10.15.2008

Bingo History

This day in Bingo history...

On October 15th, 1992, exactly sixteen years ago today, there occurred what is known as the St. Augustine's Retirement Center Bingo Massacre of '92 (not to be confused with St. Benedict's Church Bingo Massacre that occurred three years earlier) when Agnes Hochmeier won what became the last Bingo match ever played in St. Augustine's.

Several rounds into this particular match came the "blackout" round, in which participants try to cover every space on their board. Many people had already won prizes, but among the two who had not yet won were Agnes Hochmeier and Richard Charleston. As the round went on, it became clear that Agnes and Richard were in a dead heat for the win, and when the announcer called "B-12," Agnes shouted, "Bingo!" at the top of her feeble lungs.

The agony of this particular defeat burned Richard far more than any other he had yet known. He needed only one more square to cover his board, and had the announcer called "O-63," that Bingo win would have been his. And since he had never been so close to a "blackout" win before, he was ready to go crazy on the place.

And go crazy he did. He yelled like a beast out of hell and overturned his Bingo table. He embarked on a maniacal rampage that involved pushing everybody else's Bingo cards on the floor, pulling the hair of his fellow residents, punching out the Bingo announcer, and trying to suck Agnes' blood like a vampire. Had his tantrum not taken so much of his energy, he may have succeeded in killing Anges and burning the whole building down, but he passed out shortly after he leapt at his Bingo rival's neck.

Two hours later a staff member arrived to escort the residents to dinner. In the aftermath of the massacre, however, most of the residents were not as hungry as usual. After dinner, Agnes was declared the winner and awarded her prize. Richard was given a one-hour timeout during social time the next day. Bingo was banned forever.

You wouldn't even know that she was almost killed for those seven dollars.

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