Red Winged Black Bird on a fence post in a field.

Sample Checks


Category: philosophies

I?ve once again reached the point in my order of checks where they have included samples of other check designs. You know the things, cartoons, nature scenes, and the like. I could just throw the sample checks away, but I?m too cheap.

Though I?m a rational person, I often get embarrassed by the designs and end up explaining to the clerk that I?m on the sample checks. Clerks always smile and nod. They know the deal. They get lots of embarrassing checks. Many are samples, some are chosen by preference. Yea, those clerks see all kinds.

I wonder how the samples are chosen. Do they pick new styles or just the styles that aren?t selling? I know they aren?t sending me styles related to my current choice. I use the default ?bank? style. If they were sending me samples related to the checks I normally use, they would send me conservative, professional looking samples. Instead, I get checks with puppies, flowers, butterflies, ?save the marmosets?, and teddy bears.

Imagine that you are a clerk and I come up to purchase something. I?m just shy of six feet tall and I have really wide shoulders. My hair is short and my beard is neatly trimmed. My B&L Predator II sunglasses are hanging off the collar of my t-shirt. I put the motor oil and auto parts on the counter for you to ring them up. While you do that, I flirt with the woman behind me in line. You tell me my total and I hand you a check with fuzzy little kittens crawling out of a basket printed above the text that advises the clerk that ?All things are made with love.? Yea, it?s funny when you?re the clerk. I wonder if the clerk unions have anything to do with check samples?

It could always be worse. Presumably, these samples are designs that someone out there buys. Given the nature of some of the people in the world, almost anything will sell. I dread the day when I turn to the next check in the book and it?s celebrating Nazi cross-dressers. Hey, here?s one promoting pedophilia. What?s printed on that check? Oh, it says, ?Incest Rocks!? Ah, it?s a tribute to the World Trade Center. What?s that written there? ?We did it in 2001, we can do it again!?

Though it?s true that puppies aren?t as bad as it could be, I would still prefer that there be no samples in my checkbook. I can just as easily not order those samples from the catalog as I can from the samples themselves.

Comments (10)
You gotta pick the right guy to do the job.
Go out now and vote for LibertyBob.