Penny Millionaire Project – Week 16

Monday – Nix found a penny underneath an Oyster machine.

Tuesday – 20p from a tube seat at Kensington Olympia, courtesy of Kirsty. Our new boy, Andrew, also initiated himself into the project today with two 5ps he had found left on a pub table. He says he shouted after the man who left them, only to be told “I’m not interested”. You see? Someone has to clean up after these people.

Friday – Kirsty gave me a penny from the road outside our offices, near the security hut. This is the second one I’ve been given from there in the space of a week. I’d hate to think the security guard was throwing them there to watch my colleagues bend over.

Week Sixteen

How much found: 32p
Total found so far: £10.64
How it could now be spent: A Volvo high mileage club badge.

Penny Millionaire Project – Week 15

Tuesday – I knew my instincts were right about new Simon! Today he wheeled over in his seat and handed me a 2p and a 1p that he’d found clearing out his desk.

Thursday – thick and fast on the colleague generosity front. First of all, from Nix, a treasure trove of coppers from a festival – a 2p and two 1ps that were sat on the edge of a veggie burger stall, plus a penny from inside a collapsible chair.

Then Mhairi came good with what is perhaps the grottiest, blackest penny I’ve ever seen, from outside the security guard’s hut at work. Grottiness aside, I’m doubly proud of her because she picked it up in full view of the security guard, a man who sees all, and whom we have to walk past every morning.

Week Fifteen

How much found: 9p
Total found so far: £10.35
How it could now be spent: A “really cute House Mouse stamp”.

Penny Millionaire Project – Week 14

Wednesday – we’ve had a new person start at GAAPweb. His name’s Simon, and he sits behind me. Today he gave me a 5p from under his desk. I think we’re going to get along.

Sunday – a lucrative visit to my nan’s house. My auntie handed over two pieces of reclaimed wealth – a 2p rescued on the way home from Asda and a 5p that was sat on the bar at her line dancing session. Yee-ha.

Not much to report this week. Still, gives me time to start planning what to spend my million on.

Week Fourteen

How much found: 12p
Total found so far: £10.26
How it could now be spent: A boys satin wedding cravat.

Penny Millionaire Project – Week 13

Ok, now we’re back in business. I’m actually finding cash again myself.
Monday – a walk to Tesco in my lunch break, and a 2p found on the pavement.

Wednesday – another 2p in the meeting room at work, sat on the windowsill. The coin looked ancient, and I’d guess it had been there for quite some time. I reckon it was last used to buy a Janis Joplin LP.

Thursday – Matt handed over a penny from a lunchtime walk (he found it on Tuesday – he says he forgot until now, but I think he was wrestling with himself about whether I deserved it).

Again on Thursday – two pennies on the counter of our work café, in front of a big basket of apples.

Saturday – tuppence on the floor of Tesco’s car park. Tesco’s again. I hate to give them free publicity, but it’s true – every little does help.

Later on, I found 1p on the rug in the front room as I was hoovering. This absolutely counts. As does the 2p I went on to find under the sofa (well, if you’re going to hoover, do it properly).

Week Thirteen

How much found: 12p
Total found so far: £10.14
How it could now be spent: A can of Plasti Dip multi-purpose rubber coating.

Penny Millionaire Project – Week 12

I know they’re helping me out, but I’ve been completely usurped. First of all, on Monday morning, Mhairi presented me with a penny from a street down from her house, followed by Kirsty with a 5p from the seat beside her at Glasgow airport. They make it seem sooo easy.

Friday – Matt hit me with a 5p he found outside our offices.

After leaving work, I stood and seethed for a bus for 1 and a quarter hours in torrential rain, before deciding to cut my losses and try and get a train instead. It was clearly fate.

As I crossed the road, ignoring the traditional wisdom which says to look left and right, and keeping my eyes on the floor instead (money’s hardly going to fly at me from left and right is it?), I had to stop right in the middle of the road to pick up a penny. An exhilarating find, which the angry beeps and screamed obscenities only added to.

Week Twelve

How much found: 12p
Total found so far: £10.02
How it could now be spent: A 1lb box of rubber bands.

Penny Millionaire Project – Week 11

Monday – an excited Mhairi, back to work today after a week on holiday, greeted me in the best possible way – with cash. Two 5p coins, both found at Clapham Junction station.

Tuesday – a gem of a find – 20p in Tesco car park. Made all the sweeter by the fact that it was taken from Tesco’s premises.

Saturday – went on a waddle around 8pm. If I’m honest, it was less about the project and more about trying to deflate the tyre around my middle that’s crept on since I stopped walking.

Incidentally, the trek turned out to be a fitness/richness double-whammy, because I found a penny in the middle of the road. It looked a dazzling fluorescent orange in the evening sun. It shone almost like a beacon, warning me how foolish it would be to step into the road. Luckily, I’m ignorant.

Week Eleven

How much found: 31p
Total found so far: £9.90
How it could now be spent: An hour’s work from this Business Support Assistant.

Penny Millionaire Project – Week 10

Tuesday – a pattern is beginning to form. I’m now finding the mouse’s share of the penny totals each week. Today it was Kirsty who provided. A 2p and a 1p on the table in the pub before a Tori Amos concert. I guess Tori Amos fans are a well-heeled bunch.

Friday – after worrying last week about the departure of my colleague, and with him, my mystery benefactor, it seems I was being unnecessarily gloomy – I now have a new one!

Another colleague, walking behind my desk, in a well-practised manoeuvre which confirmed he’s no stranger to putting things on people’s desks then hurrying away, silently set down a pile of coins totalling 12 pence right on my desk, and whooshed away, almost unseen. I say almost, because I saw him. I now know who he is. But I’m not going to tell him that.

My ‘don’t ask, don’t tell’ approach soon began to bear more fruit. Later on, in the pub after work, I was waiting to get some drinks and deep in conversation with a couple of colleagues. When it came time to order I turned back to face the bar, ordered my round, and as I set about putting the first drink in front of the right person, I noticed that there in front of me was a 10 pence coin.

At first I was genuinely bemused. It hadn’t been there before, and I’d already had a G&T in work, so everything was hazy and unreal. Until one of my fellow Webbies nodded behind me. There he was again, my mystery benefactor, looking somewhere else. I paid for the drinks, picked up the 10p, took my drink and walked away, smiling to myself, like drunk people do.

Saturday – hallelujah! There’s been such a drought of genuine finds that this one presented an exquisite thrill. After a class of Body Combat at the gym, I was staggering back toward my car (if you’ve ever done Body Combat, you’ll know why) when a 5p revealed itself on the floor of the car park. I can’t say it was easy picking that one up.

Week Ten

How much found: 30p
Total found so far: £9.59
How it could now be spent: A bottle of Henriques and Henriques medium dry Madeira.

Penny Millionaire Project – Week 9

Monday. Things are getting a bit tight. I’m relying ever more heavily on the generosity of friends and family. In a funny way I’ve started to feel a bit of a charity case. Today my mum handed over a 5p and a 2p that she found outside a pub. It’s strange, but that’s the second time she’s handed over money she’s found “outside” a pub.

My little sister also gave me a 5p and a 2p. She tells me the 5p was found in the music room at school, right by the piano. I like to think it fell out of a teacher’s pocket as he sat down to play something by Coldplay.

The 2p was found on the school field. This is a marvellous find. That 2p all alone on a huge expanse of grass was well and truly out of circulation. And it’s helping coins like that to find their way back to where they belong that’s the true raison d’etre of this project.

Tuesday. Went to get some petrol, and as I made my way back across the forecourt after paying, there was the shiniest penny I’ve ever seen on the floor.

Thursday. In the afternoon, had a meeting about blogs to go to. As soon as I walked into the meeting room, right there on the swimming pool-sized table, was a penny.

Friday, a colleague was leaving GAAPweb, so we went out for drinks after work, and a funny thing happened. During a conversation with him, I found no fewer than 4 pennies. All around me – on the floor, on our table, on my chair. We were chatting about this project…

Ah-hah! Those unexplained pennies on my desk and behind my chair last week, and now this! I think I’ve found my mystery benefactor. While it’s possible the Friday night pennies could have been random finds, I’m more inclined to think he was planting them as we spoke. Either he’s a member of the Magic Circle, or I have the observational skills of Stevie Wonder.

I’m still counting the pennies in this week’s total – if I hadn’t found them they could still be there. A reckless gamble. Shame he’s left though. He was clearly one of life’s givers.

Week Nine

How much found: 20p
Total found so far: £9.29
How it could now be spent: A mountain survival thermal bag.

Penny Millionaire Project – Week 8

I don’t know what did it. Maybe the crestfallen expression. Maybe it was me dropping into all my conversations the fact that I hadn’t been finding many pennies. Who knows? All I know is, I came into work on Monday to find a post-it note on my desk with ‘Victoria Station’ and ‘Hay on Wye’ written on it, with two little arrows leading to two 5p coins. I knew that writing. Mhairi.

Conveniently, she sits right next to me, on my right, so she’s nice and easy to thank. I was just launching into a gushing acceptance speech when Chris piped up, from my left, with an ‘oh yeah, and I found this at a festival on Sunday’, and gave me a 5p.

And the colleague generosity wasn’t over yet. Later on I found another penny on my desk, this time attributed to nobody, but it had obviously been put there by some kind soul. My very own mystery benefactor… I like it.

Wednesday – a penny on the way to the bus stop in the morning. In one of those pavement gutters, where all the rain and slime and mulch gathers.

Friday, waiting for a Chinese takeaway, I sat at the table and was just deciding whether I’d find more of interest in Autocar magazine or Practical Fishkeeping, when I saw, on a dog-eared copy of Time magazine, a 2p and two 1ps.

Sunday, my little sister handed me a 20p that she’d found on the counter of a Chinese takeaway the night before. Our family does occasionally eat things other than Chinese takeaway…

Week Eight

How much found: 41p
Total found so far: £9.09
How it could now be spent: An “almost unbreakable” tea tray.

Penny Millionaire Project – Week 7

How mischievous life can be. It keeps me in an agonising poverty-stricken limbo all week without a single penny, then decides, on Friday afternoon, to drop one right behind my chair in the office. Like it has always been there.

Sunday – decided to walk to my nan’s house. My mum passed me in her car and beeped me the offer of a lift, but I shooed her away. I’m not saying it was easy, but I knew it was what I needed to do. The decision was worth it – I found a penny on the pavement. It scares me to think how close I came to going in the car instead. Life’s full of these “sliding doors” moments.

A lean week, but still the finds continue. Here’s to next week…

Week Seven

How much found: 2p
Total found so far: £8.68
How it could now be spent: An orange silk wine bottle holder.