Fa la la la la, la la la la…

We’ll get to that in a second.

First…I was reading an article about Amazon’s new e-book reader, which sounds like quite a neat piece of technology. If only it wasn’t expensive as all get-out.

In the article, they cited a 2004 NEA study that said 57 percent of adults in the United States read one book a year. At the time, I thought, “Holy cow, what is wrong with this country?!” I thought it was a number that pointed to a sad state of intellectual use.

But as a few days passed, I started to rethink my initial reaction. Now I’m thinking that number sounds surprisingly high. Think how many people you know who never say anything about books or even reading for that matter. How many others say they’d love to read if they only had some time. It seems like the number of people who make it through one book a year should be more like 20 percent. What do you think? Either way, maybe we should be writing books about Britney Spears and celebrity pregnancies. At least people would be reading.

And in another sad state of affairs, a story I believe out of Ohio. A contractor is remodeling a woman’s bathroom when he breaks open a wall to find a stash of old cash. The money was wrapped in newspaper dating back to 1939. The face value was $182,000, but appraisers say it could be worth half a million dollars.

The homeowner offered the contractor 10 percent of the money. Not a bad chunk of change, especially when you consider he was there to remodel a bathroom. He says that’s ridiculous. He suing, saying the money should be his under a “Finder’s Keepers” law that dates back to English common law.

You’re serious? If I went to work tomorrow and stumbled upon something worth $500,000 and my employer offered me $50 grand, I would think that was ridiculously high. What did I do other than stumbling upon it blindly?

The money in this case was probably stashed by the original homeowner, who built the house in 1922 and lived there for 47 years. The money was his, and adjusted for today’s value that’s like him putting $2.2 million inside the wall. Maybe we take a few moments and see if he has some family who actually deserves the money? Maybe we say hey, this money isn’t ours, can we put it to a good, charitable use?

No. MINE MINE MINE.

Bah humbug.