I didn't win the lottery.

[fflo]

Yeah, I bought a ticket while getting gas the other day. Despite being politically opposed to lotteries. I went inside to get warm, and there was the guy, sitting by the machine that has (yes) given me a lottery ticket in the past.

Was it worth a dollar to imagine bills paid & so much left over? That's what you buy, isn't it? I don't see the appeal of instant lotteries. You get maybe 10 seconds of the possible annointing being out there in the air. (Hey, look: I can't spell "anointing." Yet more evidence that I live fairly free of religion.) ("Anoint" apparently was a word in Middle English, hailing from the Anglo-French "enoint," past participle of "enoindre," which in turn came from the Latin "inunguere," which is "in-" + "unguere" [to smear] -- and it's all akin to "ointment.")

What would you do (differently, or additionally, or all-of-a-sudden) if you were suddenly wealthy? After paying off bills and securing housing and taking care of Mom?

Comments

[paperkingdoms]

Lots of live music. And travel.

[lickingtoad.livejournal.com]

I love the fact that you trace 'anoint.' *mwah!*

(Also, I would set up communal housing for me/my dear ones.)

[queerbychoice.livejournal.com]

Quit my job (even though I really don't mind it), or at least drastically reduce my hours. 10 or 20 hours per week might be handy just as a way to break up the long stretches of free time and keep me in touch with my sense of time passing. But I think I could find more useful things to do with the rest of my time. Whether the more useful things would be writing fiction, improving my website, painting pictures, starting some brand new political project, or what, I don't know - but I think having more hours to consider those options would be a priority.

[mrfrog.livejournal.com]

I'd sink money into building really cool stuff, like a huge - computerized "smart" house or a hover craft. Maybe work on a new type of engine. Perpetual motion!

Stuff that might put the "fame" into me being "rich and famous". ;)

[vjsmom.livejournal.com]

Quit my job. Visit folks in, say, Michigan. Pay off the mortgage (does that fall under "securing housing"?). Pay off at least one other person's mortgage (you know who you are). Buy my sister a little house with a decent yard. Decorate/fix up my house the way I'd like it to be. Find some organization that I could really believe in, one that really does some kind of tangible good in the world, and give it some money and time.

I have a big list--I guess I'd have to win a pretty freakin' big jackpot to do all that. But hey, if you're going to fantasize, then what the heck?