The following joke has been making its rounds on the Internet. It may be inappropriate for some, but it was too funny to not share:
The 6th-grade science teacher, Mrs. Parks, asked her class, “Which human body part increases to ten times its size when stimulated?”
No one answered until little Mary stood up and said, “You should not be asking sixth-graders a question like that! I’m going to tell my parents, and they will go and tell the principal, who will then fire you!”
Mrs. Parks ignored her and asked the question again, “Which body part increases to 10 times its size when stimulated?”
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Little Mary’s mouth fell open. Then she said to those around her, “Boy, is she going to get in big trouble!”
The teacher continued to ignore her and said to the class, “Anybody?”
Finally, Billy stood up, looked around nervously, and said, “The body part that increases 10 times its size when stimulated is the pupil of the eye.”
Mrs. Parks said, “Very good, Billy,” then turned to Mary and continued.
“As for you, young lady, I have three things to say: One, you have a dirty mind. Two, you didn’t read your homework. And three, one day you are going to be very, very disappointed.”
Anders said that he began seeing pennies as a reminder to stop and say a prayer.
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“If I would see a penny when I’m gassing up, on the ground, or in a store, it would be a reminder to stop right there and say a prayer,” Anders said to ABC News. “I never failed to do that. That’s why they had so much value to me.”
At no point during all of his penny-collecting did Anders accept coins as a gift from anyone else.
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“But I never allowed anyone, not even my wife nor children, to give me pennies without being compensated,” he continued. “I wanted the inner satisfaction that God and I acquired this collection.”
“I became convinced that spotting a lost or dropped penny was an additional God-given incentive reminding me to always be thankful. There have been days where I failed to pray and more often than not, a lost or dropped penny would show up to remind me.”
Anders filled big water jugs with the coins he collected.
He said at one point his goal was to fill up 5 giant water jugs but once he had done that, he felt the urge to keep going.
He needed to go to the bank and turn them in or else he’d never do it.
At the time he finally went to the bank, he had filled 15 5-gallon jugs.
“I wanted to fill five five-gallon water jugs. That was the goal, but I couldn’t stop. … If I hadn’t turned them in yesterday, I was not going to stop.”
In addition to the intrinsic value Anders found in collecting the pennies, they also added up to have significant financial value.
After finding out his homeowner’s insurance policy wouldn’t cover his collection, he called the Origin Bank in Ruston, Louisiana, where he had been a customer for years.
Anders let them know he would be coming in with a large number of pennies.
They were happy to help but it was quite the undertaking.
“We value his business, as we do all of our customers,” said the bank’s Vice President Jennie Cole. “But if we can help Anders with his endeavors, we are happy to do so.”