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Previous Update - March 1, 2006

March 1, 2006 - My First Freebie? I got home today and saw a manilla envelope bulging from my mailbox. Was this it? Was this the start of the massive free product deluge? I ripped the envelope out of the mailbox like a starved vulture — I now knew how Ralphie felt as he ripped his Orphan Annie Ovaltine decoder pin from the mail. I savagely ripped open the envelope to find... a small, grey box containing a gift card... from "Mario Tricoci Salon & Spa"...? Wha...what? I didn't write to them! Upon closer inspection, the envelope was addressed to my wife — from my mother. A birthday gift! Oops. I grumbled a few inaudible expletives. Not because I forgot my wife's birthday. Not because I ripped open her gift. Because I was let down. I really thought this was it. Anyway, I scanned the house and realized that I beat my wife home. I got rid of all the trash in a hurry and slapped my name on the little grey box. Maybe this wasn't the freebie I was after, but in this case — it works! March 1, 2006 - A Few Side Notes I just wanted to take a few seconds to comment on a few things. I've already received a lot of e-mail from folks. Way more than I'd expected. Up to this point, the e-mail has fallen into three categories: "Maybe complaining would get you more free stuff! It worked for me!" Well, yeah. That's a given. It's basically the "corporate America way". When someone complains about your products or services, just dump free stuff on them and "buy them back". Don't dare fix your products or improve your services. No way! Just give them free stuff. I'd probably end up writing a whole different letter or two if that were my goal. "Dear Company X, I dislike your product." ...following week, I receive more of said product in the mail to "buy me back"... "Dear Company X, I still dislike your product — but thank you for sending me more of it." "This is just a publicity stunt!" Oh, absolutely. My phone hasn't stopped ringing in days. The media... they want me. Bad! Oh, come on now... This site is purely a way for me to have a little fun with an experiment that I'm doing — purely for "edutainment". It will be fun to see who, if anyone, sends me anything as the result of the letters. That's it. That's the reason. This site is not a "blog", and I don't plan to ramble on about random days if they don't involve free products. I only wrote about my "first freebie" because it was such a letdown — and vaguely relevant. "This is great!" Fortunately, this makes up about half of the e-mail I'm receiving. It's nice to hear that there are people who find the idea behind this as cool as I do and are eager to hear what happens. Quite frankly, those are the people this site is for.