Ebay

The delight of watching the clock tick down with an itchy trigger finger ready to do the deed that seals the deal in my favor.

There is something especially thrilling about bidding on Ebay for the pearl in your particular oyster. Everyone wants to get a bargain and more so when you can secretly double pump your fist and proclaim yourself king, queen or regent pro tem of the bidding frenzy.

I am currently waiting out a particular purchase. I'll confide right now that my bid is the grandeloquent sum of ONE CENT.

Do I expect to win?

Absolutely.

Why?

I have no reason to believe that the item I am bidding on is so average as to be mundane. Worse yet, it isn't even pedestrian. I have bid on something old and dull. Unless it's something you actually want.

So I sit her like a fool and wait with my heart pounding like I've run a marathon.

If some other bidder sneaks in at the last critical second and trumps my maximum for the win, will I be crushed?

No. Well, maybe just a little, but I'm a big girl and I'll get over it sooner or later.

But what if I WIN!?!?!?

The starry eyed thrill of receiving the little email that says I have been declared THE WINNER among possible millions of others who wanted, but didn't obtain, the prize.

It's a heady elixer, that draught of winning.

I am not fooled by its silken flavor. I know all too well that the temptation offered by the seductive process of bidding can be snatched away like a rattle from a baby. And I imagine I'd react about the same because I have done just that in the past.

Ranting and raving about how some speed demon rushed in a last second bid to wipe mine right off the planet and bring home the shiny treasure all for themselves, I have been compelled to lull myself to sleep thinking of calmer things in the real world unattached to digital gateways and primal bidding wars.

A few moments is all that separates me from my treasured prize.

I feel a little like Gollum . . . the precious . . . the precious . . . uh . . .

I hope I don't LOOK like him.

By the way, I WON! I feel so . . . victorious!

FREE!

Okay. I'll admit to a certain amount of medicine induced stupor.

After all, cold and flu liquid medicine does have an alcohol content in it.

But I am fascinated by the junk mail and emails that promise everything for free. How can you run a business if everything is free? Is the idea behind the free pitch to run your company into the ground and then declare bankruptcy?

Has Chapter 11 become that appealing?

Then there are the offers that promise vacations and travel to exotic places (look, my definition of exotic means anyplace outside of the state) and a generous daily spending limit for your meals.

I have always been told that 'somebody wins' these free things.

I can't understand though, why if 'somebody' wins, why can't I be that 'somebody'? I have filled in enough prize claim forms to have gutted a significant amount of digital space with my pertinent information. More than likely, that is the reason I keep getting these offers for 'free' stuff that never comes my way.

I'd love to win the Wal-mart shopping card that is currently being bandied about. Stocking my pantry and the cleaning cabinet on their dime would be great news to our strapped budget. I have the feeling that whomever does win it will be someone who only stopped at Wal-mart and filled in the survey because they were bored.

Oh well.

I can guarantee one free trip for the day. Since I have been ill with the flu, I can virtually guarantee a free trip to the outside garbage can to empty the little wastebasket that has served me so admirably today for the million or so tissues that have gone to work keeping my sore and pitifully red nose from dribbling like a leaky faucet on the Titanic.

By the way, good luck on your next "FREE" opportunity. You just might win.