This is Mr. P.  His real name is Principle.  C. and I won him at the San Diego fair on Saturday.  We decided to play this carnival game where they had a hoop about thigh high with a slanted backboard that was about chest high.  You are supposed to hit the backboard and have the ball drop straight down into the hoop.  This game is difficult because of the way the backboard is slanted.  If you don’t throw the ball at a high enough angle or if you throw it too hard or if you don’t throw it with a backspin, the ball won’t drop straight down.  It will instead bounce too far out from the hoop.

The game was $5 for 1 ball and $10 for 3 balls.  One in wins.  The guy decided to offer us both prizes if one of us made it to entice us to play.  Ok, we agreed.  C. went first and missed.  I went next and to our surprise, I actually made it!!!  We celebrated and waited for our prize.  You know what the guy says, “No, you don’t win.  You shot it incorrectly.”  SERIOUSLY?  What does that even mean?  He tried to accuse me of leaning – you’re not supposed to lean.  I said, I wasn’t leaning and I made it.  He said, I saw you lean, I’m the referee.  I said, I threw the ball, I think I know what I was doing.  All the while, C. is saying, “she made it! she made it!”  He said, “that’s why we have this rule here, no leaning.”  I told him to give me my prize.  He tried to give me a few more balls to throw.  I told him to demo how to do it again and as he did it, I told him he was leaning.  I told him repeatedly.  We argued and argued.  Finally he said, you can have one of these prizes on the bottom but that he got to pick the prize.  He tried to give me this ugly bear, I said no.  He said I could either have the bear or shrek.  Those were freaking ugly.  The prize we really wanted was hanging at the top – an angry birds pig!  But since I could only pick from the bottom, I picked the Mr. P.  He was the best looking.  C. said she didn’t care about the prize.  I said, I don’t care either, but we’re taking it for principle’s sake!!  That’s how red bird got it’s name.  :)

All the arguing scared all the people away.  If he would have given us the prize initially, he could have gotten a lot more people to play.  I wonder if the guy loses money if he gives away prizes.  I wonder how many times he tries to pull that “no leaning” thing on people.  Plus the other guy who was demo-ing also leaned like crazy!  AND when he tried to teach this other guy how to do it by swinging his arm for him, he was totally pulling him over the railing.  Dumb.

Anyway, I’m happy we stuck with it to get the prize.  Then I got to lug it around for an hour – it was heavy, awkwardly large, and made my arms tired.  I also kept accidentally hitting people with it.  I even nailed a lady in the head.  Oops.

That’s the story of Mr. P.  Also, don’t play that game.  I can’t believe the guy tried to scam me even though the carnival games itself are a scam.  Geez.