Today was another very interesting day in DC, marked so far by a very eventful visit to the Treasury. We started out by a very thorough tour of the Bureau of Engraving and Printing. It was nice not having to wait in any of the lines, and because some of the other machines weren’t working they were making $10 bills instead of the $1s most people see on tours. Afterwards we had a nice lunch and headed to the Treasury building for our meeting with the Treasurer, Rosario Marin (pics). That was of course wonderful, though she couldn’t sign my sheet of $2 bills because her name wasn’t on them, something about protocol.

Some of the more interesting tidbits I picked up were about the new full-color bills being introduced next year, and that there is some serious discussion about putting a new face into the currency, but they won’t be taking any of the current ones out. Hmmmm. It’s all basically part of the fight to stay ahead of the counterfiters, but personally I’m going to miss the old greenbacks.

As almost more coincidence than anything else, we were able to meet briefly with John Taylor (pics), one of the greatest living economists and named as one of the main people to possibly succeed Alan Greenspan. Taylor is currently the Undersecretary of Foreign Affairs at the Treasury, no small job.

There were a few other things there, but it’s getting too late to write; check out the pictures