Arnold places the worn dollar bill up to his lips, exchanges a short but intimate liplock with the founder of our country, and then tosses the dollar bill into the wind never to be seen or heard from again. Now many of us would say that Arnold is a total and complete spudhead? Nobody with the sense of tree sap would just throw money away.
Do you buy lottery tickets? I caught you. Lotto commercials are very effective in portraying winning millions of dollars as a positive life experience. It’s not often they show a man in the middle of an empty living room saying (in a monotone voice), “My name is Buford Hogg. I lost my wife, my children, my furniture, and my dog because I spent all my money on lotto tickets.”
I remember reading the book “Paper Lion” by the late George Plimpton. George felt the best way to truly understand what it felt like to be a professional football player was to go to training camp and get knocked senseless on a daily basis and hoped that he had enough gray matter left to write about the experience.
So I decided to conduct a scientific study of my own. Having never participated in lotto before, I was going to take on the identity of a lotto ticket buyer. I would experience first hand what a lotto ticket buyer experiences throughout the entire process, from purchasing the ticket to ripping it up in frustration after losing. I warned Lady Debby that I would be taking on a new identity and she was overly supportive of the idea.
That night after work I stopped off at one of those gas station convenience stores. Let me digress for a moment. Does anyone actually eat the hot food served in these places? I see these signs that say “4 cheeseburgers, 3 hot dogs, and a 148 oz Big Bloat all for just 99 cents.” I’m thinking real food can’t be that cheap. I have a dog whose daily diet consists of anything that she can swallow. Food is preferred but definitely not the only thing on the menu. My next scientific study will be to bring her into one of these convenience stores and see if she’ll actually eat this stuff. She has been known to sneak treats from the kitty litter box, but I’m willing to bet even she has her standards.
Anyway, I walked up to the cashier and asked for a lotto ticket. He asked me which numbers I wanted, or did I want the computer to pick them?
I was faced with the first major hurdle of my study. Do I pick or do I let the computer pick? What would a veteran lotto ticket buyer do? They would have a system. They would have numbers that were derived from some formula they spent years perfecting. My scientific study was in jeopardy.
Then a thought struck me. These are just numbers. It’s not like trying to pick a racehorse by researching the history of each horse, each jockey, weather and track conditions, and gate assignments. You will never win the lotto because the 6 numbers you chose were derived from:
1. Your IQ divided by your shoe size.
2. The average number of credit card applications you receive in the mail each day.
3. The number of relatives living in trailer parks in Arizona.
4. The number of times you kissed Molly Pritchard behind the backstop in third grade.
5. The total number of letters in the alphabet you can belch in one continuous breath.
6. The total number of parts you had left after installing a garage door opener.
So I gave the cashier six random numbers and he entered them in. As I was handing him my dollar I could have sworn I saw George Washington’s lips move. I’m not much for reading lips, but it looked like he said, “Sucker.” But for a second I thought it was a wise investment. I pictured myself collecting those humongous checks. Living the good life. Then I was zapped back to reality by the customer behind me who wanted to purchase 20 lotto tickets. My chances of winning were already wiped out by one guy. My suggestion of one ticket per person fell on deaf ears.
I took my lotto ticket home and waved it in Lady Debby’s face and said, “This is our ticket out of this dump.” She just smiled. My wife knows not to contradict me. She knows better than to argue with me. She’s been married to me long enough to know that there is a much greater payoff by just watching me trip over my own actions. I guess she just figured that my new identity would produce the same results as my old identity, which would in turn produce the same laughter, and ultimately the same humiliation. But I wasn’t so sure. I was actually beginning to think I had a chance of winning. In medical terms I think this condition is called “delusional.”
That night while I sat waiting for the lotto drawing on television, I thought about a newspaper headline I remembered reading a few months earlier, “School Custodian Wins Millions In Lottery. Claims His Life Won’t Change.” Not being cynical by nature I gave him the benefit of the doubt-for a nanosecond. The first time he had to clean another middle-school bathroom, that would be it. The job satisfaction would disappear in one swift flush. My life will change. I’ll admit it up front. The instant the numbers on those six ping-pong balls match the ones I carefully chose, the old me is out the door with bags in hand.
The waiting was finally over. The lotto drawing was now being played out on my soon to be discarded LD (low definition) television. Fate was about to make up for all of the times it smiled down on everyone but me. I saw the blizzard of ping-pong balls. I watched the lotto lady press the button 6 times. I saw six ping-pong balls in the chamber. I saw 6 ping-pong balls with numbers that had nothing in common with the 6 numbers on my lotto ticket. Reality slapped me across the face.
I briefly looked for someone else to blame. Was the whole lotto thing rigged? Lady Debby entered the room and asked, “Shall I call the realtor in the morning”? Dracula would call that a stake through the heart.
With my scientific study complete, I reverted back to my previous identity. I now have a much clearer understanding of what lotto ticket buyers experience. I sympathize with their plight. But playing lotto is gambling. It is dangerous. It is addictive. If you don’t have the strength to walk away from it at any time, then you should never start. The next day I found out that no one won the previous night’s lotto drawing, so the jackpot was now even higher. I suddenly felt this strange urge. That same urge that millions of other people experience. The urge to throw money away.
But I won’t be like the rest of you losers. I have figured out the winning formula. Never buy a lotto ticket at the same place where you bought a losing ticket before. And if your numbers don’t win, don’t re-use them, they’re bad news. I may not be a genius, but my momma didn’t raise no spudhead neither.
Check out L. Dustin Twede’s website at www.ldustintwede.com. He can be reached at ddtwede@yahoo.com.
