Hello, hon, and welcome. My name is Barbara Brehmer. I'm 64, and for nineteen years I have collected tolls on the Pennsylvania Turnpike, mostly on the evening shift, mostly in Booth 3 at an interchange in the middle of the state. If you've driven the Turnpike at night in the last two decades, there's a decent chance you've handed me a ticket.

For those of you from out of state, here's how it works. When you get on the Turnpike, you take a ticket from the machine. When you get off, you hand that ticket to somebody like me, and the ticket tells me where you got on, and how far you came is what you pay. Then I make your change, I say "Have a good night," and you're gone. It takes about twenty seconds. I've done it, by my husband Ruben's arithmetic, something like two million times.

That's a lot of twenty-second visits. You'd be surprised what you can see in twenty seconds. My granddaughter set up this page in April and said, "Grandma, write down the stuff you tell us at Sunday dinner." So every Sunday I post a Top Ten. Here's this week's, and three of the old favorites people keep writing in about.

10. A personal check. Nice gentleman, very apologetic. I can't take it, hon. He found the cash in the ashtray.

9. A coin from somewhere in Europe. It was very pretty. It had a ship on it. It was not a quarter.

8. A grocery coupon for thirty-five cents off coffee. I told her I'd love to, but the Turnpike doesn't drink coffee. I do. I didn't take it either.

7. A library card. He was very tired. We worked it out.

6. A lottery scratch-off, unscratched. "It could be worth more than the toll!" It could. We'll never know.

5. A Turnpike ticket from 1987, found in the glove compartment of the used car she'd just bought. She handed me that one first, then the right one. We both had a laugh.

4. An IOU written on a napkin from a diner. Signed, with a little smiley face. He came back through the next night and paid it. I still have the napkin.

3. A jar of pennies. Counted out on my ledge, one at a time, while three trucks waited. He was a little short. He found the last four under the floor mat.

2. A picture of the grandkids, "as collateral." Beautiful children. I gave the picture back. He found the money.

1. A kiss on the hand. A gentleman about eighty, in a suit, on his way home from taking his wife out for her birthday. He kissed my hand, his wife rolled her eyes, and then he paid in exact change. Best customer of the month.

10. A canoe paddle. No canoe. I've wondered about it for six years.

9. A dog wearing sunglasses. He looked at me over the top of them.

8. A tuba, buckled in with the seat belt.

7. Fourteen pumpkins, stacked very carefully.

6. A grandfather clock lying down across the whole seat, covered with a quilt, like it was sick.

5. A man in a complete Santa Claus suit. In July. He said, "Busy season's coming."

4. A calf, going to the county fair, in the back of a station wagon with the seats folded down. She mooed at me. I said "Good luck, hon."

3. Forty marching band uniforms on hangers, with a band mother driving and singing.

2. A wedding cake, three tiers, with the bride in the back seat holding it steady with both hands. The groom was driving at about twenty-five miles an hour. I wished them well and told him to take his time. He said he had to, or he'd be single.

1. A baby asleep in a car seat. I've seen thousands of them. Every one sleeps through the toll booth. Every one is the best thing I see all night.

10. "How far is it to Pittsburgh?" Depends which way you're going, hon. If it's the other way, it's farther than you'd like.

9. "Is this the Turnpike?" Asked at the Turnpike toll booth, holding a Turnpike ticket.

8. "Can I just pay for the part I liked?"

7. "Do you get lonely in there?" Not with you folks coming by every twenty seconds.

6. "Can you break a hundred?" Yes. I won't be happy about it.

5. "Where's someplace good to eat around here that's still open?" At eleven at night? Hon, that's a short list, and I'm on it, and I brought a sandwich.

4. "Is it snowing in the tunnels?" It doesn't snow in a tunnel. That's sort of the point of a tunnel.

3. "Did a blue car just come through here?" Nineteen years, and I have never once known how to answer this.

2. "Do you have a bathroom in there?" I do. It's not for rent.

1. "Are you the same lady as last year?" Yes, hon. Same lady. Same booth. Glad you came back.

10. The heater in Booth 3 works better than the one in Booth 4. Don't tell Booth 4.

9. The sunsets. The evening shift faces west. In October, there's nothing like it.

8. Every car is a little story, and you only have to listen to twenty seconds of it.

7. Kids who wave from the back seat. I wave back. Every time. Nineteen years.

6. My drawer balances. It has balanced at the end of nearly every shift since 1980, and I'm prouder of that than I probably should be.

5. The regulars. The nurse who works nights at the hospital and always says "You too, Barb." The fellow who tells me a riddle every Friday and the answer the next Friday.

4. Snowy nights, when the road is quiet and white and the plow drivers wave their whole arm out the window.

3. The other ladies on second shift. We've seen each other through weddings, babies, two retirements and one very bad perm. (Mine. 1986.)

2. The thank-yous. About one driver in four says thank you. I keep count. It's been one in four for nineteen years, and I think that's pretty good for people who are paying.

1. My peach man. A trucker who's come through Booth 3 every August for eleven years with the last load of peaches from Georgia, and every year he hands me a paper bag of them along with his ticket. He's never once missed. Ruben and I eat peaches for a week and I make two pies. Calvin, if you're reading this, the pies were good this year. You'll get a slice next August if you can stop the truck long enough.