Addicted to the Claw

Hi, my name is Andrew. And I'm a claw machine addict. I stand before you as a broken man. A man who has spent his hard-earned money on claw machines since a very young age, that is, even before I earned any money. As a young child taken to places of amusement, I would always beg my mother for a couple of quarters so I could win something from the claw machine. Didn't matter what it was, I just wanted to win. An addiction that would carry over into adulthood.

Why does a grown-up man still play with such a machine? I don't know. It's certainly fun, there's no denying that. I guess if you think about how much money an adult would spend trying to win a prize, it would be the equivalent of spending a few bucks on lottery tickets. So I guess people like me have disposable money. I'd burn a hole in my pocket if I didn't put that money to some good use. But a claw machine, why?

Does the claw machine contain any item of value so as to make it worth spending a few bucks just trying to win the elusive prize? Well, quite frankly, no. The claw machine prizes are usually stuffed animals of varying size and quality. The 25-cent machines usually contain small prizes, like stuffed animals the size of beanie babies or even candy, which God only knows how long that stale and decaying food has been locked up inside the glass box. The 50-cent machines have prizes slightly larger items, from better quality stuffed animals to toy balls (plush or mini basketballs or baseballs) to plastic squeak toys, which look suspiciously like the same squeak toys you'd give to the family pet. And if your addiction takes you to the $1 dollar machines, you could win prizes as large as a house cat, ranging from full-sized teddy bears to pillow-shaped objects bearing sports team logos. Yes, that's right, most of the items are junk, unless you have a fondness for stuffed animals, which I do and which still doesn't make much sense for a grown man to collect, unless I consider myself a hoarder.

And there lies the problem, hoarding the items one wins from a claw machine. What good does it do to collect so many stuffed animals when I don't even have any kids? "What a horrible waste of money!" you say? Well, not so. Even though I have a terrible addiction, playing claw machines that contain items I'm not even remotely interested in, I still have a good plan for the prizes I win. You see, to control my hoarding and turn my bad habit into a positive hobby, at year's end (i.e., Christmastime), I like to donate a sizeable amount of the stuffed animals I win to the U.S. Marine Corps Reserve's charitable program "Toys For Tots" box found at my workplace. I take a bag full of these cuddly little critters and dump them into the box every December, knowing full well that some needy child somewhere will treasure the little prize I won from the claw machine. My addiction is their reward.

Can anyone spare a quarter? I see an Angry Bird plush toy in that claw machine over there.

~Andrew K.