The Problem Of Odd Numbers Of Fortunes

I mentioned yesterday that my wife and I recently got takeout Chinese food (Americanized Chinese food). As one would expect with Americanized Chinese food, a number of fortune cookies were tossed in with our order. We ordered two dinners. We received three fortune cookies. Perhaps you can see the problem.

Now, my wife and I aren’t real concerned about the fortune cookies. We don’t really like them. This isn’t about that.

The problem is figuring out who the extra fortune goes to. Obviously, we could each pick one and know whose fortune was whose (we didn’t get good ones). However, who does the third fortune apply to? We didn’t even want the cookie; we just don’t know how fate wants us to handle the extra.

My temptation was to let my wife have the extra cookie. This is what I did with the one almond cookie that was also in the bag (note: my wife did not give me a choice about this and did not mention the presence of the fortune cookie, but I saw it and didn’t say anything). But, what if the fortune is bad?

Does the fortune in the third cookie apply to my wife? Does it apply to me? We just don’t know. We both left it sit out on the counter. It’ll probably get tossed in the trash at some point. We don’t like to be wasteful…but why tempt fate?

I’m just not sure why the restaurant put in three fortune cookies when we ordered two dinners. I’m sure they were just tossing a bunch of extra stuff in the bag, but it caused fate-related problems. I’m just not sure how I should best have handled it. It would have been better if they’d just tossed in an extra almond cookie instead.