"Then we heard a couple of people, just random people, in the store say it, which was quite amusing," she said.
"And the store lady just gave us the weirdest look, she had no idea what was going on. And we had to spend five, 10 minutes explaining it to her."
For some, the effort behind the slippery concept of thinking about forgetting is just too much. So they focus on making others lose, going on the concept that as long as others are losing more often, they're still coming out ahead.
"You can leave notes for people. There are certain key words that you can use that will remind them - the game, losing," says Zakay. "People have sent me e-mails, notes, anything that will make you kind of unsuspectingly pick something up and get surprised."
Strategies and hints on how to do this are a popular topic of discussion on the Facebook group and on www.losethegame.com.
Ideas include penning the website along the bottom of money. That leads whoever ends up with the bills to either lose immediately, or follow the link to learn about the game and, therefore, lose. There's also changing your MSN name to include a reference to the game, so that every time you log on, you set off a chain reaction of loss among the friends who see it.
The very idea of the game infuriates some people.
"Many people say that the game is pointless, which it is," says Haywood.
"But my argument is that kicking balls around a field and into a net is pointless, too, as are most games."
"The purpose of games is to pose a challenge that's fun to play."
Johnston said she often gets a negative reaction when she tries to explain the game to adults.
"Some of them have a good laugh with it, and join along for a while, then they might leave it," she said.
"But a lot of them, I find, just look at it as a waste of time."
What seems to ruffle some people's feathers is that this isn't really the kind of game you can win.
"I guess once you start playing, you can't really stop," says Zakay.
"It's with you for life. I guess the point of the game is to not lose before you die."
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