How Maggie learned to appreciate the beer can-no not by getting drunk, thank you very much

Someone (no, not me, although it is tempting) who likes declaring days holidays has decided that today is National Beer Can Appreciation Day. Although I don't like beer I have actually learned to appreciate the beer can, several beer cans in fact, in a rather roundabout way. In high school I was a girl scout and a group I was a part of decided that we wanted to go to Europe one summer. To do, so we raised the money ourselves. In addition to money from traditional things like bake/girl scout cookie sales and car washes, part of the funding for this trip actually came from beer/soda cans. In Michigan you get 10 cents for turning in beer cans at grocery stores so they can be recycled. (Before you people in other states decide to start collecting cans and rushing to Michigan supermarkets with them, apparently the cans have to be purchased in Michigan for you to get the 10 cents.)

Anyway, we all lived close by a university and their football team is popular and a lot of people like to hold parties and drink quite a bit in the parking lot outside the stadium. With so much alcohol/soda being drunk, we figured that a lot of cans were left on the ground for us to take. So one Saturday right before a big game all 10 of us went out to the stadium's parking lot and  we managed to collect about $1,000 worth of cans in about 4 hours which we split 10 ways. We did this for a couple of games and raised quite a bit of money. The trip itself was a lot of fun. We went for 2 weeks and we traveled to the UK,France, Germany, Austria, Switzerland, and Lichtenstein. I love to travel and the cities we visited were really beautiful. Before going I didn't realize there were different girl scout centers all over Europe so it was fun to see that and learn about them as well. The trip is something I'm still really glad I did and I'm thankful in part to beer cans for helping us get there!