Lotto fever

Lyons, Ohio is a village located a few miles from the Michigan border and has a total population under 600 people. It, also, has the newly crowned Mega millionaire. While the person or persons who won the 276,000,000 dollar jackpot has decided to remain anonymous, I cannot help but dream what I would do with all that money. Would I be magnanimous and share it with all my causes, would I become part of the spending elite and buy myself a diamond encrusted toilet seat?

Evil Twin #2 started my Lotto fever. Two weeks ago, she visited Boston on the coldest weekend we've had this year. And as we shivered walking in Downtown crossing, we were distracted by the fold out sign outside a cigarette/convenient store. At that time the Mega Millions Jackpot was a mere 180,000,000 dollars, but it was enough to entice into the dark 8' by 8' store. We bought our lucky numbers and a few quick picks to spare.

Unfortunately, evil twins do not normally win these kind of things. Winners are from small towns like, Lyons. They go to church on Sundays and when they win they like to thank their Lord Saviour Almighty Jesus Christ. Sometimes they are on their last dollar, or like the recent Powerball winners, immigrants living out the American Dream. A lottery winner always makes a good human interest piece on the news.

So I came up with a plan. I needed a story. I attempted to thwart Lady Lotto Luck, by buying my ticket with pennies. Couldn't you see the headlines, "woman buys MegaMillions ticket with her last pennies?" I went to the slightly ghetto Stop and Shop in Mission Hill to buy my ticket (winning tickets are never sold in affluent areas. Even Senator Judd Gregg bought his winning Powerball ticket from a less than reputable convenient store.) I went in with a clear takeout soup container full of pennies. V agreed to enable my psychosis by helping count out stacks of 10 pennies. The lady at the customer service desk pointed out the Coinstar machine. I thanked her for her help, but told her I thought those machines were a waste of money because they take 8.9% as a handling fee. (The eighty year old woman who was returning her broccoli agreed.) After we stacked 300 pennies, I purchased my one number ticket and my two quickpicks.

I did not win. In all, it was a good experience. For five dollars total, I got to dream for a 2 weeks about all the things I could do with the money. A movie ticket which only provides, 3 hours of fun, costs a good eight dollars. And of course, no matter what the odds are, if you don't play you can never win.