Claimed currency

June 27, 2005


It’s been exactly a month since I discovered my name on an unclaimed property list for the state of Minnesota, and I had been wondering if they were ever going to get back to me. I was curious what I had left behind in the Land of 10,000 Lakes – was it a simple retro-paycheck from some unpaid hours at FuncoLand? Or was it something more significant; a forty-dollar goof that somehow landed back at my old store and was not forwarded on to me.

Today, my wait was over. I received what looked like a rebate check from the Minnesota Department of Commerce and realized that I had finally received something that apparently was already mine. I opened it up, expecting a check for fifteen dollars at the most.

The check was much larger.

I somehow had left $300.76 in Minnesota.

How could this have happened? How did I manage to find, on total chance, my name on a Minnesota Department of Commerce website for a paycheck that I never picked up from a job that I hadn’t worked at for at least eight months before I left the state? There are so many reasons that this never should have happened:

1. I gave my forwarding address to FuncoLand (which had just changed into GameStop). In fact, on my last day of work I gave my address (to send my final check) and then when I left the state I gave them my new Sioux Falls address. Why, then, was this still listed as my college apartment – an apartment I didn’t even live in when I worked at FuncoLand the second time?

2. Why was my forwarding address not followed from that apartment building through all of the apartments until we moved? I know I gave a forwarding address to every apartment I’ve lived in since my first, so there shouldn’t be too much trouble. This one is easy: I’m pretty sure that the Minnesota Department of Commerce doesn’t really put too much work into finding owners for lost money. It probably just gets funneled into some sort of huge pool of money, which the DOC then uses for their Christmas parties and Fourth of July picnics.

3. Here’s the big one. How the hell did I manage to completely forget that I had another paycheck coming? How did I not realize that I was missing $300.00 in my checking account?

I may sound mad. I’m not. I’m a little confused, but incredibly happy. This was like finding a dollar in a coat from the past winter – except about three-hundred times cooler. I just don’t get how I could have lost this in the first place.

Regardless, it’s mine now. Forty hours of unpaid work have been returned to me. It really just goes to show how important keeping track of your money can be.

Who wants lunch? It’s on me.

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Comments

6 Responses to “Claimed currency”

  1. wick on June 27th, 2005 1112 pm

    Did you collect your damage deposit from your Apt on Michigan Ave? If not, this may be it. I know we didn’t have the same landlord, but I lived accross the street, and when you gave them a damage deposit they placed it into an investment of some sort where it would grow in equity. When I left after my 3 year stint in Eastbank I got back 300 odd dollars from my 100 dollar deposit. It would of been more, but I put a huge hole in my roomates wall.

  2. Corey Vilhauer on June 28th, 2005 1250 am

    No, I thought that it might be something like that, but the original business was “Gamestop,” so I’m pretty sure that it was an old paycheck or something. They had gotten my W2 mixed up when I moved back, I remember, so I’m not putting it past the company to mess up my final paycheck.

    Maybe it was an extra bonus check for having to work with John for two separate periods.

  3. eric on June 28th, 2005 842 am

    corey, maybe you can use the extra money to buy a copy of the dirt, the motley crue book. when someone said that you can open that book to any page and find something disgusting or depraved, they weren’t lying. i added it to your list of 26 books, which is now 27
    eric

  4. Roberta on June 28th, 2005 926 pm

    i bet Kerrie will get a bigger birthday present now that you are $300 richer. she deserves it you know.

  5. Corey Vilhauer on June 28th, 2005 1105 pm

    Shhh… Don’t tell her that!

  6. LOTR LOVR on July 2nd, 2005 809 pm

    Hey Corey, Congrats on the $$$$ You should take your wonderful mother out for lunch! Hey! There’s a great idea!

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