I got a solicitation today from the Leukemia & Lymphoma Society, probably because I gave them a small donation back in August or so when a neighbor who knew someone that died from leukemia asked for one and that put me on their mailing list. It contained a nickel, as well as a page and a half of Ziggy-adorned address labels.

In light of my previous post, in which I noted that I failed to reach my 2008 deal goal, I have been wondering whether I have become a deal elitist. While I've wondered before if deals are drying up, the other possibility is that I am simply pickier about the deals that I am willing to participate in.

For example, over the last week or so I've rejected two deals that seemed to me not really worth the time and effort.

Got a $20 rebate check from a FRAM air filter for which I only paid $7.54. I love making money on deals like that, especially when it's something that I can use. (And yes, I have bought things that I could not use because I got more cash back from rebates than I used to purchase the item – don't blame me; blame the system.)

I also received today a $20 Visa prepaid debit card from a Chase Credit Card Protector offer. Nice little Christmas bonus for me.

Awhile back I signed up for Revolution Money Exchange [referral link] to get the $25 sign-up bonus and a couple referrals. It was an easy way to make a few extra dollars toward my 2008 deal goal of $2,000.

Hopefully you did something better than what these guys suggest.

For my part, I put the money into a high-yield savings account to put toward 0% balance transfers once they expire.

Back at the beginning of February, I set a goal for myself to earn $2,000 this year in deal and "found" money – through promotional offers, incentive checks (such as signing up for Chase Payment Protector or various Trilegiant programs), and general arbitrage plays. Basically, to reach my goal that means "finding" about $167 per month.

How am I doing so far? Here's the run down:

So, I was doing some number crunching and discovered that last year I completed $1,428.95 in sundry deals over the course of the year. Most of that was from sign-up bonuses and in the form of cash (or cash equivalent, such as a statement credit). I also got at least $50 in gas cards, and a free iPod shuffle (Gen 2), which I gave to my daughter.

Happy to announce that my story of How petty greed translates to more fees was added to the Carnival of Money Stories #32, hosted by The Baglady. There are some other good lessons to be learned from the stories in this week's carnival, so if you haven't read through it already, check it out.

I got an e-mail today from TradeKing describing a temporary referral program in which TK would give $100 to Toys for Tots for each referral. It got me thinking about other similar philanthropic incentive programs I've seen, like:

Is it just me, or does there seem to be fewer "free money" deals these days? And for the deals that do exist, it seems like you have to do more to get less.

I don't have any hard objective data, but taking a look at the deals mentioned on the bonuses page at Bank Deals, it seems that there are fewer straightforward deals now than there were a year ago.