I Hate To Break It To You, But You Are Not Going To Win The Lottery

Do you think a recent lottery winner lives here?

In my last office, we had a guy who ran the lottery pool. He diligently collected money every week from a sizable group of people, but not me. I buy maybe 2 tickets a year, if it occurs to me. Any more investment than that feels like burning money. This man talked about it incessantly, especially if there was a lot of money at stake. In Canada, the jackpots don't get as ridiculously huge as in America, but every now and then, they'll hit 20-40 million dollars. The good thing, though, is that lottery winnings are not taxed in Canada, so if you win $40 million, you get a cheque for $40 million. And this poor schmuck was so sure he'd win.

He worried about which room to book for the team meeting where the group would discuss their next move. He worried about hiring a lawyer to hire to help with the dispersion of the cash. His obsessive desire to hit the big score was mostly confusing, though, because if you had seen this guy, you would have to wonder what the hell he wanted with millions of dollars. I know if I had an endless stream of money, I'd upgrade my already Imelda Marcos-ish shoe collection, and the hotels I stay in when I travel. (Seriously, if I won a lottery, you would actually be able to pinpoint the day in the monthly retail sales results.) But this guy? He didn't look like someone who aspired to great wealth, he looked like someone who slept in a ditch. Never combed his hair or brushed his teeth. Wasn't interested in travel. Didn't want to help his family, based on the many comments about going off the radar to keep his mooching relatives away. And he wasn't poor! He had a house, a car, a pension, and was about to retire. The only thing we knew that he liked was Pepsi. What did he want with millions of dollars? Did he want to ride out his golden years in a villa next to George Clooney on lake Como? To steal Gisele Bundchen from Tom Brady? What?

I never did find out. He retired, so I guess he just buys tickets for himself now. I hope he found a hobby. Hell, I hope he wins the lottery. I really want to know what he'd do with all that money...

Comments

Now or Never Books

As I mentioned in a previous post , and as it's the season, I am in a purging and organizing mood. No, I'm not following Marie Kondo's advice as closely as I should be, mostly because it's SO HARD with books, and I have more books than anything else. I've gone over and over my bookshelves, but I just can't seem to part with any more titles. The vast majority of my books do spark joy, even if it's just the memory of having read it; I know I'm supposed to get rid of them anyway. Not sure I can. I have started making piles that I am calling "now or never" books. One of the bits of advice in The Life-Changing Magic of Tidying Up is essentially: if you haven't read it yet, you're never going to. I just can't face that. In the pile pictured above are some books that I know will be amazing, but for some reason I haven't found the time. I have to read these in the next, let's say, 2 months, or they get donated. It

Girls Who Wear Glasses

Image- Pinterest I had braces for 3 years. That may give you some idea of how out of whack my teeth were as an adolescent. My dad used to say I could eat corn on the cob through a picket fence. Even with good insurance, he still referred to my braces as "the trip to Hawaii." I had them removed just a few weeks into high school. I was perfect, for about a month. Then, one day in math class, my teacher asked me to do the problem written on the blackboard. "There's something written on the blackboard?" I said, which was both smart-ass and true. I couldn't see a damn thing on it. So, off I went for an eye exam, and, sure enough, I needed glasses. I was not pleased. Hipsters hadn't yet been spawned by the devil, and the only people who wore glasses were nerds and old people.

The Cottage Cookbook- Muskoka Memories

On one of my recent purging benders , I found this great old cookbook. I got it decades ago from Mrs Morland, the mother of one of my parents' friends. She had been an operator for Bell Canada in the stone age, when phones were essentially tin cans with string between them. Anyway, as a young woman, she'd bought quite a bit of stock in the company. By the time I knew her as an old lady in the late 70s, she was plenty loaded. And if you were even passably flush in Ontario in the 70s, you had a cottage in Muskoka , or as we always called it, "up north." Pointe au Baril, Ontario. This cookbook is from Pointe au Baril , a beautiful area on the Georgian Bay part of Lake Huron, for those of you not from these parts. I don't remember going there as a kid, but I probably did. My earliest cottage memories were in Bala and Baysville, with my family, and with friends in Lake of Bays, or when we were in the mood for bear sightings, Cache Bay, on the north side of L

Blue Velvet Sectional

Search This Blog