HOUSE!

I used to work in a bingo hall that shares a name with a type of apple and is represented by Sharon Osbourn. I fucking hated it, all of it, it was shit. The customers were mostly gambling addicts or alcoholic fuck-wits, the staff were mostly scummy chavs and the work was mindnumbing in the extreme.

To make matters worse being a part timer, I for some reason was singled out as a spare part and was only allowed to do two jobs in that shit hole. One was the front desk secretary type and the other was as a member of the floor staff.

For those who have never been to bingo, (keep it that way, to save time simply burn some money at home) there are two types of bingo games. The main games where a fellow in a suit gets up on stage and calls numbers and what they call 'party games,' which is like high speed coin-op bingo.

Now to play 'party bingo' you put a pound coin in a numbered slot, grab the corresponding plastic board which will be stashed next to the seat and waste your money. Of course most people don't come armed with pound coins to the floor staff (me) wonder round with trays full of coins swapping them for notes. It was truly astonishing how much money these dregs of society could put in the company coffers, it worked out at about 45% of the money put in went on prizes, while the rest was pure profit. Fucking great scam if you are on top of it.

Anyway, I digress.

While on the floor, you were in front of customers so there was very little time for tomfoolery. However one incident still makes me smile to this day.

It was new years day and as a place that is open 364 days a year, the bingo hall was open. I had volunteered to work as it was double time and even with a hangover, it was well worth it. Now as you might expect, what with just about everything else in the country being shut, people were not expecting the bingo to be opened and as such the place was dead, completely dead, less than 30/40 people in there dead. It was the only time I have ever seen the place probably lose money.

Luckily that day several of the few cool members of staff were working the floor with me, so we were having a few laughs while we raped a few old grannies for their heating money.

Signaling the mid point of the shift, the main game starts, Dan the caller walks up on stage, does his thing, the usual running about checking peoples claims goes on on the floor, all normal. As most of the customers are at deaths door we often get wrong claims from grannies who cant see/hear/remember their names/remember where they live. When this happens it builds tension, the grannies get excited as they know somebody is nearly there. This often leads to another wrong claim. This epic day we had three false claims in a row.

We all stood with bated breath waiting for the next call, would it be another dotty old bag getting it wrong?

"2 and 7, 27". Dan called.

"House!" the tiniest meekest, most frail old woman faintly called. I run over to check, I take her card and read Dan the serial number and he checks if the claim is good.

Now normally if the claim is good the caller will say 'good claim for a full house' or something similar, not today.

Dan smiled, leaned on his desk and with great composure simply nodded and said.

'Hardcore'

We all nearly pissed ourselves. The 30 or so coffin-dodgers didn't get it.

(How sad that that is my best memory of the place after 18 months)
(Bam Bam McPenis will change all this when he is fuhrer., Fri 9 Jan 2009, 18:19, 2 replies)

Ris?
That's five minutes of my life I'm never going to get back.
( Ghoti Fingers, Fri 9 Jan 2009, 18:54, closed)

?
Hardcore house??

That truly was a waste of my life.

Im bored...
(kitescreech still here, Fri 9 Jan 2009, 20:10, closed)