One time, in second grade, a bunch of us were playing soccer at morning recess. I, having recently learned that the Spanish-speaking world calls soccer ‘fútbol,’ said, “We’re playing fútbol!” to no one in particular. Later, when teachers broke up the game because students were tackling other students, a kid pleaded, “But someone said we were playing football!”
This story has nothing to do with Easter or with anything else that follows, but it came to mind this morning as I blew my nose.
Most of the time with Easter, you hear about an egg hunt. You’ve probably even hunted eggs yourself. But every now and then, you hear the term ‘egg roll.’ What’s that? That’s why we’re here.
Per Wikipedia and whatever dictionary Google uses, an egg hunt is “a treasure hunt played at Easter during which children look for hidden decorated eggs or Easter eggs.” An egg roll is “a Chinese-style snack consisting of diced meat or shrimp and shredded vegetables wrapped in a dough made with egg and deep-fried.” The price of the latter is about to triple.
If you’ve ever worried that ‘egg roll’ is some other name for ‘egg hunt’ used regionally in regions different than your own (like how people in Massachusetts call water fountains ‘bubblers’), worry no more. If you’ve ever worried that egg rolls are the dominant variant of Easter egg activities in particular American subcultures, don’t worry about that either. I worried about both those things. I worried for naught. There is one notable Easter egg roll in the United States, and it is the one at the White House. What is it?
They push eggs around on the grass with spoons. It sounds crazy out of context, but in context, it merely makes the kids look dumb.
With that out of the way, let’s talk about how to win your family’s egg hunt this year.
Most of the time when people tell you how to win an egg hunt, they remind you that kids are dumber than you but closer to the ground. I don’t think these are the only two variables to worry about. Closeness to the ground is particularly overrated.
What really determines egg hunt success is the intersection of how smart you are and how badly you want it. This is why nine-year-olds fare better at egg hunts than 16-year-olds. The teenagers are smarter, but the fourth-graders want it more. We peak early in this country.
Other tips:
- If you aren’t the only adult participating, make sure to make one of the other adults’ kids cry. That way, they’ll tend to their crying child, leaving more eggs to you. Bump into a toddler. Just a little bump, but enough to make them topple. Make it look like a teenager bumped you first. You were just trying to keep your balance!
- Similarly, try to start a fight between two elementary school-aged kids. Make up something one of them said about the other. These can get serious enough to require intervention, but you don’t have to be the one to intervene. If it doesn’t work and they don’t fight? The one you lied to will be so rattled by what you said that they’ll do the egg hunt on tilt, overlooking plenty of eggs in obvious places, like the one sitting on the swing.
- When the organizer yells, “Go!” take off in a sprint. This won’t help you but it always gets a laugh.
- Pick a baby and call them your teammate. They will eat none of the candy and more people will excuse your actions.
- If you see a particularly strong player carrying a lot of eggs, ask if they’ve hit the maximum. They won’t know if there’s a maximum or not. You don’t need to know if there’s a maximum or not. Try-hards hear something like that, and they go ask for rules clarification. More eggs for you.
- If you’re hurt and can’t sprint when the organizer yells “Go!”, fire your gun into the air instead. This will not get a laugh, but it will sure make the atmosphere more dramatic!
- Don’t worry about eating the candy as you collect it. Your wife is going to scold you for your consumption anyway. Eat it at whatever pace gives you the most joy. Nothing you do will change the scolding.
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