Final Monopoly totals & photo book/game-or-movie rental giveaway. (Come one, come all). · 3:31pm Nov 10th, 2014
In the end, it worked out like this:
420 pieces (including local contributions, and thankee) played online. (Yeah, I know...)
30 one-day movie/game Redbox rentals. Mostly unused.
6 MCR bundles totaling 300 bonus points. (Three online wins, two peels, one very welcome donation from a FIMFic member) This, incidentally, makes it my Worst Year Ever.
3 months of free Hulu Plus
3 months of free Spotify
1 Shutterfly magnet, mug, and photo book
One Fathead coupon, and we all know how that worked out.
Consumed: five smoothies, three breakfast sandwiches, two Quarter Pounders, three Medium Fries, and about 0.10 of a McFlurry because it wound up being roughly 90% Oreo fragments.
Donated: Just about everything else. Which mainly meant Medium Fries.
Exercised: a lot, in no small part to get rid of the Consumed category.
So here's the situation. I have a bunch of movie-or-game free rental codes which I can't use just because I have saturated my immediate circle with the things, there's only so many items I can humanly check out, and I already watched the single best comedy available. Seriously: brilliant satire. Wonderfully scripted with fantastic narration. I didn't stop laughing for ninety minutes. (Unfortunately, Dinesh D'Souza only releases one documentary every two years, so no more joy until 2016.) The rest of the selection... meh. And the rentals have to be used by the 24th.
I also have three extra Shutterfly photobook coupon codes, which includes shipping and handling. Again, I've locally given out what I could (which is hard, because these can be found in a lot of places, and there's a limit of one per account), and those codes have to be used today -- or at least, put into their system, and then you get an additional five days to assemble the thing. You can see the available styles here.
So if you're in the States (because for this, you kind of have to be) and want one of the free rental codes or photobooks, just let me know and I'll send you one in private message. Someone should get the benefit from them.
At least it's not a dry erase board.
How do the Redbox rental codes work? Do you put them in at one of their vending machines, or online?
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Either. You can punch them in on the kiosk touchscreen or reserve a title online through this link. The latter is also helpful for finding the local kiosk.
Every time I see that name, I think it says Fluttershy at first, and it catches my interest. And then I realize it's just that photography place and don't care anymore.
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Imagine how it feels to peel one off a food container. "I won a pony! ...oh."
Ironically, since McDonald's distributes some number of MLP toys in the States, winning a pony could have actually been an option.
ETA: I now have a mild temptation to create Shutterfly, the put-a-picture-on-anything pony -- and there, it's gone.
Maybe that's the contest for the dry erase board. Best Shutterfly story.
...and now I'm just trying to spread the pain.
Every year you seem to complain about this little game, about how all the little prizes are useless and you can't seem to use them because you've already got too many of the silly things, but despite all the complaints you continue to go and eat at a restaurant you know is unhealthy just for those little stickers in hopes of one of the good prizes. What a perfectly satirical representation of American consumerism. The constant drive for more, followed by hollow disappointment after receiving, at the grand central of consumption, and they call the game Monopoly? How appropriate.
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Except that...
A. I don't eat there, not to the degree you may believe I do. I collect pieces from friends, and they mostly gather them from putting trash where it belongs. If the majority of pieces aren't going unpeeled, it's at least a significant minority -- and that leaves a lot of little green bits clogging up the sidewalks. Collect garbage, remove piece, throw away everything else. It's good for the environment.
Excepting contest time -- where I always eat at McDonald's on the first day and go back about six times before it ends, mostly to use smoothies -- I probably get food from that franchise about eight times a year.
B. I have no hope of getting a good prize. I speak odds fluently. I've seen the probability listings for the major giveaways. I may actually have a better chance of walking through a portal leading into Equestria. Twice. So I don't hold onto a single illusion of getting a major item. I wouldn't complain, but...
Here's what I try for from the Monopoly contest: MCR points. Because the Christmas catalog is coming up and with sufficient points, I will add a bunch of gift cards to my holiday stocking. Last year, it would have taken about 6400 points to get one of everything, so that's the goal I try for during the year. (And for the record, I don't drink that much soda either. My apartment complex has cardboard recycling hutches. Once per week, go in, gather, repeat.) Anything I get beyond the points benefits... I want to be used by someone. I donate most of the food wins to charity, toss around rental codes.
And this was, in fact, a bad year. I usually manage about 750 points or so, which is a gift card all by itself. (Not necessarily a major one.) 300 points is... low. Worryingly so, especially since the peel/online ratio was the same as the previous go-round. So I'm very glad I didn't exactly spend to get what I did receive. But when comparing this run to past performance... yes, I'm disappointed.
Unnecessary C. McDonald's generally reports the million-dollar win as soon as someone calls in the code. This year was quiet. Others have been as well.
Here's the States for you: a significant number of pieces wind up in the garbage, never peeled. People don't notice the contest is going on, or don't care, or can't be bothered... and someone throws away a million dollars.
D. If I get thirty rental codes and say 'Well, I'll never use all these. Let's just hold onto them until they expire,' would that be an improvement?
E. I did work out a lot.
Quarter-Pounders are scary. I have to leave off most of the toppings just to get something I can recognize as a burger.
ETA: And to be fair, last year's EA prize was useless. (Or at least functionally use-impaired.)
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I consider it thusly: a Big Mac and a lottery ticket cost about the same where I live ($3). A lottery ticket has a 1 in 5 chance of winning a $3 prize and the chance of winning a million dollars is the same probability as being struck by lightning TWICE IN THE SAME DAY. I don't earn much money as a TA and savings rates are $h!t these days anyways (almost forgot about the no swearing rule). However the McDonald's Monopoly has a 1 in 4 chance of winning a $3 prize AND double the chance of winning the million dollars (the same probability as getting struck by lightning) AND I'm garunteed to at least have a burger to eat.
None of that means that your critique is it at all lost on me, but it's just the CLASSICAL tragedy of it, to buy into a system that isn't good for you because there are certain advantages to doing so yet never enough to make it seem satisfying. *shrugs*
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Love your work Estee, especially "Naked Lunch" and I'll gladly trade you for a month of Spotify or one of the MCR codes if there so happens to be anything you're still looking for. I've already sent you a PM.
McDonald's has had passable food in the past, although I wouldn't speak for the calorie count. For a while when they had those 1/3 pound hamburgers, they looked okay and tasted decent. Then they went back to the mediocre crap (at best) that they sold before that switch. I seem to recall that their burgers used to be better when I was a kid (90s, they weren't necessarily healthy but they tasted better and I feel like you used to get an actual burger rather than a forlorn slice of a burger), so I'm guessing costs went up and quality went down.
To be honest, I'd bet that if you don't eat there fairly regularly, it probably won't adversely impact your health unless you have specific health conditions.
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You know, the sad irony is that contrary to what some people believe, fast food isn't bad for you. The problem with it is primarily the fact that it has a lot of calories. I mean, if you look at the nutrition facts of a Big Mac, it actually isn't that bad; it is about 25% of your daily calories and provides about 25% of the nutrition that you need for a day. It is just that it is one sandwich which provides, you know, a quarter of your daily calories, and it comes with medium french fries (340 calories, 45% of your daily vitamin C) and a medium drink (200 calories, no micronutrients).
Fast food isn't bad; the problem is that that a meal with a Big Mac, a medium fry, and a medium drink is 1090 calories, but you're unlikely to really consider it as being half of your daily caloric intake and thus eat a ton of calories. But that isn't McDonald's fault or the food's fault; you get fat eating anything if you eat too much of it. McDonalds and other fast food restaurants are just convenient targets.