Drug deals

You have entered 137,292 Bills worth $357,059
Bills with hits: 10,101 Total hits: 11,393
Hit rate: 7.36% Slugging Percentage: 8.30% (total hits/total bills)
George Score: 1,278.03
Your rank (based on George Score) is #180
(out of 48,012 current users with a George Score. [99.6 Percentile])
Your State Rank in Florida is: 16 out of 8,009 [99.8]
Your initial entries with hits have traveled a total of 5,296,774 miles.
They have averaged 470.6 miles per hit and 195.73 days between each hit.

I signed up with the Census Bureau to take a test to see if I can work for them. The pay looks good, but it’s temporary. At least it’s a paycheck. I keep hoping for something more permanent, but it’s hard. Everyone keeps saying that unemployment is up. People are looking for work. All I know is that I don’t have a job right now and my savings account won’t last forever. Hopefully, I’ll end up with some more bills to enter.

I think someone else may be thinking along similar lines, but reached a different career objective, as per this hit. I think that’s the second hit I’ve gotten that’s referenced a drug deal. Again, I don’t know how serious they are. I’m thinking that it’s a joke. I wouldn’t think you’d want something like that where people can see it.

I got this one last week. It seems to have gone all over the place. I kind of like it when it does that. The distance between the endpoints is way smaller than the total distance traveled. (I also have a weakness for vectors and vector sums.)

That’s all for now. I’ll post more when I have it.

Massachusetts elects a Republican senator and I still can’t get a hit in Nantucket County

You have entered 136,916 Bills worth $356,541
Bills with hits: 9,948 Total hits: 11,226
Hit rate: 7.27% Slugging Percentage: 8.20% (total hits/total bills)
George Score: 1,276.51
Your rank (based on George Score) is #186
(out of 48,163 current users with a George Score. [99.6 Percentile])
Your State Rank in Florida is: 17 out of 7,989 [99.8]
Your initial entries with hits have traveled a total of 5,228,361 miles.
They have averaged 471.5 miles per hit and 195.68 days between each hit.

For those that don’t know, Nantucket is an island county off the coast of Massachusetts. There are several things that make getting a hit there difficult. First, you have to take a ferry over. From what I can see, the fares aren’t cheap. I don’t think a lot of people would go over just for the heck of it.

The other thing is that there don’t seem to be a lot of malls or Starbucks there. (There is a Starbuck Road, though.) Don’t get me wrong. There does seem to be retail there. It’s just that Nantucket doesn’t strike me as the kind of place that would like chains. So, even if I spent the $40 to get over there, I don’t know that there would be many places for me to spend my bills.

Now, I’m not saying that you should just hit my bills. I don’t want to be selfish. All I’m saying is that if you happen to be on Nantucket Island and you happen to find a marked bill, please enter it regardless of who originally entered it.

For that matter, you’re always welcome to start a bill’s history. If you have money, just enter it on Where’s George. Someone has to start the bill report. That’s not even considering all of the unmarked bills out there. I’m sure that there are a lot of other georgers out there that would greatly appreciate the hit. It seems that if someone needs a county in Massachusetts that the county they need is Nantucket.

Of Sanibel and Haiti

You have entered 136,519 Bills worth $355,822
Bills with hits: 9,889 Total hits: 11,164
Hit rate: 7.24% Slugging Percentage: 8.18% (total hits/total bills)
George Score: 1,275.92
Your rank (based on George Score) is #187
(out of 48,291 current users with a George Score. [99.6 Percentile])
Your State Rank in Florida is: 17 out of 7,980 [99.8]
Your initial entries with hits have traveled a total of 5,191,871 miles.
They have averaged 470.7 miles per hit and 195.44 days between each hit.

I actually found an interesting app for the iPhone that I’d use. The USPS has its own app that, among other things, allows you to know which ZIP code you’re in. This is very useful to someone who needs to know which ZIP code their bill is on before entering it on WG. The app also lets you track packages and know where the nearest Post Office is, both things that I could see using.

Yesterday, I went to a place in Florida called Sanibel Island. When I got back, I found that I had two hits related to Sanibel. One was actually hit there. The second simply refers to it in the user note. I did spend 11 bills there, but neither hit is from any of the bills that I spent there. Odd that it should take so long for one bill to make it over there and end up there on the same day that I did.

I also got a hit on a bill that was apparently intended to help Haiti. Yes, it looks like it was deposited, but it was just one bill. I’m assuming that the actual donation was much larger.

That’s all for now.

New Florida County

You have entered 134,556 Bills worth $352,623
Bills with hits: 9,616 Total hits: 10,864
Hit rate: 7.15% Slugging Percentage: 8.07% (total hits/total bills)
George Score: 1,272.98
Your rank (based on George Score) is #196
(out of 48,755 current users with a George Score. [99.6 Percentile])
Your State Rank in Florida is: 16 out of 7,962 [99.8]
Your initial entries with hits have traveled a total of 5,054,793 miles.
They have averaged 470.9 miles per hit and 194.74 days between each hit.

I got a hit in Gulf County, which brings the number of Florida counties I have up to 60. I’m now missing only seven counties in Florida.

I did get a few other interesting hits over the past month or two. This one was found on the ground in Las Vegas. (I just love the scrolling text.)

This bill Was waiting two years to be entered. I don’t know which is more frustrating: The fact that the guy held on to it for so long or the fact that it was at a local airport, potentially waiting to go out of state.

This one, I can’t say I understand. I just thought I’d share.

That’s all for now.

Cash FTW

You have entered 133,611 Bills worth $350,883
Bills with hits: 9,380 Total hits: 10,606
Hit rate: 7.02% Slugging Percentage: 7.94% (total hits/total bills)
George Score: 1,270.48
Your rank (based on George Score) is #197
(out of 49,500 current users with a George Score. [99.6 Percentile])
Your State Rank in Florida is: 18 out of 7,932 [99.8]
Your initial entries with hits have traveled a total of 4,955,361 miles.
They have averaged 473.7 miles per hit and 194.95 days between each hit.

I saw two articles today that indicate that I should expect more hits. The first says that fewer people are using credit. The driving force seems to be that people don’t want it incur unnecessary debt, which is good advice in any economy. Not only will people have less debt but the stores don’t have charges associated with having the transaction processed.

The second article is reassuring people that cash won’t slow down checkout lines. Not only does it take about the same time, but not enough people are doing it that anyone has to worry.
Either way, it means that more of my bills will be given out as change.

And now for something completely different

You have entered 131,155 Bills worth $346,299
Bills with hits: 9,205 Total hits: 10,419
Hit rate: 7.02% Slugging Percentage: 7.94% (total hits/total bills)
George Score: 1,268.43
Your rank (based on George Score) is #199
(out of 49,660 current users with a George Score. [99.6 Percentile])
Your State Rank in Florida is: 19 out of 7,924 [99.8]
Your initial entries with hits have traveled a total of 4,879,028 miles.
They have averaged 474.9 miles per hit and 194.41 days between each hit.

For those of you that think that math has no real-world application, I present to you a case of statistical sampling. Very often, I will enter 100 or more bills at a time. Once in a while, I’ll have entered fewer bills than I should have. This means one of two things: either I was shorted a bill or I missed one.

Since I deal with banks and casinos, I’m dealing with people that are a bit paranoid about money and thus not likely to short me a bill. When I’m missing a bill like that, it means that I’ve skipped over one. You may ask how I can find one missing bill among 100, 200, 300 or more. Do I have to go through each bill?

I used to do that until I realized that I didn’t have to. That’s where statistical sampling comes in. Let’s say that I have 250 bills. I think I’ve entered all of them only to discover that I’ve actually entered 249. I count off 10 bills at a time and check the top bill against the recently entered bills.

The top bill on my pile should be the most recently entered bill. If I count off ten bills, the next should be the eleventh most recently entered. When I find one that doesn’t match, I’ve effectively narrowed it down to a range of ten bills; my missing bill should be in there. (If it’s not, I’ve probably miscounted.)

I know this may well be boring to most, but it is an example of how paying attention in math class can help.

Hits and profiles and really large numbers

You have entered 123,555 Bills worth $328,764
Bills with hits: 8,822 Total hits: 10,009
Hit rate: 7.14% Slugging Percentage: 8.10% (total hits/total bills)
George Score: 1,263.54
Your rank (based on George Score) is #199
(out of 51,518 current users with a George Score. [99.6 Percentile])
Your State Rank in Florida is: 19 out of 7,888 [99.8]
Your initial entries with hits have traveled a total of 4,669,903 miles.
They have averaged 473.1 miles per hit and 193.98 days between each hit.

Someone in the Where’s George forums pointed out that the profiles have new stats. (Here's a link to my profile.) These are stats that are normally available on my profile, as indicated above, but are now available to all each time I refresh.

I also have an interesting comment to report. Since the person commenting knows the full name of the person, I doubt that Alex Mozeak really is a crack head. (For those that point out that it’s obvious, I do have liability to worry about; there are one or two other people that read this blog every so often.)

Then there’s the three-year sleeper. The one thing I wonder about a hit like this is if the bill traveled around the world only to end up 14 miles away. I know that it was probably sitting in a bank vault somewhere, but it’s impossible to tell as there were no hits for more than 40 months. It could go either way.

Finally, I’ve just gotten hit number 10,000. (As of this posting, the page isn’t showing the actual hit number; I had to count backwards from hit 10,009, so there’s a slight possibility that it’s one off.) At the rate I’m going, I may get to 20,000 within two years.