Hellzapoppin' For The Lowell Spinners

If it's Friday, it must be "wacky minor-league promotion" day. This week's entry comes from the Single-A affiliate of the Boston Red Sox, the Lowell Spinners. In the middle of the third inning during Saturday night's game against the Aberdeen Ironbirds, the team will attempt to set a new world record for... the most people popping bubble-wrap at the same time.

It's to celebrate the wrapping material's golden anniversary, and according to the team site, the festivities will also include "a kid's Bubble Wrap dance off, and all fans who've celebrated their 50th birthday within the past year will be invited onto the Bubble Wrap dance floor to dance to 50-Cent." The 50th fan into the park that night will also win a year’s supply of popcorn, if the 50th out of the game is - what else? - a pop-up.

The focus, however, will be on the record attempt - not that anyone appears to know what the current mark is [I would not be surprised if a college frat house was involved somehow]. For this attempt, everyone in attendance - including staff members and players - will be given a one-foot-square piece of bubble wrap on entering the park. I quite like the idea of the dugout being filled with the pleasantly-relaxing sounds of plastic being squeezed.

It's not the team's first efforts in the area of setting records of dubious merit. Back on August 17, 2004, they set the record for the largest game of "Duck, Duck, Goose," though it appears that record may subsequently have fallen. The biggest problem Saturday may be restraint. Said their VP of Communications Jon Goode, "We just hope that fans will be able to resist the urge to pop the Bubble Wrap before the record attempt."