I'm going to soapbox here about something

Dougie and I went for lunch today at the local sports club, just cos it's nearby, it's relatively inexpensive and they have pool tables that are never in use during the day, oh and the Guinness is still less than $4 a pint! We decided just before leaving to waste $5 in a pokie machine and that's usually all we spend because I can think of other things to do with money than throw it away and as far as I'm concerned I don't ever gamble more than I could bear to put a match to and burn which I think is what gambling equates to. So.......we are sitting at our machine happily pressing our button and the promo guy is walking around talking about their Monday afternoon grocery grab. I went to have a look cos basically I'm nosy as well as uninformed and on a big trestle table in the pokie hall ther was a huge spread of groceries, even right down to basics like dishwashing liquid and tins of baked beans!!! Apparently, and this strikes me as both moronic and a bit sad, the punters get a token for each time they have a win of a minimum amount on the machine. So you get one token if you win a $1 drop and two tokens if you win a drop of $5 etc. And then at a designated time of the promotion you get to walk over to the table "in an orderly manner folks, with no pushing or queue jumping and no passing groceries to those further back in the queue, and you can only claim three items to start with so nobody misses out" and basically exchange the tokens you gained by pissing away your money for food that you could have bloody well spent that money on to start with!!!!!! Am I the only one who sees the stupid irony in that?????? Now before I get flamed by an anonymous post, I do realise some people have available money for gambling. I wasn't thinking so much about them as those who are there and can't afford to be. So I left feeling a little depressed actually. And the worst part was that these poor folks, mostly elderly, were excited like they were getting something for nothing. I know there are lots of people who like the idea of getting something for nothing and can easily talk themselves into believing that but it just isn't true very often these days. They've spent their grocery money on gambling so they could win tokens to buy even less groceries that they could have bought with their grocery money. Yes, I know lots of people need a social activity, and yes, I realise that some of them are probably very lonely and have no other opportunities for going out, and yes I also know that clubs are entitled to run a business and make money but I still think the whole shebang sux (how grade 9 is that for ya???!) and even though people have the right to choose where they go and what they do, I felt like I was watching them all get conned. I'm sure some know exactly what they were doing but it felt like a cheap, crappy stunt to watch. Sorry for the downer people, but that's what impacted me the most today, seeing that pokie promo and the people crowding around that table like a charity food giveaway when they had really paid for it themselves and for some of them it will have cost them more than a few bucks for groceries. I don't know anyone with a gambling problem and I haven't had one myself, but the whole thing seemed absurd, sad, and a pretty crummy yardstick of our society. Please somebody tell me I'm overreacting cos I don't know anymore, maybe it's would have been anything today that set me off, I don't know but there's my rant about something I didn't like, can't change and am not personally involved in. I can't be the only one who has those kind of tanties can I? lol