Nobody, including me, hit the Mega Millions jackpot on Friday, meaning the next drawing, next Tuesday, will be for an estimated $530 million.
Smart move on my part. I could use that extra $50 million to do some good.
I’m kidding.
Partially.
Admit it: you let your imagination run wild when the lottery gets this big.
In my case, I’m thinking, dog farm.
A big farm for shih tzus, yorkies, poodles, to run free.
We’d charge admission; the proceeds would go to charity.
The Human Fund: Money for People.
What we don’t do when we let our minds wander is consider how unlikely it is to actually win the lottery.
I mean, somebody has to win, right?
The odds with Mega Millions: 1 in 300 million.
Things that are more likely to happen to you include:
- Being struck by lightning (1 in 180,000)
- Drowning in a bathtub (1 in 840,000)
- Being hit by a meteorite (1 in 1.6 million)
- Falling out of bed and dying (1 in 2 million)
- Being killed by a shark (1 in 3.7 million)
- Being killed by scalding hot water (1 in 5 million)
- Dying from a bee, hornet or wasp sting (1 in 6.1 million)
- Dying in a plane crash (1 in 11 million)
- Having identical quadruplets (1 in 15 million)
- Dying on a roller coaster (1 in 24 million)
- Dying from a snake bite (1 in 50 million)
- Being killed by a vending machine (1 in 112 million)
Which is all well and good to point out, but when you win the lottery, of course, you don’t need to buy things out of vending machines anymore.
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Chris Graham
