Bucket of Fun

You know those movies that claim to be about 37 different people, but in the end, bring them all together around one common theme or motif? Today's blog takes that tact, but we're not going to make you guess what the common denominator is. The thing they all share is that universal symbol of the season, the Salvation Army collection bucket.

One red bucket, a million (or 5) stories to tell:

• We start in good spirits with the anonymous Pennsylvania man who dropped $3000 in the bucket and just kept on walking.
  
• We follow that up with another anonymous donor, this one in Vermont, who, for the second straight year, dropped a rare gold coin worth a couple thousand bucks in a bucket.
  
• Feeling good still? I can put an end to that. Here's a story of a woman in Illinois who took her daughters down to a Wal-Mart so the girls could put the $8.26 they had scrounged up in a bucket. While the two girls were putting their money in the kettle, the mom left her sleeping 2-year-old in the car (no more than 30 feet away, according to the mom, and no one went in the store). Still, she was arrested for child endangerment and then handcuffed in front of her other kids. Ahh, the lessons we teach our children...
  
• Still hopeful? Check out this story of a bell-ringer who got tired of standing out in the cold, so he abandoned his post. Shortly thereafter, a kind stranger stumbled by and stole the entire bucket.
• And finally, I give you the woman who not only used her position as a bell ringer to shoplift from the store she was standing outside, but seems to have also been stealing cash right from the bucket. She denies the latter charge, arguing that the dollars she had on hand were actually "tips" given to her by those who also dropped a few coins off. What, you're not tipping your bell-ringers this holiday season? And I'm the Scrooge?