The gingham dress that Judy Garland wore in The Wizard of Oz sold recently for half a million dollars. Even if you're a billionaire I think it's insane to pay that much for an iconic movie costume. (It's only a cotton dress, for goodness sake!) Charlie Chaplin's bowler hat and cane just fetched over $60,000 at auction. That seems a little less crazy to me, but it's still on the wacky side. I once owned a cigarette butt that had been smoked by John Lennon. It was special to me, long-since thrown out, but I wonder how much I could have gotten for it? Would someone have wanted to preserve it under glass so they could show it to dinner guests? Sounds bizarre. When it comes to icons and contemporary art (some paintings that strike me as merely competent and very, very uninspired have sold for $43 million) wackiness seems to be the new norm among collectors. Who buys this stuff and why in the world are they willing to pay so much? It must be a mental derangment that comes from having too much money. With so many needy people in the world it is unconscionable. But then great wealth and a social conscience don't always go together.