By Chester Seaton, News

2/7- It’s been over a year since a sizable chunk of Crowndon’s gold supply was contaminated by a crashed shipment of Barrier Ocean Tuna. The lingering smell was such that the gold had to be melted down. Much of that gold is now finding its way back into circulation, but not without some problems.

“I went down to the bank last weekend, to pick up me check,” said Lorne Delantine, a dockworker in Walsh. “Turned it in for twenty gold jacks. Should’ve known something was wrong when the teller seemed to be holding her breath as she placed them on the counter. Now, I work on the docks, so I’m used to all kinds of nasty niffs. But this, faint as it was, was nearly enough to bowl me over.”

Other reports ranging from Walsh to Toring over the weekend pay period seem to indicate a wide spread problem.

“We’ve gotten complaints from everyone from citizens collecting their pay to business owners,” said Sylvester Tourney, regional manager of the Crowndon bank. “And there’s rumors that people are trying to give to gold to vagrants, and the vagrants won’t take it. We thought we were over this! I wouldn’t be surprised if La Pierre kept a portion of the gold and found a way to put it in circulation once we thought we were in the clear. Even stranded in the desert and surrounded by an army, he’s a thorn in this nation’s side!”

The Secretary of the National Treasury offers a more reasonable explanation, however.

“It would seem that a bureaucratic error led to a portion of the gold to evade several of the last sanitation procedures,” the secretary said. “Hence, the faint remainders of the foul stench. We urge any citizens who received the rotten gold to return it to the banks for an exchange, so that the gold can be re-processed.”