My wife and I attended a “Wicked Wednesday” evening at the South Okanagan Events Centre in Penticton last week.
Wicked Wednesday is a promotion built around a mid week Penticton Vees game, where a raffle for a used car is held in conjunction with the game. A limited number of tickets are sold, making the odds of winning quite reasonable, at least when compared to those of, say Lotto Max.
Another selling point of the promo are cheap ticket prices – $5 – and beer, at $2.50.
What’s not to like? There is something for everyone, it amounts to a low cost night away from the family television (where nothing is on anyway) and it gets people out in support of the local hockey team.
It seemed to be working, judging by the crowds on both evenings, which I believe were in excess of 2,000.
I even ran into an acquaintance I hadn’t seen in seven years.
Holy cow, had he ever aged.
In our case, I always enjoy going to watch the Vees, but seldom make the effort on my own.
My wife appreciates the draw opportunities offered by the promos, so she provides the impetus to get us both to the SOEC. It’s win-win-win for everyone involved.
It wasn’t our first time to this mid week promotion. We went to our first one last year, but as novices, lost out on our chance to win a 2001 Aztec.
After finding our seats and our $2.50 beer, we made the beginner’s mistake of waiting until the first period intermission to buy a ticket on the vehicle.
At first, I couldn’t find the sales area for the tickets – it was located in the Hockey Hall of Fame area – nor did I realize how busy the ticket sellers were.
Finally, I didn’t realize at the time that the tickets were limited. I was third from the front of the line when ticket sales were declared over.
Bad timing.
“That would have been my car,” my wife said as we watched the Aztec being presented to the eventual winner.
She was probably right.
Still it was a good night out, with an entertaining hockey game to boot.
We were better educated upon attending last week’s version of the event, where a 2001 Ford Taurus was up for grabs.
We got our tickets before finding out seats, waiting until the first period intermission to purchase some 50 /50 tickets.
It still wasn’t our night, as someone else took home both prizes, and to top it off, the Vees lost.
But hey, there’s always next time.
