Winning an Intellivision from a can of Pringles

We were piled all about my parent's bedroom. It was Sunday evening, a McGarity household tradition to lounge around & watch a movie. This particular evening, it was ABC's premiere of "Smokey and the Bandit 2".

At the time, there had been a recently-introduced snack food called Pringles. They came packaged in two cans shrink-wrapped together. This was a most-excellent configuration for maintaining family sanity – mom would buy these bi-Pringles, give one can to me, the other to my brother, and we would have our own physically-separate supply without fighting over a single bag of chips.

So that evening, I was munching away at my can while rooting for both the Bandit & Sheriff Justice (quite the compelling character). Before the climax, thanks to my child-sized hand, I reached down to the bottom of the can to retrieve the final Pringle. However, the can wasn't completely empty: there was a piece of paper accompanying the remaining crisp.

The paper read: "Congratulations! You have won a Mattel Electronics Intellivision"

I blinked and read it again. And again. I tried to alert my dad, who told me to wait until the next commercial break.

I showed my dad the paper and he was happy & excited for me. I showed it to my brother and he was far less happy & excited for me.

I found the original contest rules from 1982. It was held in the United States (except for Kansas — fuck you in particular, Jayhawks!) and the prizes included:

• Grand Prize (1 total): Intellivision console, Intellivoice module, and 25 games worth $1100.
• 1st Prize (250 total): Intellivision console and 1 game worth $250
• 2nd Prize (750 total): bicycle worth $130
• 3rd Prize (1000 total): Football 2 handheld worth $25

So apparently I won one of the 250 1st prizes!

My dad took the paper to work, so he could photocopy everything before mailing it off to the Nebraska P.O. Box. Then it became a waiting game....

Eventually, the Intellivision arrived, but my mom withheld it because I was being punished for other behavior (worse than being grounded)! So the wait stretched out even longer for 9-year-old McG...!

Finally, the day came, and the box was beautiful — So vivid and full of color (although in retrospect, every game is so green). The one game I won along with it was Poker & Blackjack. Compare the box art to actual gameplay — such incredible fidelity. No false advertising here, folks!

The Intellivision became the center of our video game lives, immediately supplanting the Atari 2600 for which we never bought another game. We played it all the time, until my cat threw up on it & fried the motherboard.

Good times.