Friday, November 03, 2006

Why don't you come with me, little girl...

...on a magic carpet ride. (if you don't know what song that lyric is from and don't instantly start singing it in your head, well, then, I just feel sorry for you.)

I won a prize. Carpet. 630 sq. feet of it. Seriously! You have to know my family to appreciate the utter shifting of the balance of power in the universe that my winning this has caused.

We don't win stuff. It just doesn't happen. Okay, yes, there has been the odd talent show or cake decorating contest (Most Patriotic, thank you very much) but those were based on SOME measure of merit. We don't EVER win things that you just sign up for and then are randomly plucked from obscurity to get a prize.

In fact, there is a running joke in our family. Our kids will see some thing on TV saying to "Sign up to win the brand new QRY!!! You could be the Grand Prize Winner!!" and they will start getting excited, saying, "Dad, we should totally enter that contest!! We could win a new QRY!!"


"We aren't going to win a new QRY."
"But, why??"
"What is your last name?"
"_______!"
"Uh huh. Well, _____s don't win contests."

I cannot even tell you how many times that conversation has gone on in our house.

But now, the streak is broken. And just in time for the family who was looking sadly at their not-yet-finished basement and wondering how to get everything they needed to finish it. And we're talking, how to get the rest of the drywall and paint, let alone nice carpeting for the 600 sq foot floors. That's right, 600 sq feet.

Magic carpet ride, indeed.

6 comments:

Anonymous said...

Wonderful! Congratulations! Now you should enter things just to see if you might win again.

Millie said...

Wow, you must have paid your tithing. :)

Lisa M. said...

I love that. Love that...

Mellocat said...

How fun! Many years ago while I was still in graduate school, my Mrs. won a radio call in contest by being able to name Betty Rubble's (of Flintstone's fame) maiden name.

But, your prize is much more prestigious! All she won was 12 free tickets and free concessions to the grand opening of a multi-plex movie theatre. And, we weren't even allowed to choose the day which to use them. All of them had to be used on that same day (which was a week night and the grand opening night of the multi-plex) and few of our friends could get baby sitters... ;)

Anonymous said...

Neat! We never win stuff either but then we never enter contests so I guess that is really not much of a surprise.

Anne/kq said...

That's awesome! We had never won anything, either, and I almost deleted the e-mail that came for my husband telling him he had won box tickets for, like, 14 people for a local feeder league game back in Dallas! That included access to the VIP club, 6 VIP parking passes, all kinds of stuff. Of course, almost no one showed up who we invited, but it was still fun. :) It was, like, the thrill of his life to have a box, even at such a small stadium.