Print

Email story

Comment

Email editor

Dreams keep Lotto registers ringing

Wednesday is the big night for the estimated $82-million drawing. Have you decided what big-ticket items you're going to buy?

By JORGE SANCHEZ
Published April 18, 2006

INVERNESS - It's Thursday morning. You roll out of bed, pick up a copy of the St. Petersburg Times and check the winning numbers for the estimated $82-million Florida Lotto from the night before.

Looking at the flamingo-hued ticket, you start counting the matches: One number . . . no big deal. Two numbers ... still no money. Three numbers ... okay, now you have won lunch.

Four numbers ... your hands tremble, spilling hot coffee over the dog as you realize you're close. Five numbers ... your chest tightens, you suck in sweet, delirious breaths as you double check to see that you've matched ... all six numbers.

Cha-ching, $82-million belongs to you.

Sunlight dapples your face. Yellow songbirds somehow got in the house and flutter and chirp around your head. You're in silk pajamas and you don't have bed hair.

Then you wake up. The dog is licking your face.

Even if only a dream, winning the nation's second largest current lottery jackpot is one that plenty of people are having.

The Florida Lotto jackpot, which has rolled over for the past 10 biweekly drawings since March 15, has people dreaming large.

Ticket sales are expected to peak at $46,000 per minute - or $2.76-million per hour - Wednesday night prior to the $82-million drawing, according to lottery officials. Only tonight's 12-state, $265-million Mega Millions jackpot is richer.

While Lotto fever won't peak until Wednesday, there is plenty of early action.

"About every other customer" on Monday bought a lottery ticket at the Kangaroo Food Mart on U.S. 41 S and Eden Drive in Inverness, according to store clerk Kayla Losciale. She said that was above average for a Monday afternoon.

At the B&W drugstore a few blocks away, store clerks Flossie Hicks and Cynthia Lloyd said they had been busy with ticket sales. But Lotto fever hadn't quite set in.

"But wait until Wednesday, then this place will be, like, cuckoo," Hicks said.

Lloyd said she would choose the one-time payout of $45-million to a single winner if she won.

"I actually sold a five-number winning ticket when I worked at a convenience store in Floral City," Lloyd said. "The guy came back and gave me $200."

Hicks said she'd take the 30 yearly payments of $2.7-million.

"That way I could always tell people that I was broke," she said, with a wink. "After taxes, there's not much left."

Wednesday night's Lotto, will be the seventh largest jackpot in Florida history, said Alfred Bea, communications manager with the lottery office in Tallahassee.

Citrus County had one Lotto winner last year. Crystal River resident Anna Porcelli split a $3-million jackpot, claiming her instant payout share of $1-million.

In 1990, deli owner Joe Fallon hit a $325,000 Fantasy Five jackpot.

"But what's that compared to $82-million?" Fallon asked Monday. "It helped me pay off my debts, put my kids through college, fixed up the house, but I'm still working."

Asked if he had any advice for a prospective Lotto winner, he said:

"Advice? Hey, with that kind of money, you can do whatever you want. There's no way you can spend it all."

Unless he wins the Lotto on Wednesday night, Jorge Sanchez can be reached at 860-7313 or sanchez@sptimes.com

How much is $82-million? It could fund the city of Inverness government ($9.7-million a year) for 8.4 years. It would cover the cost of the Sheriff's Office ($25.2-million a year) for 3.2 years. It would buy 820 of the most expensive Cadillacs available, the XLR supercharged coupe, ($100,000 each at Village Cadillac in Homosassa Springs).

[Last modified April 18, 2006, 01:49:20]