20 Year Old Mega Millions Winner

WHEN I READ ABOUT SHANE MISSLER, THE FLORIDA MAN WHO WON THE MOST REECENT MEGA MILLIONS JACKPOT, THE THING THAT STRUCK ME WAS HOW OLD HE IS.

He's just 20 years old! He chose to take the lump sum which amounted to about $282 million. 

But there you have it. You just never know who is going to win or where, and it matters little how long they have been playing, and in the case of many lottery winners, whether they play at all until they hit the big one.

How many times have you heard a winner say, "I never played before, but something told me to buy a ticket this time."

UGH. I HAVE BEEN PLAYING FOR YEARS AND HALF THE TIME I AM LUCKY IF I EVEN GET MY WAGER BACK!

Still, and I know it's as cliché as clichés come, somebody has to win. As I am a realist by nature, just based on the odds, I am practical in my thinking that perhaps no matter how often I play, or where I buy my tickets—I will probably never see a jackpot.

It's funny little mind games you play sometimes too. For example, I travel into several other states for my job. And so I can buy tickets in Illinois, Wisconsin, Missouri, and Kansas quite often. Sometimes I think to myself, "Wow, this kind of increases my odds." In fact, about a year ago or so I had to travel to Fort Wayne, Indiana on business, and the jackpot of whichever multi-state lottery was kind of up there, and one of the town I passed through and did buy a ticket wound up being where the thing was won...

ONE WEEK AFTER I HAD BEEN THERE.

Granted, the store where the ticket was bought was also a different store, so while it was close, in reality it really wasn't. But in my mind? There was the chance.

I am happy for Shane Missler. From what he has said he is doing to manage the money, and what he wants to do with the money, maybe he will come out as one of the ones who didn't squander it all away in short time. That is always the tragedy of big lottery wins—sometimes the winners lose it all.

Either way, both the PowerBall and the Mega Millions have essentially reset. I will still play. I can't help myself. And hopefully one day I can be posting about my own big win. Only time will tell.