US citizenship.
Awww, that’s really cool. I would’ve died from excitement. What did you ask him?
This. So much this. Free to me at the time. I think I’ve paid up in property tax since but I think of it as paying it forward because I want intelligent, capable, younger neighbors to have conversations with.
An original Xbox. When the machine debuted, Microsoft ran a promotion with Taco Bell. You would go in, buy your meal, and get a ticket for an Xbox. The ticket had a code on it and you had to go to a website to register the code. The promotion was that an Xbox would be given away at every Taco Bell location.
Well, I happened to go into Taco Bell in my small town on the last day the tickets were being handed out. I got a ticket, which the kid tore from a pad of tickets. I asked if I could have more, since it was the last day. By sheer luck, the regional manager was there. The Taco Bell guy asked the boss if he could give me extra tickets. The boss let me take home a box with thousands of tickets.
So, for the next few days, when I had a spare moment, I would go to the website and enter codes. Over and over. And over.
And I won.
My son (the gamer in the family) was thrilled. I was a hero!
A Nintendo Virtual Boy with Warioland, Tennis, and Mario Clash. It’s stereostopic joy
A Japanese magazine directly from the publisher.
In the 90’s, my favorite Taiwanese actress, Joey Wang Tsu Hsien/Wong Jyo Yin made a rare appearance in the a Japanese magazine. I learned about it by chance because of a short promo video that I somehow came across.
Not only was the magazine from Japan, but it was a few months old. I checked my local Japanese bookstores, but they didn’t know anything about it. They did tell me the publisher’s name however and I was able to locate their website.
I took a chance and emailed them in English, never expecting a response. To my surprise, the President of the company wrote back and told me the magazine was short lived and out of print. However, he very graciously told me he’d send me a copy at no charge and even paid the shipping. To say the least I was stunned!
I still have the magazine and absolutely treasure it!
My cat, shown in my avatar. My aunt decided to let her kitten have one litter before she spayed her, and I got one of them. Of course, I’ve paid many thousands in food, litter, toys, and vet bills in the 11 years since, but he’s worth every cent.
Guess it’d be the 2007 Kia Rio with 45k miles I got a few years ago. Although, considering I only ended up with it 'cause my dad died, one might argue I paid a rather steep price for it.
Apart from that, only thing that comes to mind was I got a free tablet when I bought a new smartphone. It was a pretty nice tablet and I used it a lot.
Commodore 64 + 1541 disc drive + 1702 monitor + 1660 modem. The system was supposed to be my dad’s but I ended up with it shortly before graduating high school.
The monitor ended up being hooked to a cable box, thus becoming my TV, when I got my first apartment. I was into Windows 3.1 by then.
+1
Though with primary, secondary and tertiary it was 16 years for me
Many years ago when I relied on paper bank statements to balance my checking account, the bank (now BOA) had credited about $365.00 to my account. After thorough research, I concluded they had obviously made an error.
I’ve been meaning to give them a call about it.
First thought- Pretty much a free trip to the ER, Covid related coverage provided by insurance during pandemic. But I tested neg.
A Dell desktop PC, complete with HD monitor, keyboard, etc. It’s a few years old, but has 16GB of RAM, an SSD, and Win10/MS Office. A friend of mine used to exchange small items that we no longer needed and always told each other not to worry about paying anything. One day he got frustrated with some Window problem and decided to just switch to the Apple universe, buying a new Mac that very afternoon. He brought the Dell to our lunch together and insisted I take it. I have a little more experience and was able to fix the problem that evening. It’s not the newest or most powerful PC, but it was newer than anything I had and now serves as my media workstation and server.
Probably the best thing was a 1984 Mercedes 500SEL sedan. At the time it was 20 years old, hadn’t been used in a while, but it filled a need when my beloved Civic was stolen, and we kept that car about 10 more years.
In second place is “The Fleet”
When my wife came into an inheritance, we decided to use it as a downpayment on a vacation home. Found a cute (and cheap) place in a lake community (cheap… i.e. not lakeside). Going through the process, near the end the owners ask if we’d like to keep “The Fleet” or should they dispose of it. We kept it, two kayaks, a canoe and a sailboat.
(bolding italics mine)
That is funny, as Germans not only call their smartphones Handy, they often believe it is the proper English word for the things!
A laptop from work. It was my work laptop for three years until it came time to be replaced. Long story short, in the time I had the laptop, the company had changed from purchasing computers to leasing them, so that they weren’t stuck with a bunch of old equipment after it had depreciated. So I got a new laptop after three years, moved everything off my old one, had IT wipe the hard drive, and went to turn it in. But my manager said the company no longer had an asset disposal policy. I asked if I could buy it and he said they didn’t have a policy for that either. I said “So what am I supposed to do with it?” and he said “Just stick it in a drawer and somebody will find it after you leave.” So it sat in a drawer in my desk for a couple of years, nobody ever asked for it, and I had a few opportunities over the years to confirm that it was not on any of the corporate asset lists. So I finally said “screw it”, took it home, installed Ubuntu on it, and I’m still using it to this day.
You can read for yourself here in an archived copy of Pete’s webpage.
Five years ago I happened to visit a good friend who was about to move to north coastal Oregon. In her kitchen was an original Western Electric (AT&T) turquoise rotary dial wall phone. It was there when she moved in in 1995, but was not connected, so she didn’t know if it worked. (It was one of those hard wired units.) I asked for it and when I got it home found it to be operational! Remember, turquoise, and in excellent condition.
I still use it at home, but there is an “old phone” shop I visit in Oregon. The owner has offered me $150 for the unit. I tell 'ya, the guy was drooling over the thing.
Winner winner. Chicken dinner!
My parents gave me a car a year after I graduated college, saying it was less than what I had cost them there.
I’ve gotten a lot of free books over the years. Probably the best was “The Carpet Makers” by Andreas Eschbach.
Several things from my parents (college education, car, etc) but I don’t think they are in the spirit of this thead.
When iPads came out I saw no need for one, but I was on Board that wanted to save paper and provide everything digitally. They gave each board member a free iPad to bring to our meetings. I have used one every since.
When I was in Junior High, our neighborhood put a dumpster at the end of the street for everyone to get rid of stuff. We found a lot of good stuff in there. What I recall was a briefcase full of padlocks, all with the same combination. (one of our neighbors was a retired lock salesman and these were samples). Anyway, I got what amounted to a lifetime supply of padlocks, with the same combo. I have one left, 45 years later.