I love my gift cards! (I had to laugh when I saw someone else had the same post this weekend ).

I had gotten a DnD gift card for Xmas and used that (plus a coupon) to pick up a $.99 coffee yesterday on the way to the mall with Mums. Since I used the GC, I don't count that towards my Weekly Spending.

At the mall I returned a dress that just didn't fit right, even after I tried some non-permanent and non-damaging minor alterations. It had tags on it, but since I didn't have the receipt (it was in my old wallet, which was stolen last month) they wouldn't take the charge off my CC. I can understand it because they need to make sure I didn't steal it, but since they could have just looked the purchase up on my CC history, I was pissed that they insisted on giving me a GC and not the refund. I'm going to call the company on Monday and see if they will transfer the GC amount to my CC even though you can't usually use a GC to pay a CC bill.

If they won't, I'll have a $59 GC to a store I like. I will use it, but I would have rather had the $59 taken off my balance. But hey, at least I can say I tried and then I can buy a new pair of shoe without feeling guilty, right?

I also used a GC to Amazon today to buy a book I've been reading. I borrowed it from my BFF, but I know I'll reread it several times. It's humor, and not much makes me laugh these days, so when I found myself cracking up this afternoon, I knew I had to get it. It's written in short chapters, and each chapter is a little memoir-type story. There are crude and funny drawings with it, and it's the type of book you can pick up and read all the way through or just one random chapter at a time. I bought a used copy and after shipping spent $10.97, which is a great deal since it would have been $17.99 new.

So basically, I consider this a No Spend Weekend, even though I did buy a coffee and a new book. How about you guys? Do you consider GC's "free" money?