Some are born great, some achieve greatness and some have greatness thrust into their mouths.
Meet Joe — a man who chewed greatness, swallowed greatness but, ultimately didn’t quite have the stomach for all of it.
Joe was last night live-streamed by his friends as he tried to eat 90 chicken McNuggets in 90 minutes.
Thousands tuned in to watch the Herculean feat for which the young Hongkonger stood to reap a prize of HK$20,000 (US$2,550) cold hard cash laid down on the table at what looks to be one of their homes.
But the stakes were higher than just Joe’s threshold for nugget-induced pain.
The penalty for failing to complete the challenge was HK$100 (US$13) for each chicken nugget left over.
Joe was fined HK$3,600 (US$459) which, if our McMath is correct, means he reached an admirable 54 nuggets without throwing up.
Even more impressive, Joe said the money he forked over for his failure will be donated to the Ronald McDonald house charity.
As of this afternoon, video of Joe’s attempt has been viewed more than 333,000 times.
The internet, as always, was split between encouragement, criticism and concern, particularly as one of Joe’s friends yelled out “his face is turning green” as he climbed his personal McEverest.
“Eat faster!” Cheered on one commenter.
“Watching this makes me want to vomit,” said another, who presumably continued watching.
“Has anyone called the ambulance yet?” someone added at the 20 minute mark.
It’s unclearly exactly who came up with the challenge and why, though it does coincide with a series of special offers over the past few days from the American fast food giant.
Yesterday’s offer happened to be nine chicken McNuggets for HK$10 (US$1.30). Hmmm … just HK$100 for 90 nugs? We’re suddenly having a very bad idea.
