Events / Help make awesome and extended bits of surreality happen to a fellow SFZerian!

March 8th, 2010 @ 12:00am

The interwebs, and in particular http://bit.ly/92gbBV

6/unlimited

teucer

(I hope you'll forgive the almost-spam, on the grounds that this is totally awesome and worth it. Seriously, it is, so read on. There are monkeys.)

Groupon is some weird prepaid coupon thingy. You buy the coupon at a discount, and redeem it for the stuff. I'm not clear on the details, but they've got it in most major US cities.

Anyhow, the Groupon folks are doing a promotion where they're picking a person to be their spokesperson, giving that person unlimited coupons, and challenging them to live on nothing else for a year. No cash, except for healthcare and "some basic equipment" - just whatever food and other life stuff you can buy off Groupon, and lodgings in whatever hotels they have deals on (or, potentially, what crash space you scrounge). Given that they have coupons for some of the most random things ever, like renting a monkey for a week (yes, really - an honest-to-god live monkey), it's going to be one hell of an awesome year.

At least, it is if somebody with the right mindset is the one doing it. Also, I want someone with a mind that encourages good documentation, since if it's sufficiently awesome I want to read the blog covering how the year goes. And if they're cool enough, it might be neat to see whether they subvert the inherently corporate nature of the event in any way. (I don't know of anyone considering such a thing, but by the end of the year it's got to be something you try out at least once. At least, if you're cool.) Sure, the whole thing's just a big marketing stunt - but if someone who will approach the issue from the right mindset gets the nod, it'll be a marketing stunt those of us who don't even have Groupon in our areas will be able to enjoy watching.

As it happens, one of the applicants is, in fact, someone with the right mindset - Ian O'Dea, better known to SF0 players as the currently-inactive Chicago player Iaman. He's scaled buildings to capture flags, led CG0 in a ritual to break every sundial ever, and set a book on fire for points; next, apparently, comes volunteering to live like some sort of coupon-clad urban hermit for a year because he's insane enough to think it sounds like fun.

I want to make his fun happen. Not for me - I'm more than a little intimidated by the idea - but for Iaman.

There's not a lot you and me can do to try to help Iaman win this awesome-but-more-than-slightly-insane opportunity, but he does have a Facebook group dedicated to the matter and there is actually reason to believe the size of said group will actually be taken into account when deciding who wins. I think the idea of someone who used to do some pretty cool tasking, even if he doesn't anymore, would be neat.

Plus, think of all the tasks you could do with a rental monkey. In fact, I defy you to think of any tasks you couldn't do with a rental monkey.