Grabber machine mayhem

On Friday night I went out with my SIL's for Chinese food and grown-up conversation. After the meal and much debate we decided to hit the bowling alley on the way home, so we could keep 'cinders' here out for as long as possible, and that it's the only place in town dark enough to hide the fact that no-one was wearing make-up or appropriate 'going out' gear for a Friday night.

What a bowling alley will teach anyone of any age, is that they, and we really haven't grown up at all. My 20-something sil's were breaking out moves on the dance machine. We had air-hockey tournaments and generally avoided actually bowling (that game is 'spensive!). Just as we were ready to leave, we spied the grabber machine. It was plastered with stickers saying 'win every time!' so how could we NOT have a go!

Smurfette went first and took roughly eight thousand goes to grab this creepy looking hamster, clutching a bloody heart claiming it would give you ' hugs' before clawing your face and eating your eyes.

Then jessicar decided she would have a try, which is where it all went wrong. She was amazingly good at selecting her teddy, the claw grabbed it first time and dropped it in the chute...but nothing came out the little prize door.
After some super technical belly shuffling, I spied it stuck in the chute doorway waaay up inside the machine, but just close enough for me to attempt breaking my arm over. I laid on the floor, one hand holding the door up, the other trying to bend behind the now open door to grab a teeny tiny teddy leg to pull down through the chute.
At this point we began to attract an audience. Perhaps it was from my graceful acrobatics, perhaps it was our loud laughter, or perhaps it was because I'd started to bang the machine door harder and harder (at Smurfettes suggestion) in the vain hope that it would dislodge the bear and save me my arm.

As we discovered, one cannot beat an arcade machine into a pulp without getting noticed by the staff of the establishment. A big burly guy asked me 'can I help you' or maybe it was 'what do you think you are doing?' (I can't say for sure as at this point we all had the giggles), and I explained my predicament.
I got the clear impression that he didn't think we had won anything and that he thought we were simply trying to destroy his machine, but after he had copied my 'highly technical' belly crawl he too spied the little trapped bear.

Now this guy was middle-aged, very large and had far shorter arms than me. But now he was trying to do exactly what I had been doing... and he was having even less success than me. He had adopted, what Chexcloud brilliantly described as 'the best porn position ever' while we all tried not to laugh, which may have then attracted an even greater crowd.

If I'd been faster, I'd have given you a fantastic picture of a 500 pound man trying to wriggle into a tiny grabber machine...but I was laughing too hard.

He ended up retreating to gather a ruler before trying to free the little teddy again. At this point the desk phone began ringing and we started umming and ahhing whether to answer it to help him out, since he clearly couldn't hear us from inside the machine. To cut a long story a bit shorter, eventually he freed the bear, I cheered and he went back to his desk.

You would think that we would have learned, but no, we went right back on that grab machine the moment he moved out of the way. This time it was my turn.

My 'object of desire' was a poor little upside down kitty cat, which looked soft and snuggly. It took many, many goes to free it from it's steel claw prison, I managed to flip it over at one point and the poor pitiful look on it's face was enough to renew my determination.

Like all good grabber machines, plastered in 'win every time' sticker stories, I did free it eventually. I came close to homing an ugly monkey and disturbing elephant but I freed my kitty, which turned out to be a tiger. We once again attracted unnecessary attention by cheering our heads-off when it didn't get stuck in the prize chute