Unlucky At Luck

Typically, I don’t play state lotteries.  The odds are astronomical.

The only exception is when the potential winnings reach the $100 million-plus range, and I happen to be passing through some small town in a remote area at the time.  My reasoning is that the winning tickets always tend be purchased from a gas station in East Bejesus, so my approach at least gives me a reasonable chance of getting the lucky numbers.

Of course, I’ve never won the handful of times I’ve tried this technique.

But what if you did win — and then instead of getting cash, you just got an IOU?  That’s the unfortunate reality for some poor schmoes in Illinois.  They won $250,000 in the Illinois Lottery, but because Illinois doesn’t have a budget, state officials can’t cut them a check in the amount of their winnings — so they get a crappy IOU instead.  And with Illinois’ crippling budget problems, I wouldn’t be supremely confident about getting a prompt payout on those IOUs, either.

No word yet on whether the “lucky” winners bought their ticket in East Bejesus.

Not San Frantic

The Ferry Buiding

I just got back to Columbus from a work trip to San Francisco.  I like San Francisco very much.  The summer weather is great, cool and crisp.  It is a lovely city, filled with picturesque vistas, and it has some fantastic restaurants.  One afternoon we had the opportunity to stroll along the Embarcardero, from the Ferry Building to Pier 39, where the sea lions frolic and play and bark while Alcatraz looms in the distance, across the choppy water.   It was a brisk day on the waterfront, and the mood as we took our stroll was fun and festive, with street musicians playing, the “bush guy” ready to spring out on the unwary,  and underdressed tourists shivering.  (I have to believe that one of the consistent best sellers at gift shops in San Francisco are hooded sweatshirts, brought by tourists who expect warm weather during summer and then learn their lesson when they begin their walk on the waterfront.)

The Pier 39 sea lions

The relaxed mood on the waterfront was dramatically different from the frantic mood on the front page of the local newspaper, where we were treated to constant headlines about California’s still unresolved, steadily worsening budget crisis.  One day it was the Speaker of the House saying that she was tired of the Governor’s demands, the next day it was the Governor asking for action.  In the meantime, the stories about the “IOUs” issued by California’s state governments are instructive.  One story reported that large banks are refusing to have anything to do with them, as California’s credit rating plunges.  A local news story broadcast at the airport, on the other hand, reported that some people who have received IOUs from the state government have turned to “brokers” who are paying 80 or 90 cents on the dollar, cash, in exchange for the IOUs.  One California resident explained:  “My landlord doesn’t take IOUs, so what choice do I have?”

What choice, indeed?  One only hopes that, when the next state election rolls around, voters remember the embarrassing and ineffectual efforts of their elected representatives and exercise the most fundamental choice available to our citizens — the choice to throw the bums out.