Feeling flush with holiday generosity and a beer or two, I recently decided it was time to give back to my favorite public radio station. Their outstanding selection of music and news, which I'd been mooching for some time now, is all that stands between me and the glut of insipid pop stations otherwise available in this fine city. Since in my estimation it was worth every penny, I navigated to the station's donation page and selected the "dollar-a-day" option.

Upon selecting the donation amount, a pulldown menu labeled "FREE GIFT" appeared. Neat! Let's see... coffee mug, water bottle, the usual for a nominal gift. Better stuff lower down for the bigger spenders: Book club (six books throughout the year personally selected by the book show host), cookbook club (ditto for cookbooks from the foodie host), CD club (self-explanatory). And below that, the siren's call: 3000 frequent-flyer miles (AA, DL, or UA). Ho boy.

3000 miles. It's not much in the scheme of things, but every little bit helps right? And it's another little step toward AA lifetime status, not to mention 3/25 of a domestic award ticket! Or 0.0207 of a CX F award! Really it's a drop in the bucket, but... isn't it nice to see that total tick upward regardless?

But in the end, perhaps because of a lack of fresh reading material or maybe just to prove to myself that frequent-flyer programs don't run my life (yet), I opted for the book club. Now I'll freely admit that I've received bonus miles from far more sources than would be considered reasonable in polite society. For some reason, however, opting for miles in this case felt like slipping just a bit too far down the rabbit hole. It doesn't make logical sense, but there you go. At least I'll now have something to read. On the plane.

Anyone else reach a moment where you felt you were going overboard?