I play Barrel Of Monkeys, frequently. Like many another kid’s game, this simple pastime can when approached by a grown person, reveal unsuspected nuances and aspects that make it fascinating and rewarding. I’ve been playing for five years now, mostly solo because 1) none of my friends want to play with me (either because they think it’s just a kid game or because they’ve seen me in action and know I’d have them whupped), and 2) I don’t know any kids, nor want to; besides, if you play a game with a kid you’re supposed to let the kid win. I’ve gotten real good, too. I can pick up all 13 of monkeys in my set in about a minute and a half or three-quarters nearly every time, and I’ve done it a few times in a minute or a little less
Naturally, I wanted to do some research on my new interest, so, naturally, I looked on Wikipedia. Therein I found the following information:
*The first speed record for a standard 13 monkey barrel of monkeys game was set by Dr. Gilbert Patterson on November 29, 2014. The time was officially recorded as 2:01:88 minutes.
On July 4, 2015 Sir Robert Donald of Orange County set a new unofficial record of 2:00.46. The recorded game is being sent in for review by the North American Barrel of Monkeys Association.*
Well, like I already told you, I’ve got that beat! The problem is, how do I prove it? There’s no official BO’M site that keeps these records as far as I can tell (I have tried several times to locate this so-called North American Barrel of Monkeys Association), and I looked up the names of both of the worthy gentlemen listed above, to no avail – which prevents me from issuing my challenge directly to the defender, as it were.
So, how do I go about contacting someone in charge of verifying these kinds of things, in order to claim my ace-ness and set the record straight on the matter?
I don’t have any idea of where you go to establish that record. But I recall the chronicles of a co-worker who beat the world’s record for another, quite popular game. To begin with, the game needs to be taped with a recorded time display.
He used to watch his videos and analyze them for places to pick up time. Just like race car drivers do, he used split times between various milestones. A record time for one section might be followed by a relatively slow time for the next. By adding up all the fastest segment times, a theoretical fastest overall time was generated. It took months to gain the last second or two as I recall.
The Wikipedia article is suspect. There’s no source for the alleged record times. It also says “standard 13 monkey barrel of monkeys game”, but it’s never been sold in a set of 13.
Create a website for the World Barrel of Monkeys Association (WBMA) and start publicising your successes there. Amend the wikipedia page to reflect your “officially endorsed” records with links and all will be well.
I am sure lots of professional types do this. Say you are a data analyst. You create the Data Analytics and Intelligence International Forum (DAIIF) and list yourself as a founding member on LinkedIn. Only people like me who google such things ever find out that it is some tissue thin veneer.
Start with Guinness. Any world record of this sort claimed otherwise will be suspect. Not that they go to any great effort to make sure they have identified the world’s best for something like this, but a Guinness World Record has brand based credibility while any other one is immediately suspect. As mentioned above you can just form your own BoM record sanctioning organization, but so can someone else.
Or you could see a doctor and get some medication to stop this OCD behavior.
Well, quality control slipped up when my current set was made-it’s got 13 monkeys! Since 13 is my lucky number, I was delighted to find this out the first time I threw out the monkeys from that barrel.