* I not only went to Israel for free (on the country’s tourism department dollar), I also had my personal driver and tour guide, all so I could write one story about a race there.

* I got enough free shoes for a review I did 4 years ago that my husband and I still haven’t worn all of them. And I gave many of them to charity, too.

* I once did a sports watch review and got enough watches to give one to everyone on staff and every member of my family.

* I once got something like $1000 in free apparel from Nike.

THAT was all for magazines. OH, and the ad reps often asked me to write about certain companies and products, just so they could land those accounts.

For my blog? Let’s see. I think I’ve had review copies of two different books sent to me. And some sort of spray that I was supposed to use down there to get myself in the mood (never wrote about it because it didn’t do anything for me). Trying to think. That might be it. I know, it’s a tragedy that I got those free books, and even worse that I earned 55 cents from the one person who clicked on my affiliate link and bought one of them off amazon (to date amazon hasn’t paid me). Yes, we definitely need to get the government to police this. Otherwise consumers just won’t know where to put their money.