Report: Nobody wants to go to your games night

Halifax — A recent report by Statistics Atlantic has confirmed that absolutely nobody wishes to attend the games night you’ve been planning for this coming Friday.

“No amount of chips or veggie trays will make four hours of Monopoly with three boring couples seem at all enticing,” reads the report, which doesn’t hold back its criticism of games nights as a general concept, and yours in particular. “How could you possibly think it would be a good idea to entertain your friends with everyone’s most hated family ritual? Honestly, what is wrong with you?

“Not to mention, who wants to waste a Friday evening playing board games?” demands the scathing report. “Beautiful Fridays in June are for going out and hitting up a patio, not playing Parcheesi at your work-friend’s girlfriend’s apartment. Maybe a dreary Sunday evening in the dead of winter…maybe. But even then there’s only a 12 per cent chance your friends might want to — and that’s if there’s nothing good on TV.”

The report quotes your friend Mike, who usually shows up to pretty much any event as long as there’s the promise of beer. 

“But this is a ‘wholesome’ games night, according to the Facebook event… so like, no drinking,” said Mike. “And they suggested we all bring ‘our favourite vegan dish to share’…seriously, who wants to do any of that? I’ll have more fun at home by myself — at least then I won’t have to play Pictionary with people I barely know.”

On page 16 of the report, a graph shows a downward red arrow illustrating what happens the second an event becomes a “potluck.”

“If you’re hosting the event, you should provide food,” the graph’s caption reads. “As the responsibility shifts to the guests, the likelihood of those guests deciding to show up at all plummets to an abysmal four per cent. No one wants to get home after a stressful work-week and prepare meatless meatballs for ungrateful acquaintances.”

Page 23 of the report mentions the improbability of anyone even bothering to click “going” on the Facebook invite you sent out.

“You’ll be lucky to get one ‘yes’ on Facebook,” it says, next to a pie chart illustrating typical Facebook responses for events that are this level of lame. “Approximately 86 per cent of the people you invited will say ‘maybe,’ because that noncommittal answer frees them from any guilt normally associated with not attending a friend’s sad event. Be warned that none of the ‘maybes’ will show up, and even the one ‘yes’ is quite iffy.”