Day 54: Did I become a millionaire

Between You, Me and the Lamp Post

Day 54: Did I become a millionaire

Last Friday I made the bold statement ‘I’m gonna be a millionaire’ and I’ll bet some of you are wondering if I indeed won the lottery.

I must say, I had every reason to be hopeful, there had been signs of good fortune to come and when I received an email from the lottery commission saying ‘You are a winner’ I thought ... this is it.

When I checked my account my hopes and dreams were once again smashed to smithereens. No penthouse condo, no Lamborghini in the garage, no giant diamond on my finger, not able to help those in desperate need.

I had indeed won, but not nearly as much as I had hoped for. I had won $40 and a free ticket. Okay, not enough for Dieter and me to quit our jobs, but enough for four weeks of free play. Better than nothing, right?

Maybe it’s for the best that I didn’t win. Would I survive winning millions of dollars?

Many years ago I bought a family magazine every week. At one time the magazine ran a competition. Inside the magazine was a number followed by two letters, for instance, 277 AB. Week after week I checked the provided sticker but I was never the lucky one.

And then one week it happened. I checked my sticker, 934 TN and the winning number was 934 TM. Holy shit, I screamed like I had seen a monster and started jumping up and down.

Alerted by the noise, my then-husband came running into the living room to see what was doing on. “We won! We won!” I kept repeating. He grabbed the magazine, checked the sticker and ... “Hold on a second,” he said. “You didn’t win. The winning number is 934 TM and your sticker number is 934 TN.” 

Oh, the disappointment of it. 

The thing is though, in that competition the winning amount was 1,000 Rand ($87,25). If I had such a reaction to $87,25 can you imagine what I would be like if I found out I had won millions? I'm liable to give myself a heart attack and drop dead on the spot. 

Still, I'll take the chance and play again next Friday. One day (hopefully soon) I will get it right, right?

What would change if you won the lottery?

Like millions of others, I play the lottery every week. I have a set of numbers memorized which makes it sort of necessary to play. Suppose I don’t play one week and my numbers come up … I would pull out my last hair.

Like so many others I often fantasize what I would do if I hit the jackpot: move to a nicer neighborhood, drive an exotic car, go shopping for clothes, shoes, and jewelry, donate to the local animal shelter and help a few of my friends.

Beyond that, I don’t actually have a clue what I would do with millions of dollars. Do you? Having no money brings problems, but having tons of money would no doubt bring problems too.

To find out a little more about a lucky winner I recently read “Lottery” by Anita Burgh.

Peggy, the main character wins the jackpot and as a result, her life, that of her husband and three children dramatically changes.

While the book was a nice enough read, the alcohol consumption of the main character bothered me to no end. I lost count of the amount of gin this woman guzzled. Gin and tonic in the morning, for lunch, at dinner, and while watching TV. Forget glasses, this woman went through bottles and bottles of the stuff, interspersed with red and white wine and brandy.

She drank when she was happy, she drank when she was sad, she drank alone and she drank in company. I got the feeling that whenever the writer didn’t know what to do with her character, she had her reach for the bottle.

Admittedly, her life was not without problems. Her husband hooked up with her best friend, her children treated her as their own personal piggy bank and friends and neighbors suddenly gave her the cold shoulder. Still, is that any reason to start downing gin and tonics?

Every person with a bit of common sense knows that alcohol doesn’t solve any problems, if anything, it creates more of them.

Fortunately, this is not the first book I’ve read from Anita Burgh. If it was, I might not go for a second.

Has the book altered my enthusiasm for winning the lottery … not at all. 

There’s no chance of a cheating husband as I’m divorced and will never marry again (not if you held a knife to my throat).

There would be no children fighting over financial favoritism as I only have one child and he would share in my good fortune.

Friends would most definitely not turn their backs on me, as I would pay them a visit and present them with a nice check.

And if neighbors were to give me the cold shoulder … who cares, I would soon have new neighbors. 

Neither would I become a drunken lush as I don’t drink at all.

So, next Friday I’m going to play my numbers as usual, keep my fingers crossed, expect the worst but hope for the best.

Drop by my website at:

www.connymanero.weebly.com

When the going gets tough, the crooks get creative

The unemployed are easy targets for crooks.  Now that promised millions from Middle Eastern business men and princes no longer have the desired effect, scammers have to come up with other ways to ensnare well-meaning people into their web.

If the unemployed happen to be a writers (and let’s face it, with millions of blogs out there, who isn’t a writer these days?) the scams become much more easy to execute.  Just play on someone’s writing abilities and you scam is sure to get attention.  It got mine.

The scam in question is a call for bloggers on Craigslist. 

Serious inquiries only. This is for people who are looking to put in the hard work daily to create limitless opportunistic for themselves through blogging. I need ten new bloggers respond to this post and the details will follow. Make anywhere between 25-1000 dollars your first day.

Sounds intriguing, right?  I thought so too.  So I clicked the provided link and made some enquiries.

Maria (not her real name) sent me the following explanation:

Hey Conny! If your already wayyyy into the freelance writing and blogging than you could very easily transform your current work into this blog! This would be great for you! I think its great for anyone really! It's the best move I 've made for myself since working wayy too many jobs to try and get by! I would like to work one on one with you so that you understand the process. I will send over the video that explains how everything works, but I must say some people are overwhelmed by it. There are four steps to our program. I myself, only did the first two steps which are basic and inner circle training. What scares people off initially is the fact that you have to pay a monthly fee to be a part of the XXX network. Don't be frightened by that. I didn't start off with much money myself and together the first two steps cost me about a hundred and twenty five dollars. (I was in between jobs when I invested trust me it is soooo worth a hundred dollars.) However, I made it all back the second day with two hundred dollars into my account! 

The video will explain everything but I like to break it down for people so that they can understand it better. You blog daily, get attention to your blog simply by posting everyday and making new connections. They join your team and you get straight money to the bank! Its really quite simple. You learn new tricks and tools for small businesses and tips to live like the new rich. If you would like to talk to me more about the process after you watch the video you can call me personally at XXX XXX XXXX between the hours of 9 am- 1 pm tomorrow-Friday. I know I asked my sponsor about 100 questions my first day! If you are interested in lifestyle design and you want to take the leap I suggest you do! You can work when you want and where you want and make an endless amount of money! It sounds crazy but my sponsor Christopher is pulling in around 1500 dollars in just a few hours of work. Same for the rest of our team. Our specific team is very friendly and I'm sure you would get along with us great we even have our own facebook group called "The XXX." The last team trip was to Costa Rica! It was only my first week on the job so I unfortunately did not make that team meeting :p. Anyways thats lots of exciting things going on! I hope we can add you to the team and get you pointed off in the right direction! 

Here is the video:  They make you enter your email first but then the video appears :) Please contact me if you have questions after the video !!! I repeat please contact me if you are confused on to how this actually works. I would hate for you to get confused or think this is more complicated than it really is. Its probably the most simple, full-filling lifestyle one could have! I know the video is a little long but its worth watching! 

-Maria

As soon as I read that I had to pay to join, I smelled a rat.  I may not be a decedent from Einstein, but I wasn’t exactly hatched under a chicken either.  I also noticed several spelling mistakes, which didn't instill confidence.  So I asked Maria how much had to be paid.  She replied …

There are now five steps to the XXX Program. I started off with the first two because I really did not have any money to spare. I had no job but I knew something had to be done and that my four year business degree was worth more than babysitting and waiting tables until I figured my life out. The first step which is the basic membership is twenty five dollars. The second is 100. Third step is 500. Fourth is 1000, the newly added step costs 3500 dollars. (Which sounds insane but for our upper members like my sponsor, he makes that 3500 dollar commission off of adding new people to his team daily, that its absolutely ridiculous.) Did you watch the video yet?  What my sponsor recommended me to do was to invest in the first two because that was all I could afford until I could move up. That week I realized how easy it really was. While I had two members join my team the second day. I made two hundred dollars. They bought the 500 dollar step. Therefore I lost a thousand dollars worth of commissions off having new members join my team because well simply I did not have a choice! I was still sort of broke then! I hope that kind of puts a bit of a picture on what happens here in the XXX network. In the meantime I was blogging, getting traffic to my site was really quite easy because the XXX network does most of the work for you! You can sit at home blog about whatever you want, people like personality if they like what you write about they will be attracted to your blog! Which your probably already really good at by now! 

She made money with baby sitting ... just exactly how old is this girl?  A program that works for you while you sit back and do nothing ... I smelled another rat.  A pack of rats actually.  If it was this easy to make money, would anyone bother with a full-time job?

Do these people think we’re crazy!  Who’s going to spend that kind of money?

It might be good for the starter or the program though.  With every new fool who joins, he gets a fee.  Then it’s up to you to rope in your friends (to make a little money) or to advertise on Craigslist or Facebook to find other fools.

Fortunately, I am not a fool and those I know aren’t either.

Can money buy happiness?

Last Friday, the Max Millions lotto drawing was $50 million. 

A jackpot this size always draws more players than usual.  Some people can’t be bothered with $10 or $15 million, when they win they want to win big and $15 million just doesn’t cut it.

Me, I play every week, twice a week.  I play the Max Millions on Fridays and 649 on Saturdays.  Having a regular set of numbers I can’t afford not to play.  Imagine not playing and recognizing the winning numbers as “my” numbers ... I wouldn’t survive the shock.

Yet this is exactly what happened ... last Friday, I forgot to play.  This in itself was a shock.  $50 million up for grabs and I didn’t buy a ticket! 

I’m sure there are others like me, faithful players who buy a ticket every week with a regular set of numbers.  I wonder if they ever won anything sizable.  I don’t mean a free ticket or $5 or $10 here and there, I mean a sum that makes a difference.

Whenever I read about Lotto winners I find there are four categories:

• people who state that this was their first time playing;
• people who only play when the jackpot meets their expectations;
• the elderly; and
• the disabled.

Since I don’t fit in any of the four categories, I wonder about my chances.  I also wonder what I would do with $50 million. 

People say that money doesn't buy happiness, but I’d sure would like to put that theory to the test.  $50 million would make me VERY happy and I can think of quite a few people and one organization with whom I would share that happiness.

I shall persevere and try again next Friday ...

Book characters

Aspiring actors are given the advice to avoid type casting. Only being able to portray one type of character might lead to an audience quickly becoming bored with that actor. 

Aspiring authors would do well to follow the same advice. Writing about the same subject over and over again will make what the reader can expect predictable. Some very talented authors can get away with it, weaving a completely different story writing about their favorite subject.

Among others, Jilly Cooper can do this. Whether she writes about Rupert Campbell Black’s antics in “Riders” or an emotionally abused grandma in “Jump”, somewhere along the line a horse is playing a part, but the stories are very different.

Author X (I shall not mention her name) is not such an author or she didn’t get the memo. All her books are about the rich and famous. I liked her first book, I like it enough to buy the second one. I was somewhat disappointed when the second story was again about people with money and power, but okay, maybe it was a coincidence.

Research about her third and fourth novel revealed that the story was again about the rich and famous and I thought “Oh hell no.”

Author X’s books summarized:

·       The main character is filthy rich. He’s not just a millionaire, he’s a billionaire. While it can be nice to read about people with pots of money, it can also become rather annoying. Especially if your bank balance lacks a couple of zeros.

·       Supporting characters work themselves into a stupor. Working 18 hours a day is part of the package in clawing their way to the top.

·       After work they attend parties (only movers and shakers invited of course) where they drink copious amount of champagne and sniff a few lines of coke. I have no experience with coke sniffing, but on the few occasions that I looked too deep into a glass I had such a hangover the next day that I was in no condition to go to work. 

·       When the supporting characters come home from the party they have steamy sex for hours on end. This really makes me wonder. If they worked an 18 hour day and got wasted at a party, how do they manage to romp around until the wee hours of the morning? When do these people actually sleep?

·       Still on the subject of sexual escapades … the men are always ready for action and the women have multiple orgasms. I have a little trouble with that too. I think it’s far more likely that a woman who’s been on her feet since the crack of dawn, and for whom the room starts to spin to moment she lies down (on account of all the champagne) is more likely to utter the words “Not tonight honey”.

·       While the women sleep their way around New York, Los Angeles, London, Sidney and a few other cities, they don’t give a second thought to sexually transmitted diseases. They meet a man who can help them reach their goal and hup, they’re between the sheets. Whatever happened to women making it on their own? Isn’t it a little degrading that they still use sex as a means of advancement?

·       The men in author X’s stories invariably look like George Clooney. I can only sigh and shake my head at the comparison. I mean really, is there only one attractive man on earth? Personally I don’t see what the big deal is. I’ve seen Clooney in his early years in the TV series E.R. and in movies such as “Up in the Air” and “The Descendants” and I see nothing special. He’s a good actor, but as far as looks are concerned he’s not my cup of tea.

·       The women in author X’s stories are always chic and glamorous. They wear designer clothing (of course, if you worked 18 hours a day in a power job you could afford designer labels too), their hair is always smooth and sleek no matter what the weather conditions are, and short of mascara and a bit of lip gloss they wear no makeup. They are blessed with a natural beauty.

Darn, I wish I was blessed with a natural beauty. When there’s moisture in the air my hair turns frizzy no matter what I do.
As for makeup, I need the full nine yards. If I was to just use a bit of mascara and lip gloss I’d look like death warmed up.

While some people will undoubtedly enjoy a story about millionaires and their entourage, that doesn’t mean that author X has to be the sole provider of those stories. Can’t she write about something else? 

Then again, maybe I’m taking this all a bit too seriously. After all, it is just fiction. But if I am taking these stories seriously, I’m hardly the only one. One woman posted on author X’s website “Could you give Adam H.  my phone number? Even though he’s selfish and arrogant, I want to marry him (and his billions)”.

Donations ... what is your money used for?

Has anyone seen the ad from the Princess Margaret hospital on TV?  They’re website is www.helpconquercancer.ca, which incidentally is also their slogan to motivate you to donate.  But what is your money really used for?

Visit the website and have a look at the houses they are giving away.  How did they come into possession of those mansions?  Were they donated or were they bought?  Bought with your donations?

They must have an awful lot of donations.  The mansion in Oakville is valued at $3,999,000 and the one in Muskoka $1,175,000.  There are also luxury condos to be won at King Street West and Downtown Toronto.
In addition there are fourteen cars to be won, ranging between $300,000 and $18,000.

All in all over ten million on prizes are to be won.  TEN MILLION!!!  How did the organization get ten million dollars?  If that’s the total amount of donations, shouldn’t that money be used for … oh I don’t know, the research and treatment of cancer!

When will people open their eyes and close their wallets and say “You’ve wasted enough of our money.”

Lotto Winnings

Tonight was Lotto night and I won ... nothing.
I was close, I could have had four numbers right, but close isn’t good enough.

The Lotto corporation’s motto is ‘You have to be in it to win it’. Well, I have been in it. I have been in it for years, but I haven’t won yet.
What exactly do they mean by ‘You have to be in it to win it'? Win a free ticket? Win five or ten bucks? That’s all I’ve ever won.
No, wait, I’m lying.

We were only two or three weeks in Canada when I started playing Lotto. Back then I played Super 7 and when checking my ticket I noticed, with growing excitement, that I had not three or four but five numbers right.
Being new to the game I thought I had won several thousand dollars.
I mean, five out of seven numbers, that had to be a sizeable payout, right?
Wrong, I won exactly $132,23.

Since then I’ve won numerous free tickets for three correct numbers and the occasional $10 for four correct numbers, but other than that ... nothing worth mentioning.

Occasionally you hear or read of people who won the jackpot. Usually old folks or the disabled. And if you hear of someone winning it’s usually a lucky shot. According to their interview they usually never play, them buying a ticket was a fluke, a shot in the dark. Yet here they are, millionaires.

Don’t you find it strange that it’s always old folks, disabled or ‘new’ players that win? Maybe it looks better that way for the Lotto corporation. I mean, how would it sound if a 32 year accountant stated that he had been playing for years and years and never won anything more than $10? That wouldn’t exactly prompt people to buy a ticket, now would it?
They might think ... ‘If that guy had been playing for years without winning anything, then we might also have to wait for a long long time before this game pays off’.
On the other hand, if you hear someone stating that he was a first time ticket buyer, then others might think they might get lucky too.
Does it all come down to strategy?

So what happens to all the money that the Lotto corporation collects? Does it all go back to the players or does it find another purpose? I once heard that half of it goes to the players and half of it gets divided among charities.
So let’s say that the Lotto corporation collects forty million dollars in one week, does that mean that twenty million dollars get divided among charities? Surely not, if that were the case the charities would be swimming in money.
I personally support the Toronto Cat Rescue (TCR for short) and I’ve never heard of them receiving a cent from the Lotto corporation.
So where does the money go?

If I question the Lotto corporation as I do, why do I keep playing you might wonder. Simple, I have two sets of numbers I’ve been playing with for years and I know them by heart.
In the event that I forget to play, as I did yesterday, I don’t dare to look at the Lotto results for fear of seeing some or (God forbid) all ‘my’ numbers. Can you imagine, playing for years, not playing one week and exactly that week having the winning numbers! I would go bananas!

So I keep on playing and hoping. Maybe one day when I’m old and/or disabled I might actually win.

Talking with Tom Cruise

Saturday is bowling day.
Dieter did beautifully.
He played: 191 – 194 – 194 – 211 – 175.
My scores ... oh, let’s not go there. Suffice to say that I finished on a high note ... 200 on the dot.

Where it comes to gambling I was kind of hopeful that I would win big this weekend, either on Friday with Max Millions or today with Lotto 649, but except for two free tickets, I won nothing. 

Excuse me for being hopeful, but take a look at my horoscope for yesterday. Now wouldn't you be hopeful too?

Expect some great news regarding money, possibly professional advancement. You may have to control the urge to break into tears of joy, Gemini. A female friend could be going through some heavy changes and might want your support. Your best course of action would be to listen rather than offer advice. You may have to try hard to control yourself, however. The situation could defy all reason.

As I’m a little short of inspiration today, I would like to tell you about an embarrassing experience at work a couple of years ago. It involves Tom Cruise, but that’s all I’m gonna say. If you want to know more, here’s the link:

http://www.helium.com/items/1351577-embarrassing-moments