Free stuff

[Rev. Powell]

I just got a surprising email. My car insurance company just sent me a free coupon for an Amazon Auto Echo (about a $50 value). At first I thought it had to be a scam, but it checked out: Amazon sold it to me for free. I have no idea whether I'll like the product, but it's awful cool to get something like that for free out of the blue.

Anyone else ever get any free stuff by surprise? Ever won a sweepstakes prize or something?

[Olivia Bauer]

I don't know if this counts but my Mom has an Amazon account that we share. That's not the free thing though.
I was reading through a random article when I found out that you get a free Twitch Prime membership.
Since Mom doesn't use Twitch I redeemed it.

Now I get one free Twitch sub every month.

Twitch subs remove ads for one streamer and give you whatever subscriber-exclusive content they have.

[ER]

Yes, in the '90s I went into a store called Games People Play, and there was a kiosk set up by Avalon Hill Games that said send us a slogan for one of our products, and if we like it we'll give you a prize.

So I wrote this tag line:

"Play Civilization, and build Rome in a day!"

I put my dad's address down on the entry card and a few months later he called to tell me I got an envelope from Avalon Hill Games in the mail and I said hey open it, and inside was a letter that said they liked my slogan and I'd won one of the lesser prizes, a fifty-dollar gift certificate for any Avalon Hill product Games People Play carried.

(I gave it to my friend, who played games more than I ever did.)

[Olivia Bauer]

Actually, I just remembered a couple more examples. First, there was some kind of sweepstakes I won in a magazine. Not a huge one where you get a bunch of money,
I just got a small prize. It was a little plastic figure of the character "Master Splinter" from the "Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles" series. I don't know where that figure went
and, frankly, I don't care. I've never been a big fan of that show.

The other thing I got was my first microphone (Not counting the one that came with Hey You, Pikachu!). It was a reward for sending back those little cardboard tabs
that come at the top of Froot Loops boxes. The reward was a Froot Loops themed microphone shaped like a palm tree. Yes, I literally got my first microphone ever out
of a cereal box. I don't remember how the audio sounded but I'm sure it was awful.

I tried looking up a photo of the microphone since I don't have it anymore. However I can't find any proof on the internet of the microphone's existence anywhere.
You guys will just have to take my word for it. But if you ever find a picture of the thing let me know.

[Olivia Bauer]

Okay, I've been Googling it and I think it came with a disc called "Talking Toucan Sam". It was some dumb program where Sam just did what you told him to do.
I may actually still have the disc. Mom and Dad have always been kinda obsessive about keeping computer CDs for some reason. I found photos of the disc but
none of the microphone.

Also, for some reason when I was Googling "Talking Toucan Sam" I stumbled upon the most appropriate GIF to sum up my feelings on this.

[chefzombie]

i fill out surveys for various grocery stores and stuff like that, never win the gift cards though. after the flights from hell on my way to florida, i filled out the delta survey and made a few comments on how on the second flight, they gave out snacks, but not drinks, as it was a very rough flight.
  my point was that these snacks are very dry, and it was a good thing for my seatmates that i had a filled water bottle with me and was happy to share. i told them that they shouldn't do snacks either when a flight is that rough, it's dangerous for attendants too.
  they didn't get it, i guess. in thursday's mail i got a dozen bags of cheezits and a voucher for a free domestic beer on my next flight, along with them adding 5000 miles to my account. cracked me up!

[Alex]

I won some tickets to go to a Goth music festival back in August, but couldn't travel to the gig down in England. There was only one band playing that I wanted to see anyway (Fields of the Nephilim if anyone is interested).

[Rev. Powell]

i fill out surveys for various grocery stores and stuff like that, never win the gift cards though. after the flights from hell on my way to florida, i filled out the delta survey and made a few comments on how on the second flight, they gave out snacks, but not drinks, as it was a very rough flight.
  my point was that these snacks are very dry, and it was a good thing for my seatmates that i had a filled water bottle with me and was happy to share. i told them that they shouldn't do snacks either when a flight is that rough, it's dangerous for attendants too.
  they didn't get it, i guess. in thursday's mail i got a dozen bags of cheezits and a voucher for a free domestic beer on my next flight, along with them adding 5000 miles to my account. cracked me up!

I did once get a free airline ticket for volunteering to be bumped from an overbooked flight. Very good deal if you don't have to be anywhere and don't mind being inconvenienced.

[bob]

Over a year ago for some reason I kept getting free samples of fancy dog food in the mail.



I don't have a dog.

[chefzombie]

i fill out surveys for various grocery stores and stuff like that, never win the gift cards though. after the flights from hell on my way to florida, i filled out the delta survey and made a few comments on how on the second flight, they gave out snacks, but not drinks, as it was a very rough flight.
  my point was that these snacks are very dry, and it was a good thing for my seatmates that i had a filled water bottle with me and was happy to share. i told them that they shouldn't do snacks either when a flight is that rough, it's dangerous for attendants too.
  they didn't get it, i guess. in thursday's mail i got a dozen bags of cheezits and a voucher for a free domestic beer on my next flight, along with them adding 5000 miles to my account. cracked me up!

I did once get a free airline ticket for volunteering to be bumped from an overbooked flight. Very good deal if you don't have to be anywhere and don't mind being inconvenienced.

  i used to do that if i was in cinci or chicago, since i had friends to stay with in both places, on my way to green bay. did you get a meal voucher too? those always amused me, WAY too much money for my small self to spend on food, but they allowed you to buy alcohol with them too, back then.
  now when i go there they route me through minn/st.paul, and i HATE that place, so i get on the plane.

[indianasmith]

Our church (we just joined last month) did a dessert auction today to raise money for youth camp.
I bid on this homemade peach cobbler, and it quickly went out of my $50 budget . . . but the pastor bought it for $106, and then gave it to me!
We get to keep the cast iron skillet it was made in, too!

[claws]

My mom and me won a bunch of vhs movies at our favorite rental place once. They did a raffle type of thing and the movies were ex-rental tapes, but it was still pretty cool. If I remember correctly we got a bunch of Wizard Video big box releases like Fear (1981), Absurd (1981), The Mafu Cage (1978), Demoniac (1975) and the Elvira presented movie Children of the Full Moon (1980).

Not too long ago I bought a potato peeler at some fancy kitchenware shop at a mall. They threw in a garlic press which was priced at 8 euros, for free.

[Rev. Powell]

i fill out surveys for various grocery stores and stuff like that, never win the gift cards though. after the flights from hell on my way to florida, i filled out the delta survey and made a few comments on how on the second flight, they gave out snacks, but not drinks, as it was a very rough flight.
 my point was that these snacks are very dry, and it was a good thing for my seatmates that i had a filled water bottle with me and was happy to share. i told them that they shouldn't do snacks either when a flight is that rough, it's dangerous for attendants too.
 they didn't get it, i guess. in thursday's mail i got a dozen bags of cheezits and a voucher for a free domestic beer on my next flight, along with them adding 5000 miles to my account. cracked me up!

I did once get a free airline ticket for volunteering to be bumped from an overbooked flight. Very good deal if you don't have to be anywhere and don't mind being inconvenienced.

did you get a meal voucher too?

I don't remember, but I don't think so.

[chefzombie]

hhmmm...maybe it was because i was REALLY skinny back then.....or just something united did, i was very loyal to united for years.

[Allhallowsday]

I was walking my usual walk 15 or more years ago, and there was a trailer parked on one street with a hand lettered sign: FREE 
I hardly took everything, but there were 3 boxes of strange toys from the 1970s that I've never identified (except one box I sold) and a box of unexpected CDs, a fair amount of crap, nothing much I would have chosen, but a few collections I've come to LOVE (like ANTHONY NEWLEY Once In A Lifetime ) or gave to an appreciator (SPANKY & OUR GANG).