The other day, we wrote about a professional poop scooper in St. Louis who found $58 in a client’s dog’s poop. The very honest fellow washed it, and returned it to the dog’s owner. We were blown away by his ethics, and by his cleaning ability.
But if you thought the story was unusual before, check this out: Karen Linn, who owns money-eater Fozzie the Dog, is auctioning the unusable bills on eBay, with 100 percent of the proceeds going to the Humane Society of the United States. They’re in the same sealable plastic bag given to her by honest-to-the-core Steve Wilson, of DoodyCalls Pet Waste Removal, in St. Louis.
“We adopted Fozzie from our local shelter, and we wanted to give back,” Karen says. (I wonder if she is giving the $20 usable bills to charity?)
Right now the bid for the approximately $30 worth of unusable bills is up to $30. All the money goes directly to HSUS through eBay, so if you like HSUS, that’s one reason to bid for the bills. But for me, the main impetus would be to have these bills as a reminder that some people in the world still embrace a deep sense of ethics. I would buy the bag of shredded bills and frame it.
Poop scoopers can’t make a lot of money, so I was interested in what kind of person would refrain from keeping the cash. I was able to land a little interview with Steve Wilson, who proved to be the kind of person I’d hoped he’d be.
MG: Are you surprised that this story has gone somewhat viral?
SW: I still shake my head and grin everytime I think about all the attention this has gotten. I was just doing my job and the honest thing by returning the money.
MG: How do you come by your honesty?
SW: I got my ethics from my parents. They raised all of their children to be diligent, hard working, and most of all honest. I never thought about keeping the money. It belongs to my customer.
MG: How did you get the money so clean? You made money laundering an art!
SW: Initially I rinsed the money off with the rain that was coming down pretty good that day. I then put the money in a spare Ziplock bag and took it home. My wife washed it in a small zippered bag along with my work clothes. She then hung it up to dry.
If you’re looking for an interesting conversation piece or a symbol of the ethics that still exist in this world, offer up a bid on eBay in the next couple of days. Bidding ends June 28 at 00:48 PDT.
