LeeMobile

So for the past week there has been advertisements in our local newspaper for free Ipods. The first 100 customers to enter the brand new Safeway grocery store near my buddy Mylore’s place gets a free Ipod Shuffle.

Like a bunch of cheap and sick nerds, the boys (Mylore and Paolo) and I decided to camp out in front early to claim our free gear. We expected it to be a gong show, but we never expected that there would be as many dedicated people vying for the same prize.

Our strategy was to stay up all night and hang out at Mylore’s place to play video games. Every hour or so, we’d make a trip and drive by the parking lot to check the status of the line up. The break down of events:

12:00 AM - The boys picked me up from home… I’m already exhausted and my body wants to sleep. We head to Humpty’s (an all night diner) for some grub and coffee.

1:00 AM - Hopped up on 3 glasses of coffee we all feel like this’ll be a cake walk. We know our caffeine is going to crash, but whatever, we feel fine!

1:30 AM - Oh god, caffeine is starting to crash. We circle around the parking lot to find that there are already two carloads full of people camped out. They looked passed out in their cars with fogged windows, a sign that they’ve been there for awhile at least. SICK! Back to Mylore’s for some GameCube action.

3:00 AM - My fingers are going to fall off, and I get totally owned playing Mario Tennis by Mylore. We swing by to check the parking lot and nothing has really changed… back to the comfort of Mylore’s place again.

4:20 AM - Our eye-lids are starting to close on us. Paolo passes out momentarily. We’re all zombies from the lack of sleep. We get up and make a run to the 7-11. I buy a Jamaican Patty and eat said patty. It doesn’t sit well in my stomach… smart Lee… very smart. We swing by the parking lot and a few more cars are there, so we decide to take shifts watching the front door while the others nap.

4:40 AM - A group of girls waltz up to the front door and wait. The line up begins. Damn them!! Why couldn’t they just sit in their cars for another half an hour… now that the line is formed we have to get out too. The cold keeps us awake. Being the bright guys we are, we didn’t bring enough warm clothes. Mylore leaves us to pick up his girlfriend to join the line.

5:30 AM - People have been streaming in at an exponential rate. My only protection from the elements is a fleece blanket and my sweater. Minutes start to feel like hours. There is easily more than 100 people in the line by now, and things are starting to get rowdy. People are complaining about people cutting in the front of the line, and the security rent-a-cops are now out to enforce the line. Good thing we’re staked about 10 from the front.

6:00 AM - The store manager hands out tickets to the first 100 to claim the prize. This ensures that no one cutting in front of the line will be awarded with a precious precious ipod. It starts to rain.

7:00 AM - After an hour of more brutal cold and rain, they open the doors! There’s now a crowd of over 300 people out in front. Many are cutting in front of the line thinking they could swindle everyone else, little do they know that those who waited earlier were given vouchers. Karma sucks! We get our ipods! *Victory Dance*

12:18 PM - After sleeping for less than an hour, coding a bit, and going to class, I’m about to pass out in the Computing Science lab from lack of sleep. I somewhat question if the 512 Meg Ipod Shuffle was worth it. Oh well, I love free stuff.

One class left to go and a 15 minute lab and I’m scot free to sleep!

This entry was posted on Friday, September 22nd, 2006 at 11:18 am and is filed under Uncategorized. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.