Lukin
11-25-2005, 07:43 PM
At approximately 10:30pm on Sunday, Nov. 20th, (after the season finale of ROME) Me and my brother-in-law Charlie and my sister-in-law Nicole all loaded up in my '97 Trans AM and set off upon a magical journey which would forever alter the course of our lives.
After eagerly anticipating the launch of the X360 for more than a month, I could not stand the thought of not getting one, so I determined it would be a safe bet to show up at Wal-Mart apprx. 24 hrs before launch. We arrived at the Richmond, KY Wal-Mart at around 12:00am, Monday, Nov 21st and after walking around the store for about 1.5 hours in a futile atempt to make the time pass, we realized the seriousness of our error: 24 hours is a long effing time to wait at Wal-Mart.
Reluctantly, and slightly embarassed, we gathered up some magazines and started the official Xbox 360 line by setting in the floor in front of the lay-away department. At approximately 3:00 AM, a rather loud red-haired female wal-mart associate informed us that it was pointless to wait in line all day because they would not be dispersing their 30 or so Xbox 360s on a first come-first serve basis, but rather a lottery, which means some bloke could show up at 10 minutes till launch and get a system while I did not.
"Well that is preposterous" I said. But she was rather nice about it and said we should just hang out and wait for the manager to get there and make sure. "Yeah Right".
Panic began to set in. Upon the brink of downright hysteria I told Charlie to call Berea Wal-Mart (about 30 minutes away) to see if they would be doing a lottery as well. So he did, and much to our relief they said NO, it would be first come-first serve. This was about 3:15 am, at which time we loaded up in the White Dragon (my Trans Am is white, I call it the WHite Dragon) and headed towards Berea.
Upon Reaching Our destination at around 3:45 am Monday morning, we found that we were not the only completely insane people willing to wait all night and all day for the X360. There was a slightly overweight guy with long hair, glasses and a HALO 2 hat on already waiting in lay-away. His name was Donald, and He informed us that he had been there since 8:00pm SUnday night. After becoming aquainted with Donald, we passed the time by playing Rummy, reading magazines, shooting the sh*t, until about 7:00am Monday morning when a manager arrived and told us we would have to move to the snack bar location and that is where the official line would be. This bit of news was a welcomed one, it meant we could sat at the booths in the snack bar and have easy access to food while we waited, waited, waited, waited. At about 8:00am CHarlie and I decided to try a Fritos Chili n' CHeese thing from the snack bar and sat down at a different booth than we were previously at when we were reprimanded by the old lady at the bar. "Y'all can't take up all the tables now." She said. "It'll be lunch time in a few minutes, you need to stay at one table." Even though there wasn't another soul in sight and lunch was 5 hrs away, we graciously obliged.
"We're about to spend $1500 dollars at this store lady, show some freaking courtesy" I thought to myself.
12:00 pm, Monday. While in the middle of a game of rummy, still the only ones in line, Me, Charlie, Nicole, and Donald were approached by a black guy in his late 20's named Derrick. He asked if we were in line for the Xbox and if he could join our game to which we replied, "Yeah" and "Sure". Not long after that a guy I new but hadn't seen in a while named Michael showed up and also joined our game. It was at this time the same manager who told us to move to the snack bar returned and gave us an update: They had exactly 46 units in stock, 24 premium, 22 core. At 10pm monday night, they were going to hand out tickets which guaranteed you a unit. He wanted us to form an organized line outside the snack bar and give everyone that shows up the low down. He was pretty cool.
1:00 pm, Monday, we formed our line and waited. Slowly more people began to show up, and we were mentally and verbally keeping track of what # each person was in line. Donald was 1, Char was 2, I was 3, Nic was 4, Derrick was 5, Michael was 6 so on....
3:30 pm, The line is completely packed. There is already 21 people there when a girl named Sydney that I also knew showed up to claim #22. This was also about the time that a rather large and loud kid showed up who knew absolutely everthing about everything. He would get really annoying as time went on.
So we waited and waited and Sydney taught me how to play Yahtzee (yeah I had never played it before). At about 5:00pm the head manager came and took our names down on a piece of paper. AFter that nothing signifigant happend until 9:00 pm. THe cool manager came back and told us to start lining up (the line had begun to dicipate) and he would hand out tickets. 1 hour later, at 10pm Monday night, he called my name and hand me the golden ticket. I was so Excited, it felt like mission accomplished. I wanted to go home now. But I had to stick it out for 2 more hours.
11:00pm Monday night, we began to congregate back at lay-away as they started bringing out the systems, games, prehiprials, etc. and set them up. You could cut the anticipation with a knife. It was at this point someone said they only had 4 copies of Call of Duty 2. GASP! That's the game I wanted and I wasn't 4th in line. What is they sell out!? I began to panic and think of making a mad dash for the front of the line when they bring in a Police Deputy who looks just like Barney from the ANdy Griffith show to help keep the peace. It appears a fight had broke out at the RIchmond wal-mart, hehe, glad we didn't stay there.
Then my anxiety was relieved when they brought out several more copies of COD2. Cool. Everything is going to be okay.
12:01am, Tuesday, Nov 22, launch. They began handing out the systems. The time is finally here. They opened up a second register so I ended up being like the 2nd person to get mine. I was suprised at the weight of the package. It's definitely the heaviest system I've ever held. But with 512mb of RAM and a 20 gb hard drive it's basically a computer that you hook up to your TV. Awesome.
Well, that's my story. If anyone actually reads this whole thing you must be more bored than I was when I wrote it. :lol:
After eagerly anticipating the launch of the X360 for more than a month, I could not stand the thought of not getting one, so I determined it would be a safe bet to show up at Wal-Mart apprx. 24 hrs before launch. We arrived at the Richmond, KY Wal-Mart at around 12:00am, Monday, Nov 21st and after walking around the store for about 1.5 hours in a futile atempt to make the time pass, we realized the seriousness of our error: 24 hours is a long effing time to wait at Wal-Mart.
Reluctantly, and slightly embarassed, we gathered up some magazines and started the official Xbox 360 line by setting in the floor in front of the lay-away department. At approximately 3:00 AM, a rather loud red-haired female wal-mart associate informed us that it was pointless to wait in line all day because they would not be dispersing their 30 or so Xbox 360s on a first come-first serve basis, but rather a lottery, which means some bloke could show up at 10 minutes till launch and get a system while I did not.
"Well that is preposterous" I said. But she was rather nice about it and said we should just hang out and wait for the manager to get there and make sure. "Yeah Right".
Panic began to set in. Upon the brink of downright hysteria I told Charlie to call Berea Wal-Mart (about 30 minutes away) to see if they would be doing a lottery as well. So he did, and much to our relief they said NO, it would be first come-first serve. This was about 3:15 am, at which time we loaded up in the White Dragon (my Trans Am is white, I call it the WHite Dragon) and headed towards Berea.
Upon Reaching Our destination at around 3:45 am Monday morning, we found that we were not the only completely insane people willing to wait all night and all day for the X360. There was a slightly overweight guy with long hair, glasses and a HALO 2 hat on already waiting in lay-away. His name was Donald, and He informed us that he had been there since 8:00pm SUnday night. After becoming aquainted with Donald, we passed the time by playing Rummy, reading magazines, shooting the sh*t, until about 7:00am Monday morning when a manager arrived and told us we would have to move to the snack bar location and that is where the official line would be. This bit of news was a welcomed one, it meant we could sat at the booths in the snack bar and have easy access to food while we waited, waited, waited, waited. At about 8:00am CHarlie and I decided to try a Fritos Chili n' CHeese thing from the snack bar and sat down at a different booth than we were previously at when we were reprimanded by the old lady at the bar. "Y'all can't take up all the tables now." She said. "It'll be lunch time in a few minutes, you need to stay at one table." Even though there wasn't another soul in sight and lunch was 5 hrs away, we graciously obliged.
"We're about to spend $1500 dollars at this store lady, show some freaking courtesy" I thought to myself.
12:00 pm, Monday. While in the middle of a game of rummy, still the only ones in line, Me, Charlie, Nicole, and Donald were approached by a black guy in his late 20's named Derrick. He asked if we were in line for the Xbox and if he could join our game to which we replied, "Yeah" and "Sure". Not long after that a guy I new but hadn't seen in a while named Michael showed up and also joined our game. It was at this time the same manager who told us to move to the snack bar returned and gave us an update: They had exactly 46 units in stock, 24 premium, 22 core. At 10pm monday night, they were going to hand out tickets which guaranteed you a unit. He wanted us to form an organized line outside the snack bar and give everyone that shows up the low down. He was pretty cool.
1:00 pm, Monday, we formed our line and waited. Slowly more people began to show up, and we were mentally and verbally keeping track of what # each person was in line. Donald was 1, Char was 2, I was 3, Nic was 4, Derrick was 5, Michael was 6 so on....
3:30 pm, The line is completely packed. There is already 21 people there when a girl named Sydney that I also knew showed up to claim #22. This was also about the time that a rather large and loud kid showed up who knew absolutely everthing about everything. He would get really annoying as time went on.
So we waited and waited and Sydney taught me how to play Yahtzee (yeah I had never played it before). At about 5:00pm the head manager came and took our names down on a piece of paper. AFter that nothing signifigant happend until 9:00 pm. THe cool manager came back and told us to start lining up (the line had begun to dicipate) and he would hand out tickets. 1 hour later, at 10pm Monday night, he called my name and hand me the golden ticket. I was so Excited, it felt like mission accomplished. I wanted to go home now. But I had to stick it out for 2 more hours.
11:00pm Monday night, we began to congregate back at lay-away as they started bringing out the systems, games, prehiprials, etc. and set them up. You could cut the anticipation with a knife. It was at this point someone said they only had 4 copies of Call of Duty 2. GASP! That's the game I wanted and I wasn't 4th in line. What is they sell out!? I began to panic and think of making a mad dash for the front of the line when they bring in a Police Deputy who looks just like Barney from the ANdy Griffith show to help keep the peace. It appears a fight had broke out at the RIchmond wal-mart, hehe, glad we didn't stay there.
Then my anxiety was relieved when they brought out several more copies of COD2. Cool. Everything is going to be okay.
12:01am, Tuesday, Nov 22, launch. They began handing out the systems. The time is finally here. They opened up a second register so I ended up being like the 2nd person to get mine. I was suprised at the weight of the package. It's definitely the heaviest system I've ever held. But with 512mb of RAM and a 20 gb hard drive it's basically a computer that you hook up to your TV. Awesome.
Well, that's my story. If anyone actually reads this whole thing you must be more bored than I was when I wrote it. :lol: