Shredding Benjamin

Oh, Ben, we're so sorry. We didn't mean it. Please, come back! I was cleaning out the shred bag--doesn't everyone have a shred bag in the days of identity theft from recycling bins?--that had some stuff that was a year or two old in it. I'm dumping items into the shredder and I see what looks like a bill. A $100 bill. As I feed it in, I think, oh, I hate those fake bills that they insert into credit-card flyers to make us think they're giving us money. A few seconds later as my wife strolled in, I realized it was currency. Honey, I shredded a benjamin. We don't have a cross-cut shredder, as that's overkill if you're not wanted by a foreign power or have millions in your bank accounts, and we were able to find most of the pieces, so we think a bank can exchange it for us in accord with the rules for damaged currency that the Department of the Treasury promulgates. Curiously, my wife and I don't casually put $100 bills in shred or burn bags. We don't recall receiving high-denomination bills recently. We have no idea where this came from. Just glad I spotted it. The ultimate way to dispose of shredded paper is vermicomposting, of course. We recycle non-identity-based paperwork, but we feed our shredded remains to our worms to create soil. We give them paper to help their digestive tracts, and our non-meat food scraps to turn into perfect soil.