Bottlecaps & Birthday Cake
Dad collected a bunch of bottle caps. Some came from mom's coke bottles and some came from the store. You see, dad could go down to the store, open the big cooler (like a huge-sized ice chest), grab a bottle, pay the nickel for it, open with the bottle opener built-in to the outside of the chest and sit and visit with the other neighborhood men sitting around doing the same thing. I think he asked the store owner if he could empty and take home the bottle caps. See, he had devised a plan to satisfy a need the family had, a want to not be wasteful/to show how clever and smart he was and to be unique (weird) in another way. Once he had as many as he thought he needed he set them out in a rectangle pattern and nailed each one down (smooth side down). This made a door mat you could wipe the mud off your feet. Worked great when we had rainy weather AND if you had something on your feet. I used to have to jump a big jump to avoid it with my barefeet! It was somebody's birthday and mo...