# Is this how the_traveler gets all those AGR points?



## CHamilton (Sep 18, 2013)

The Engineer Who Bought Over 12,100 Cups Of Pudding to Earn 1.25 Million Air Miles


> ...David Phillips, a civil engineer who teaches at the University of California, Davis....
> came to the attention of the wider media when he managed to convert about 12,150 cups of Healthy Choice chocolate pudding into over a million Air Miles. Ever since, David and his entire family have been travelling the world for next to nothing....
> 
> His most famous endevour was back in 1999 when he saw that Healthy Choice was having a promotion on their frozen entrées section. The offer was as follows: for every 10 bar codes of their product a person sent in, they’d be awarded 500 Air Miles. However, the company had an early bird stipulation that people who redeemed the offer within the first month of the competition would receive double that, meaning a person could potentially receive 1000 Air Miles for buying just 10 of their entrées.
> ...



Read the full article for the slightly-sick-to-the-stomach-making details.


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## the_traveler (Sep 18, 2013)

Straight from the horse's mouth, essentially yes!  I use my AGR MasterCard to buy "luxuries" like food and gas. I also buy things I need via "Points For Shopping". (Just yesterday, I purchased coffee for my Kuerig coffee maker from Bed Bath and Buy - with free shipping). I usually earn 1,000-2,000 AGR points every month, even not riding a train!

And anyone named David has to be smart! :giggle:


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## CHamilton (Sep 18, 2013)

I'm glad it works for you  I find that getting credit for using "Points for Shopping" is liking pulling teeth. I'm currently dickering with AGR to get credit for four separate transactions, none of which ever showed up. So far, they've found one. The only non-Amtrak points that credit automatically for me are from Hilton. (I don't have an AGR credit card.)


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## SarahZ (Sep 18, 2013)

This is amazing.

And I would totally eat every single bit of that pudding.


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## the_traveler (Sep 18, 2013)

CHamilton said:


> I'm glad it works for you  I find that getting credit for using "Points for Shopping" is liking pulling teeth. I'm currently dickering with AGR to get credit for four separate transactions, none of which ever showed up.


Are you sure you started from the portal? And if you hit the "back" button at any point during your shopping, the site may not "remember" that you entered thru the AGR portal!
Here's my trick. Even if you entered thru the portal (and this is true with other portals like airlines or hotel sites), just before you checkout make sure everything is in your "cart". *THEN GO BACK AND REENTER THE SITE VIA THE PORTAL!* The site will then register that you entered thru the portal!


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## CHamilton (Sep 18, 2013)

Yes, I did everything as I was supposed to. I even have screen shots of my browser history (something that was suggested on AU, I believe). We'll see how it turns out.


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## the_traveler (Sep 18, 2013)

I find that AGR is slow to post points on some sites.

I also collect Delta Airlines FFQ's (to get rid of - er send) my sister and BIL to Europe. At the same store, Delta posts the miles as soon as the items are shipped, while AGR waits the full 6-8 weeks before the points post!


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## pennyk (Sep 18, 2013)

CHamilton said:


> I'm glad it works for you  I find that getting credit for using "Points for Shopping" is liking pulling teeth. I'm currently dickering with AGR to get credit for four separate transactions, none of which ever showed up. So far, they've found one. The only non-Amtrak points that credit automatically for me are from Hilton. (I don't have an AGR credit card.)


Charlie, I have problems also. About 1/3 of my transactions show up without having to call AGR. In fact, I was on the phone (with an very nice AGR agent) yesterday inquiring about my "points for shopping" for a computer I purchased through the AGR portal from Dell.


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## Ryan (Sep 18, 2013)

That guy is awesome, I dream of running across a deal like that one.

Still, cranking things out through the Ultimate Rewards card has done quite well...


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## Bob Dylan (Sep 18, 2013)

That must be some tasty puding!  Bet they dont eat it anymore during their World Travels! :giggle:


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## SarahZ (Sep 18, 2013)

Ryan said:


>


Geez, Ryan. Thanks for throwing me in the wayback machine.

BTW, I just bought a 56K modem. You can come over and check it out. The directions to my apartment are on my Angelfire page.


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## the_traveler (Sep 18, 2013)

Do you have to have a Comadore 64 with floppy disks to find it? :giggle:


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## TinCan782 (Sep 18, 2013)

I like how he got a tax deduction for donating the pudding to the Salvation Army after they peeled the labels for him!


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## SarahZ (Sep 18, 2013)

FrensicPic said:


> I like how he got a tax deduction for donating the pudding to the Salvation Army after they peeled the labels for him!


Yeah, that part made me laugh. This man is freaking brilliant.


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## amamba (Sep 19, 2013)

SarahZ said:


> Ryan said:
> 
> 
> >
> ...


56k - wowzers. Super fast for the 90s! My first modem was something like 2400


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## SarahZ (Sep 19, 2013)

It was late in the 90s, Amamba, like 1999 or maybe even 2000. I had a 14.4 modem before that. I think I got my first cable modem in 2004.

2400 takes me back. I remember I'd set up a download (like, ONE picture) and then go run errands and have lunch while it was downloading. Then I'd come home to check on it, and if it was still downloading, I'd do more stuff. Now I freak out if it takes longer than two seconds for an image to appear on my phone.


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## the_traveler (Sep 19, 2013)

"Phone"? :huh: You mean the old brick cell phones that took 3 hands to hold? :giggle:


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## AlanB (Sep 19, 2013)

I wrote my first program using a teletype machine running on 150 baud connection.


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## CHamilton (Sep 19, 2013)

Technology marches on.


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## Bob Dylan (Sep 19, 2013)

When I was in College (I'm Old! :giggle: ) using Computers involved going to "The Computer Room" with your Boxes of Punch Cards (Card Punch/Data Entry Jobs were Big then! Programers were the Wizards!)and Computer Paper to use the IBM Mainframe that required a frigid Climate and that filled Acres of Space in the Building! Michael Dell,the H&P Guys, Steve Jobs, Bill Gates etc were alreay Dreaming about their ideas for the Amazing Devices and Software we have today!


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## Slasharoo (Sep 19, 2013)

I remember my dad bringing home spools of teletype from ATSF and "reading" it to us kids.


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## SarahZ (Sep 19, 2013)




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## AmtrakBlue (Sep 19, 2013)

SarahZ said:


>


 :giggle:


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## tonys96 (Sep 19, 2013)

AlanB said:


> I wrote my first program using a teletype machine running on 150 baud connection.


I used to write NC programs with a Teletype machine, then we could get it to punch a paper tape to run through tape readers with light. Finally got fancy and got tape readers that were magnetic instead of lighted!!!


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## NAVYBLUE (Sep 23, 2013)

the_traveler said:


> "Phone"? :huh: You mean the old brick cell phones that took 3 hands to hold? :giggle:



T_T

Used to have a "bag phone" in my Explorer in the 90's. I have now "advanced" to a flip phone WITH a camera. My grand-daughter (7) laughs at me as she plays with her mother's "old" IPhone and her brother (4) plays with the IPod Touch. At my MILs in CT in August for her 90th bithday with kids/grandkids I regalled everyone with a black rotary dial phone built 8/72 that I stored in MILs basement.Do you remeber Prodigy ?

NAVYBLUE


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## the_traveler (Sep 23, 2013)

I do remember Prodigy, and I also had a bag phone. I also had a phone installed in my car (Bonnaville I think) and the car's alternator died at midnight in the middle of nowhere. So when the alternator (and car's battery) died, of course the phone did not work either!  Luckily someone stopped to help me. I got one of those new fangled pocket flip phones the next day!


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## PRR 60 (Sep 24, 2013)

Prodigy (the original, later called classic) was state-of-the-art. Prodigy had graphics, and for the day, pretty good ones. Today's On Track On Line is a reincarnation of the old Prodigy rail discussion board, which itself started as a discussion within the original Prodigy travel board.


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## Anderson (Sep 25, 2013)

I actually still had a 26.6 dial-up (at least, that's what I recall it reading) until 2008. This started resulting in some...interesting exchanges with people sending me big emails with images and the like, since they would cause my email to take _forever_ to download. Then again, I didn't have any real reason for a faster connection...most of what I did was text-based (anybody remember M*s?). Then again, industrial applications notwithstanding I _still_ don't get the desire for universal broadband.


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## SarahZ (Sep 25, 2013)

I remember Prodigy. I also remember meeting people on Grex (a BBS based in Ann Arbor) and trading real pictures with them via snail mail so we could see what each other looked like.

Eventually, someone with a scanner volunteered to put together a Geocities website with everyone's picture so you could click on their screen name and see an assortment of pictures they sent in, like a very early Facebook album.


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## Bob Dylan (Sep 25, 2013)

SarahZ said:


> I remember Prodigy. I also remember meeting people on Grex (a BBS based in Ann Arbor) and trading real pictures with them via snail mail so we could see what each other looked like.
> 
> Eventually, someone with a scanner volunteered to put together a Geocities website with everyone's picture so you could click on their screen name and see an assortment of pictures they sent in, like a very early Facebook album.


In retrospect bet ya'll wish you were the ones who developed it farther into the Multi-Billion Dollar Operation it is today!


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## Anderson (Sep 25, 2013)

jimhudson said:


> SarahZ said:
> 
> 
> > I remember Prodigy. I also remember meeting people on Grex (a BBS based in Ann Arbor) and trading real pictures with them via snail mail so we could see what each other looked like.
> ...


The funny thing is that Facebook really just got lucky in some sense. There were a couple of similar sites running around at the time; Facebook was the one that "took off" on a mix of timing, luck, and possibly some interface quirks.


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## rrdude (Sep 25, 2013)

AlanB said:


> I wrote my first program using a teletype machine running on 150 baud connection.


HA! Me too, back in 1977 at WMU. no monitor, no nothing, Would it have been BASIC even? That was it for me, one program and done. Me NO LIKEY writing code. Me not likey math at all...............Zeros and Ones... Thank Gawd for Apple and the Lisa, then Macs........... I am DOS-Challenged too. I physically shudder when someone at my office says, "open your command prompt and type.......................AHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!


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## the_traveler (Sep 25, 2013)

It could have been BASIC. I learned BASIC in 1978 - in a college course! 

Me likely -0- and 1's because -0- means FREE! As in AGR award trips - where the "cost" is -0- for this 1 person (and I like 2's also)! :giggle:


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## OlympianHiawatha (Sep 25, 2013)

I remember taking _*BASIC*_ (Beginner's All-Purpose Symbolic Instruction Code) and Introduction to _*FORTRAN*_ back in High School in 1977. You mention these languages to younglins today and all they do is tip their heads in curious amazement. But then again when I explain I enjoy train travel then they realize I am a very anachronistic creature :huh: :unsure:


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## the_traveler (Sep 25, 2013)

And if you say "steam locomotive", they say "Oh yeah, I saw one of those in a museum!" or "in a Western on Blue Ray"! Ugggggg!


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