Jim Tumbls.

adamisacson:

So the CVS by my office has an ATM that only spits out $20s, and if you use it, the fees (your banks and theirs) total up to $4.

However, all of the registers, including the self-check, give you cash back with no fees when you use your ATM card.

Yesterday I needed cash for cab fare - small bills preferred. I walked past the ATM (a friend of mine calls those hard-to-break ATM 20s “yuppie food stamps”). I picked up a $1 box of Junior Mints, paid for them at the self-check, and got $35 cash back.

So, in effect: 10 feet away from the proper ATM, I got small bills, paid a dollar in fees, and got free Junior Mints.

And the bank - or financial-services company or whoever - that runs the ATM? They’re going to have a very long, very hard recession.

(Another recent recession-thinking example, of course, is the iPhone Internet tethering I was going on about yesterday. It’s amazing and I’d gladly pay for it, but I can’t because the Ministry of Telecommunications — I mean, AT&T — has a policy against it. So for now I’m officially stealing it.)