Saw about 20 gift cards for various merchants from The Home Depot to Starbucks to iTunes on sale at the Shell station yesterday. The merchants must be paying Shell a commission but I wonder if that's any kind of good business sense. Not that I would know any kind of good business sense if I saw it. ConsumerMan says to pass. This little bit got me:
Scott Sistek of Mukilteo, Wash., saw the value of his Visa gift card melt away when he put it in a dresser drawer and forgot about it for about a year. He was "shocked" to learn the $50 card was only worth $26.50. After a grace period, the bank charged him a monthly maintenance fee of $3.50. Plus, Sistek was dinged $2.50 when he called to check on the balance.
Nice scam. If I had a different conscience, I'd say I wish I'd thought of it.
I don't golf but even I know the biggest name in the game is Tiger Woods. In fact, I'd say he's the biggest name in all of sports. The second biggest name in golf, though, seems to be John Daly and I can't, for the life of me, figure out why.
Just some silliness on a slow day.
Quote of the Day
With most terrorist attacks, it's relatively clear-cut who is involved. In this case, it could be all sorts of constellations that are at work.
Magnus Ranstorp, Swedish National Defense College
Blog of the day via The Coalition is here.
Quote from said blog: "Mr. Dave took six White Castle "Sliders" (mini-hamburgers for you folks not fortunate enough to have experienced them), stuck them in a baking dish, removed the top buns, lined them with bacon & cheese, added some homemade batter, and cooked the whole shebang to a level of perfection we can only imagine."
The thing you also have to be careful about these days are the vast numbers of these companies that are either closing hundreds of stores or straight-up going bankrupt. Cash is always the gift that truly keeps on giving.
I'm not sure if "Mr. Dave" should be applauded for his creativity or hauled off for a psych exam. Anyway, I don't think I'll be trying that for breakfast anytime soon.
Cash is hard for me to come by these days, Lana.
I think I'd like it but I probably won't be trying it, either. It's like deep-fried Twinkies or Jolt cola, Dave. My conscience won't allow me to try it but it sounds great.
I'm naive enough to think they'd sorted out the downside of things like Visa gift cards years ago. I remember the warnings mentioned in the article from Christmases past -- I guess they're still valid.
I've been considering buying a Visa gift card for a friend ... I'll be giving them cash, now, instead.