Changing the game

At the annual department holiday luncheon, one activity conducted (besides gorging ourselves) is a game called "Something You Probably Don't Know About Me" (which I've written about before).

To recap: On a slip of paper each person writes down a fact about him- or herself that is unlikely to be commonly known about that person by the other people in the department. Then someone reads aloud the anonymous facts, and after each one people yell out guesses about whom they think was the writer of that particular fact. If someone guesses correctly he or she gets a prize, but if after three guesses the person has not been identified then that person gets the prize.

After years of playing this game, I've determined a pattern: someone is going to guess me for just about anything, as people clearly think I'm capable of just about anything. I'm still not sure whether to be flattered by that or offended, but it is pretty much a given; it is something I can anticipate.

And thus it makes it tricky to successfully fool co-workers and collect a prize (although I did so last year through a bit of chicanery--as noted in this post).

So this year, with minutes left before the luncheon, I pondered what to put on the paper. Then I looked closely at the pre-printed sentence on the slip of paper--"The One Thing You Probably Don't Know About Me…"--and of course I thought, There's only one thing? Well, that's not the case.

So it struck me: Don't try to fool 'em. Just go with the deconstruction of the language selected for the slip of paper.

Below is the content of what I submitted and was read:

The one thing
you probably don't know about me...

Come now, people--there's more than one thing you probably don't know about me. Let's not even pretend there's only one thing. Were it, in fact, the case that you already probably knew everything about me save one bit of personal trivia then it would be possible to list that here, but the slip specifies "The one thing..." and not merely "One of the many things..." so therefore the task is rendered moot.

Now, if everyone would please stop yelling out my name (because undoubtedly we've all already figured out whose slip this is by the time whoever--and it would be "whoever" and not "whomever" in this context--is reading this), we can get on with the festivities.

Also, it would be appreciated if you'd stop booing and throwing food, as these pants are not machine-washable. An imprudent sartorial decision for the day, I realize now. I will know better next year on the off-chance that I am still invited to the party.

Of course that was identified as mine before the person reading even finished the second paragraph (so after my name was called out I had to yell "Let her finish!") When she finally got to the end, everyone laughed. (And unlike with all the other slips of paper after they'd been read, mine was snatched up by the head of the department to keep.)

Although I'd fooled no one, I got the prize.

And more important, no food was thrown. It's entirely possible that people in the department learned something about me (even if that was only that their preconceived notions were roughly accurate).

It's not always a matter of following the rules; sometimes it's a matter of throwing them out.

~

No, it's not high comedy, but hey, what do you expect for what is acceptable for a general workplace audience?

I was just happy it didn't backfire.

However, in the interest of full disclosure: the pants were, in fact, machine-washable. But the joke worked better lying. The things we do for our art. Or whatever that was.