​It has to be too good to be true. It has to be. There must be a catch. Where do I even start? There are so many options. 
The font under the bold face category headings was tiny. I lay on my stomach softly kicking my feet in the air.

Ahha
Allman brothers
…
Beatles
Bette Middler
Blondie
Bob Dylan
…
Carol King
Cars

Any 12 CD’s FOR $.01. Really? 12 CD’s for $.01. I couldn’t wrap my head around it. I was no economist but even if knew it seemed far fetched.

Dire straits
Dolly Parton
Doobie Bros. 

Could we do this without getting our parents involved? I had a penny. I wouldn’t need their money. S&H though. I’d learned from infomercials that that meant shipping and handling and that was usually the catch.

Oh well. I circled the 6 CD’s I wanted. They’d ship in two batches. Pick 6 pay S&H and the receive 6 more. I had nothing to loose.

I approached my parents and they agreed to do whatever it was that only adults could do if I promised up and down left and right that’d I’d pay any and all fees- hidden and exposed. Of course I would. I’d been working selling newspapers and helping at the flea market, not to mention my allowence earned for being a decently clean child. By decently clean, I mean a serial shover of things into any hole they’d fit when cleaning my room. I tactic I’m shamefully still using today.

I filled out the newspaper thin form that had come in an envelope of random coupons and ads for crystal roses, polyester pants, and China inscribed with bible versus.

Attached a penny, licked the envelope and the stamp and handed it to my parents to take to town the next time they were headed that way.

I waited. And waited. And waited.  I’d check the post office box daily and cross my fingers that I’d turn the mail key and find a slip letting me know to come to the desk for a package. I waited and waited.

My mom came home from work and handed me a box. It had come. It was real.

I tore open the package and my eyes widened.  There in front of me the 6 CD’s I had thought long and hard about

Wilson Phillips
Boys II Men
MEATLOAF Bat out of Hell II
The Beaches Soundtrack
The John Lennon Collection
Toni Braxton

This was just the beginning. Once we tapped this round of 12 out, we’d need to make a fake identity to be eligible for the same offer. In college I’d deploy the same skill to apply for credit cards in order to get a free phone card. There is always a way around the system.