BOGO

What do you think when you read the following text? (it's a text message I sent to about 10 friends).

"Big special for Thursday night football (during the game only): buy one beer get one beer. All you drunkies come on down. Will the Packers be 0 and 2 or will the Bears be 2 and 0, find out tonight ONLY at the Matrix. Please forget to make ur picks in the league."

Some of you might think “wow Packers vs. Bears, that’s a big game, should be a fun night.” It is in fact the oldest rivalry in football (American). Thursday’s game was the 185th time these two teams played each other. If you follow sports maybe you also laughed because I was saying in other words “will the Packers lose, or will the Bears win.”

Some might wonder why I’m asking you to forget to make your picks (we have a pick’em league where each week you pick the winner of each game). I’m actually trying to remind people, in a funny way, to make their picks (I did not forget to write “don’t” before “forget”).

Yet most of you probably focused on the BOGO (Buy One, Get One). So did my friends to whom I texted this message.

The Matrix is a new small casino/card room 10 minutes from my place. They have a great bar with huge TVs and lots of them. I haven’t been out too much lately, you know, because of this whole cancer thing I have... I wanted to hang out with my friends, and watch this big game on the big screens.

Some of you might think “aahhh, you sneaky bastard! You mislead your friends to believe the casino is giving away free beer.” But no! I was just trying to be funny. Surely, if you read this text you might be thinking something like "ka-ching, free beer." But, I did not say “free” did I?!

I made sure not to write the word “free,” so that no one could accuse me of false information. And if anyone would take me too seriously, I could point out that I never said “free.” I simply said: you buy one beer, you get exactly what you paid for, and that is ONE freaking beer. HAHAHA. Yeah ok I'll admit, it was a little misleading.

I thought my friends would all get that I’m exaggerating and joking. However, I was curious to see if anyone would actually think it’s for real. I didn’t think anyone of my friends would fall for it. I mean, come on! I’ve never been or heard of a bar that has a “buy one, get one free” special on beers. I’ve seen many bars that have “happy hour” with discounted beers, but never “buy one, get one free.” I also don’t think any of my friends heard of such a special before. It looks like they’re lacking some basic critical thinking. When you read a text like the one I sent, you should be thinking to yourself “What?! No way, that’s too good to be true, he is probably just joking around.”

I gave other hints that the whole text is a joke. Most of them keep up with sports and for sure knew that the Packers, who lost to the GREAT 49ERS last week, are 0 and 1, and that the Bears who won last week are 1 and 0. So I was saying the same, later in the text message, when I said "Will the Packers be 0 and 2 or will the Bears be 2 and 0" which means in other words "heads I win, tails you lose." (Yeah I know I explained this at the beginning, I just had to throw in the 49ers, especially after they DOMINATED the Packers).

I kept going saying "Please forget to make ur picks in the league." Which is an unusual way to remind people something, right?! I was trying to be funny. Perhaps I was funny, but I only made myself laugh.

In my mind, as I was writing and coming up with this brilliant hilarious material, I was also acting it. I was pretending to read this text out loud like some commercial you hear on the radio only with exaggeration. Exaggeration that should have made it clear it's not real, and that I'm just trying to be funny. I guess it didn't work. Or maybe it did. It depends on what we are asking I was trying to achieve. Did I get people to show up? Yes. Did people get that I was joking? No. Did I actually want my friends the get that my text was a joke? hhhmmmm...

Things got quite funny come game time. I was already at the bar, and one by one my innocent friends (I think this is still the current status) came up to the casino's bar, and asked the bartender about today's special. I think most of them had a good laughed about it (some might have taken it too seriously, and won't trust what I say no more, haha). Some actually seemed a little hesitate to ask the bartender. Instead they quietly asked me first. This might mean that they suspected the text message was a joke, but they score no kudo points, for they still seriously asked me about the special. One actually replied to my text with an "lol."

So that was that. I wanted the Bears to win, but they lost. They lost and looked very bad, and that's after a nice win last week. This Sunday I'm going to see the GREAT 49ERS vs. the Lions with my brother. Should be a fun game. I'm predicting a Niners win by more than 10 points, say 27-13. Last Friday I had some scans, and then saw my oncologist on Monday. In short, she is very pleased with things. Though she still says I will need a surgery at one point or another. I will see the surgeon next week to see if he feels that it is now safe to operate. Last I saw him he wasn’t excited about doing a surgery at all, and was hoping the chemo alone could take care of things. If the surgeon says that he still doesn’t think it is safe to operate, I will go on a medicine called Pazopanib. It is a new medicine that is meant to keep killing the cancer cells. I might have to take it for a year. And if this medicine is doing its job, it probably means no more chemo.

P.S. if you didn’t laugh during this post please go look for you sense of humor in the lost and found.