in your pocket next to said wallet, and walk elsewhere, where they hopefully have horizontal surfaces that people aren't currently attempting to walk on.

It may sound crazy but every now and then it is my dilemma in teeny hole-in-the-wall places.

If you don't have a place for people to set down the things they are buying while taking out their payment method then expect people to hold said payment method in unconventional ways.

nom nom nom this dollar is yummy nom nom nom.

@#9 I feel your horror. I spent one summer as a Target cashier right after high school. There's nothing quite like watching a 300lb woman reach deep into her cavernous bra to hand you a damp wrinkly $20. Don't even get me started on the chicks who kept money in their shoes. Ugh.

Gloves are Anonymous's friend- s/he should use them and quit whining.
Nobody likes a whiner.

@16 - Welcome to the internet.

I think there's a difference between being a germaphobe and asking the people not to slobber on things, or pull them from an excessively sweaty location.

Worked with a bank teller who had to process currency deposits from strippers from a strip joint up the road--he said the money always had "a smell" and was moist more often than not. Next time you want to stick a bill in your mouth, keep in mind how well-traveled currency is. Oh! This is I-Anon, which means I've just created an incentive for guys to smack down on bills.

and stop pulling out wet money from your cleavage. It's nasty!

I'm a cashier at the Ballard Market and when all the exercisey people come in dripping with sweat and pull damp, limp cash out of their (pocket? sock? underwear?) it takes everything I have not to vomit. Mouth thing doesn't bother me as much.

I've had to dry wet smelly cash out under a register before. Very happy to work in a field now that doesn't require touching damp pocket cash.

@21 - now, that one takes the cake. I'll bet the money did indeed have a smell (ever smell a stripper pole? let's have a little hygiene here, ladies!).

If this is the biggest gripe in your life you should be thankful for your blessed life!

@1 your upright citizen's brigade reference has totally made my day.

hahahaha ass pennies.

I worked a couple different service industry jobs to put myself through college, and I'm seconding this. Both places had lots of counter space to put things. I wasn't allowed to wear gloves at either job, and only one allowed me to use hand sanitizer. Really, how complicated is it to not stuff things in your mouth like a filthy toddler? Germs or no germs, it's nasty to get a stranger's slobber or sweat all over your hands.

That, and people would have cuts on their hands and hand me BLOOD SOAKED MONEY. Now that really IS something that you don't have to be germophobic to get up in arms about. Just because service people are poor doesn't mean that they don't have a right to avoid blood borne illnesses, you nasty slobs.

@9 and @12 - In high school, I worked at a certain fish and chips stand generally located across the street from a beach or a lake, and the summer crowds were nothin' but wet, sweaty money. Not a huge deal in retrospect, since it paled in comparison to the horror that was working register #1 (with meant mostly ringing up quick purchases like cigarette and toiletries and also corralling the insane) at the 4th and Pike Payless Drugs.

I understand that if you sleep on the street, you might hide your money on your body out of necessity, but empathy did little to calm my gag reflex on those hot August days.

I have the solution...mandatory fannypacks for everyone!

Caught the bus on 3rd and Pike today and saw a bum take his shoe off and pull out his cash. Think about it.

@27 the fact that you know and obviously enjoy UCB enough to pick up references - is awesome.

Some shit you don't ever get immune to, like drug-resistant staph found in hospitals. That shit will kill you. So fuck all these "good for the immune system" type comments.

Couple decades back I worked as a cashier in a large urban liquor store, in Berkeley. (JayVee, anyone?)
The homeless alcoholics who lived outside often reeked so badly you had to back away from them at the counter, and as they swayed and blinked and shook, they would fumble out the money they had spanged and scraped together for their half-pint of Wolfschmidt. Quite often they had pissed themselves at some distant or not-so-distant point. They would dig deep down in the damp, filthy, urine-soaked darkness of their pants for that money. We kept alcohol swabs behind the counter, for cleaning our hands before we went on break, or smoked a cigarette. (Yeah, I know; everyone has their own take on disgusting and unhealthy practices.)

But that money went into the TILL, and was eventually, inevitably handed out as change to some other unsuspecting customer. That was a little over twenty years ago, and to this day, I operate on the premise that all cash I encounter has come from a wino's piss-pocket. I am absolutely appalled when I see people hold cash in their mouth, even for a second. And I really appreciate my bank debit card, which no one ever handles but me.

This column makes me want to iron all my currency. Nothing like clean, crisp, sanitary bills.

@36, after just reading @35, I'm going to go out on a limb here and suggest that it might take more than an iron..

Dinero mojado de mis chichis... oh yeah.

Hmmm...

I wonder if all the germophobes have ever heard of Dickbills... ?

Many years ago, my wife and I were in our car, stopped at an intersection, and waiting for the light to change. A short distance away, a middle-aged man dressed in a tuxedo was taking a piss, in the belief that he was invisible.

When he finished his piss, he did a few shakes, and then, he wiped the end of his dick with paper money. Mercifully, the light changed and we drove off. It was only then that he realized he was standing next to an intersection.

So, to all you folks who like to put money where your mouth is, or worse yet, in your mouth, good luck with that…

ahemm, excuse me 32 but i believe velma praised MY comment! I'M the UCB expert here, thank you very much.
anyway velma, hit me up for some werewolf sex anytime.

All the people who are saying that Anon is just a germophobe and needs to get over it have obviously never worked in a shitty service job in their life. People treat such workers like subhumans most of the time, doing things to or expecting them to do things that they'd never expect from any equal human being. Like shitting in the isle of a store and leaving it for the workers to clean up because the store had no public restroom. And before you get up in arms about that, people were allowed to use the restroom until customers STOLE shit out of employee lockers a few times, and in any case it was the owner's policy, so all the rebellious customer did was punish the slave wage peons who had no control over the decision by forcing them to clean up the FECES of a completely healthy adult.

Sure, that's an extreme case, but during my time there as a cashier, not a day went by that customers weren't heedlessly exposing me to their gross body fluids and other filth, and expecting me to clean it up. It's not even about germs, although yes, I don't think it's "germophobic" to not want to have to touch bills that a person who clearly has a flu just coughed all over. It's about common human decency - most people understand that it's not polite to intimately expose strangers to their secretions, body odor, etc. Cashiers and other service people are not seen in the same light, so people don't even consider cleaning up the huge puddle of drool left on the counter by their squealing brat.

35 - Your graphic imagery has scarred me for life. I will never, ever handle money the same way ever again. Lesson learned!

43 - People fucking SUCK and your story just confirms it. It's amazing how adults behave like filthy, selfish animals when they think they won't get busted for it. They didn't consider you, of course. That a real, live person has to clean up their body spew. Assholes. You deserve a medal for the shit you put up with. Fuck you, general public!

OCD much?

You know what's worse than spitty dollar bills? Junkie blood sprayed all over a sink and mirror. I used to feel sorry for junkies because their lives are usually so pathetic and sad, but now I hate them because they are truly scum of the earth. Leaving their infected-with-who-knows-what needles and blood all over the place -- outside on the ground, in bathrooms used by families. Leaving their drugs lying around for anyone to find.

Fuck you, junkies. Now I understand why all of my cop relatives were so reactionary -- when you see people at their worst every day, you begin to hate them.

Also, I have a feeling mouth spit isn't as toxic as people assume. People kiss random strangers in the bar all the time, so why whine about this? Weird.

Consider a different job.

it's not about GERMS, you stupidheads, it's about COOTIES!

ever think about mabey gettin a new job.....you sound like a pussy