On Picking Prizes

So far, selecting a prize to offer up for a BANG has usually been a last minute thing. For example, Jonathan and I were in a store at 11pm the night before one event, discussing the ins and outs of different possibilities before finally selecting something (a trivia book I think) and heading out as the store closed.

It's a balance of finding something intersting, unique, useful, and/or fun and of finding something in the ~$10 price range. Since I don't know any other team's taste (apart from, perhaps, puzzles), we try and go with something we'd like... especially if we're lucky enough to place high enough to get a prize and only have what we had brought as a choice.

This time, I decided to get BANG 19's prize out of the way early. Some things I've looked at and decided not to choose:

A 25-piece kitchen knife set (seemed dangerous)

A giant rootbeer keg filled popcorn that can then be used to brew rootbeer

A Sudoku cube

A digital sudoku hand-held game

The complete collection of Space Quest games (dunno if anyone besides me would use it)

A diamond-tipped circular saw blade (ditto)

A collection of burrs (did it last time)

A Halloween costume (it's the day after...)

I finally chose something I though was interesting, unique, useful, fun, and a drinking game to boot, and brought it home, safe in the thought that I wouldn't have to worry about it for the coming month. My wife then mentioned that the package looked a little banged up. I looked closer and saw it was taped shut over the original packing tape. Opening it up, I found that of the eighteen necessary parts to assemble this thing, all but seven were missing. I returned what had obviously been a return.

There weren't any others, so I selected something else with the store credit. Ah well. It may not be as interesting, unique or useful as the first, but I think it just might be fun.