What is it about money and coat pockets? Even people who are habitual about putting their money in a wallet have, at one time, found money in a jacket pocket. Here's an experiment a la Exploritorium:
TO DO AND NOTICE:
Why is this? You never find money in coats normally. We postulate that there is a category of stuff, for lack of a better name, we will call "Stuff that mysteriously breeds." This is the opposite of "Stuff that mysteriously disappears," which includes pens, and socks (which we have discussed at length before.)
Now, everyone has had something that they could have *sworn* they threw away. In my case it is 2 oz drinking glasses. I've easily thrown away 20 or so, which is amazing, considering we started with 4. This is might odd. Why does this happen? Because they breed. Lets look at our example of money for a more detailed discussion.
Money is a slow maturing thing, and very delicate as it grows up. The slightest disturbance can destroy formative money. But a coat pocket, undisturbed for months, is the perfect breeding ground. Currency will lay its eggs within the pocket. Newborn currency will often be disguised as lint. As it matures, it will develop into coins and from there dollar bills. It will eventually reach its maturity at $20, but only after an extremely long gestation time (preliminary research gives indication that it may take up to three years for money to fully develop.) Money is most often found in its $5 or $10 form, owing to the fact that each stage in the currency process is geometrically further from the last (1x5, 2x5, 4x5), and takes a corresponding amount of maturity time