the Skill Testing Question

I found myself at McDonald’s the other day. It wasn’t that I ‘found myself’ spiritually, and I hadn’t actually become physically lost, but I did break free of the Happy Haze long enough to remember that Stupid Happens. And it doesn’t just happen sometimes, or occasionally, or when big idiots are around, Stupid Happens always. This is why I spend a significant amount of time in the Happy Haze, where my above average idiot-tolerance and elite ability to ignore ignorance allows me to focus on the Good, and joyously bound from cloud to cloud in the celestial bliss of a CareBear style world. Now, you may think that I frown at such stupidity, that anything boldly idiotic enough to tear me back down to the ridiculousness of a CareBearless world would set me off. But that’s not true. Not at all. I long for these extra-special situation. It’s these unique and baffling moments of total mental lapse that charge up my day, bring me a smile, remind me that although Good is good, sometimes Bad is good too.

I like McDonald’s. And since I’ve already harped on the hamburger haters at length (see the June’s Hi-Jacked! episode the ‘Hamburger Hitmen', it’s juicy) and feel no obligation to convince anyone of the benefits of an MC’s episode, I will move on. Except to say that if you can’t allow yourself a golden-arches smile every now and then, you need to spend more time in the Happy Haze. Don’t be so miserable. And ask yourself ‘Why, so, SERioussssssSah?!’ Okay, I’m done.


I live on the edge when it comes to fast food. Sure I’ll decide the establishment in advance as oppose to just hope that I end up somewhere greasy and good (heaven forbid I park near the word Organic, that’s a red flag), but when it comes to the order, I let the building speak to me. I make my decision as I walk up to the smiling face of the McDonald’s Master. Actually if you can find someone, somewhere who is even close to a ‘Master’ of the McDonald’s, hold on and don’t let go. With no experience behind the Ronald McDonald counter, I can only assume this is an excruciatingly difficult job that requires more brainpower than most can muster. I think that very few are truly ever ready to take the plug into the challenges of a career at the Arches, leaving the average MC soldier to be overwhelmed and outmatched by the Extra Value Meals and the Super Sizing and the Apple Pies (why do these things exist, who is buying ‘Pies’ from the ‘1 billion burgers sold’ crowd, is it possible that at some point this ‘Pie’ adder was a good idea, and is it in fact a ‘Pie’, cause it looks a lot like a ‘Mistake’, and seriously, Apple, am I to believe that even the artificial flavouring injected into this mess is suppose to be Apple… Apple Pies, big Lies).

It has to be the impenetrability of the job that makes getting my order anywhere-near-correct so tricky, right? I mean it’s either that, or the place must be infested with lifeless hallow morons. Hurry, join me in the Haze: it must be the challenge of the chore.

Nonetheless I drink in the menu board, watch for deals and steals, open myself up to the sights, sounds, and smells of the McDonald’s, and that is where my order comes from. Unless of course I am armed with the weapon of choice.

Coupons are a different game all together. A game I will play any time. Now, I have direction, I have goals, I have an Ordering regime. And I have my ticket into a world where Stupid Happens. Coupons require a level of cunning that most Cash Register Wranglers haven’t been able to tie down. It breaks down like this: I go to McDonald’s, I order food, I eat food, I am happy… I play McDonald’s Monopoly, I win food, I order food, I am happy. But wait, as it turns out, the fun isn’t over yet. The way it actually breaks down is like this: I play Monopoly, I win food, I order food, I am presented with a skill testing question. What? What is this little pop-quiz all about? Here I am, ready to sample the staple of the MacDee world with its ‘Big’, and the Master-in-training has surprised me with a math test. So now I’m doing math… so that I can eat McDonalds… something is not right here. It’s fishy and it’s not the Fillet O’ (do people buy that, the Fillet o’Fish, does anyone think That is a good idea?) So I answer this ‘question’, which is worthy of quotations because it is both an embarrassment to math and to the number 28.

42 - (6+8)… hmmm. If only I had brought my graphic calculator, or a set of marbles.

There are way too many things wrong with this scene for me to stay in the clouds. Bye for now you Caring Bears. I ‘play’ Monopoly, I win a prize, why am I playing a new game to try and win the same prize? I’m not playing these games for fun. They are miserable games. Monopoly at the best of times is just a big fight waiting to happen. And Math? That’s not even a real game. That’s learning. I don’t want to be learning when I go to McDonald’s. In fact I think I actually have a subconscious longing to become stupider when I go to McDonald’s. So what am I doing here?

By this time, my Happy Haze has evaporated and I am choking on the strangle hold that Stupidity has on me. Stupid Happens, and it’s happening right meow. The best part about the whole thing is that everyone, the MC Master, the Burger Chef Extrordinar, all the Wranglers, head of operations at the drive-thru window, the kid in the play-place trying to eat one of those balls in the sea of colour, Mr. Monopoly, me, we are all too half-witted to even realize the sluggishness of the corner-office brains behind this lost cause operation; I can feel them trying so desperately to flex their grey-matter. Nothing seems out of place to any of us. That is until I start thinking about what the Skill Testing Question is all about.

I launch into a rundown of possible explanations that might relieve some of the pressure on my soul from all the ‘game play’. Stupidity is tasking. As I worked my grade 2 math skills I decided to multitask and eliminate the most obvious options that were even too Stupid for our little Arches Adventure. I figured that this little math conquest couldn’t have anything to do with identity verification. There’s no limit to the number of times you can ‘win’, so there’s no need to keep track of who has claimed prizes. I briefly pictured myself as a really dominant MacDee participant, epically pulling Monopoly pieces off of Big Mac boxes, collecting an entire Extra Value Meal’s worth of freebee winnings and being surrounded by cheering employees and random people in the background riding large tricycles, doing cart-wheels, holding up neon signs that read ‘Jack for President… suck-it Obama… you too Kathy Griffin, cause I hate you, you’re not funny… at all’.

I kept running down the list: Was this to prove that you were indeed a human? Was there fine print that excluded Dogs and Park Benches? It can’t have anything to do with knowing simple algebra. There’s no prerequisite to eating fast food. It’s not like the assistant to the Drive-Thru Manager has a second job that gives him the power to confiscate your drink if you can’t divide the number of fries in your Large by the total number of flat disc shaped thingys in your double Royale with Cheese. Are they trying to make sure that all customers are smart enough to understand the risk they are entering into by eating this nutritious and delicious option? Is anyone on the planet still surprised that on the scale of ‘Broccoli to High-Fat-Plutonium’ a Number 1 combo is in the same food group as mercury-enriched-dirt and expired-bacon-fat? Was this part of the prize? ‘Hey, look at you, you won some more McDonald’s for yourself, here quick, keep your spirits high, do some Math!’

When I answered the question correctly the MC Master congratulated me and gave me a very rewarding smile. I smiled. It felt good. Hmmm, maybe I was on to something. Now not only was I about to get my prize but I was also a genius. 42 - (6+8) = 28, Yeah it does!!! I wondered what would have happened if I had got it wrong. Is it good enough for the employee to simply announce, “No, I’m sorry, but that is Not the correct answer, you got a Zero on this test, you have failed at the Skill Testing Question, and you have failed at life”. Humiliation can be quite powerful, especially when Stupid is happening. Would they deny your winnings? Is that what the Skill Testing Question is, a double or nothing? “So you’ve won a burger, now do you want to let it ride for a smile and a warm fuzzy feeling inside?” Did it matter at all? I suddenly wished that I had answered with the square-root of two, just to see what would happen.


(as an aside, how creepy is that dude? Ronald McDonald... he looks like a crazy person, a crazy person disguised as a murderer in a clown suit)

I stopped thinking and realized that some things are just beyond the realm of logic. Some things are neither built for speed nor strength. Some things are a riddle wrapped in a paradox on an imaginary IQ test written in invisible ink. I thought about one-handed clapping and trees falling in the forest when no one was around. Pompous questions. Just attempting to answer such a question makes you an imbecile. I left McDonald’s having accepted the fact that along with the ‘Caution: contents may be Hot’ warning on your Scalding cup of HOT coffee and the fact that on most alarm clocks the snooze button is snuggled right up against the Off button, the Skill Testing Question was one of those loop-holes in the universe that didn’t have to make sense.

Normally that story would be enough to give me a good old chuckle and remind me that La Vita E Bella, but things get better. A few days after I receive my 100% grade at McDonald’s, my nagging mind took me to Wikipedia:

“The combined effect of Sections 197 to 206 of the Criminal Code of Canada bans for-profit gaming or betting, with exceptions made for provincial lotteries, licensed casinos, and charity events. Many stores, radio stations, and other groups still wish to hold contests to encourage more purchases or increase consumer interest. These organizations take advantage of the fact that the law does allow prizes to be given for games of skill, or mixed games of skill and chance. In order to make the chance-based contests legal, such games generally have mathematical skill-testing questions incorporated.”

Well played Universe, well played indeed. Wikipedia went on to state that in order for these questions to be ‘Skill Testing’, a minimum of three numbers must used in the arithmetic exercise. And here I am thinking I’m being all clever and witty, when really I’m competing with the freakin Law to see who’s stupider.

So in the end I left my Stupid Happens event a little smarter than when I had gone in. Touché. On the one hand it’s nice to know that Math is not being used and abused, but on the other hand, I miss having this McDonald’s mystery hanging over my head torturing my love for logic and order. I guess I could always look into the raison d’être of Diet Soda (Don’t want to get fat? Want to be health? How about Stop drinking Soda, go on a real Diet, not a Soda diet).

Now, I know what you’re all thinking though, because I did this on purpose, ‘thank goodness he gave us the answer to that MC’s universal Skill Testing Question, cause after the brain battle involved with rationalizing the consumption of McDonald’s, my mind is in no state to be dealing with unsolved mysteries, let alone mathematics…’ So remember kids stay in school, Skill Testing Questions are fun, and the answer is 28.






















When Stupid Happens Brother-Neil and I get pretty Jazzed...