Just between you and me (I don’t want this to go public) – If you had a web-cam set up in my house, you would know that when I’m not eating or sleeping, and I’m not at my computer, I’m probably in front of my Playstation – and between 3 and 8 PM, I’m probably there with my seven-year-old son.
As it happens, we were playing a racing game called Gran Turismo and I had just won a race using my son’s favorite car, called a "Tickford." Now, I sometimes keep a car for sentimental reasons, such as, I always wanted to have that car in real life, but for the most part – in game – I select my favorites based on how well they will compete in races. He, on the other hand, selects his favorites based on how cool they are, i.e., "that green one has a cool orange stripe!"
The prize for this particular victory was a car we absolutely needed to compete in a model-specific race; and a promising one, if tuned correctly. But – you guessed it: he didn’t like the car’s appearance. After some convincing, he decided to try the car out on a test track…
It was horrible, the car slid off practically every turn! It had lousy acceleration, practically no brakes and just, generally, didn’t respond well. I suggested that maybe he wasn’t being fair with his criticisms and he retorted that I should "try it yourself!" And so I did…
I found the car to be acceptable, and said so. I even noticed a certain familiarity about it’s responsiveness. I said, "it doesn’t seem to be any different than your Tickford" (the favorite). This was obviously not an acceptable viewpoint, based on his sarcastic reply.
Still trying to placate him – because we really DID need the car – I suggested that he let me tune it and then test the car again, to which he reluctantly agreed.
When I got to the "Tune Up" area of the game, I found that all the tuning had already been done – exactly to the set-up we usually build. Then it dawned on me: we never got in the new car. We had been testing the Tickford!
Note: he has caught me in similar "Eat Crow" situations, but those stories aren’t nearly as amusing!