Winners Club!

 Finally!!!!!!  We did it!!!!!!   We won the lottery!!!!  $358 million!!!!  Un-F-N-believable!!!!!  Woooooo!!!!!  We did it, Ba Ngoai!  Oh my God!  How did this happen?!  What happens now?!!  First, an explanation.  I almost fell asleep before the drawing because I had been running on a few hours of sleep after waking up at 1am for work.  But I stayed up watching the Olympics and reading Dance of Dragons.  When I saw the numbers I knew they looked familiar.  I searched for my ticket and checked it immediately.  It was left in my vinyl records basket next to a Taylor Swift album.  Well, setting that ticket next to a billionaire was putting it in good company.  It is strange to fathom that financially I am essentially in the same league with Taylor Swift!  We are equals now, Tay Tay!  Well, she's 3x as rich as us, but my wife is the better singer.  I don't know what we're going to do!  Obviously, we need to figure out how to invest the money and live off of the interest.  That is the most important part.  We need to create a company or trust to disperse the money.  My wife has always wanted to give half to charity.  But the best thing to do is make it a pledge to donate over time half after taxes to charity.  We need a financial fiduciary.  There will be things we need to purchase almost immediately, such as a house in the location that we want.  We have talked about moving to San Diego.  I think it would be ideal to live a little inland from the south coast of CA, in case of hurricanes and such.  I want a bigger family car, such as the Mazda CX-90.  No X5 or F-Pace for us.  We're modest and loyal to the Mazda zoom-zoom driving experience.  My autistic kids will have full time therapists or nannies of our choosing.  A personal chef would be wonderful.  Travel is one of the things we already like to do, so we will plan on traveling even more--Japan, Europe, Hawaii, Alaska, and more.  What grandma would want is to divide some of the money for family.  My wife's family will be reserved a piece too.  I'm going to have to do research on what is the best method of dispersing funds to family, whether a one time check, trust funds, investments, or periodical remittance is best.  Maybe a combination of all.  We also need to figure out how to privatize our lives and remain reclusive to the public and distant relatives.  Would I share any with my co-workers?  I can't say I've formed much of a bond with anyone at work since starting at the new building.  The old one, sure, there were a few people I would have liked to help at one point, but in hindsight, there's probably just 1 or 2 who might still think fondly of me, as I didn't quite leave on the friendliest of notes.  Anyway, I am sure there is so many more ways to spend this money however, I am looking for the fewest ways necessary.  Mostly, I am afraid of the changes to come.  The "fanmail," people knocking on my door, getting asked for money, being treated differently, etc.  I'm scared of wanting to help too many people, of people thinking I am easy, of people feeling entitled to our money, and of my wife being emotionally weak as well.  I am scared of TV crews and paparazzi.  I am scared my plan to help my kids will fail.  Although it's nice to know they will not have financial struggles when they are older, it's bittersweet knowing that money is not going to solve their biggest life challenges.  I am scared of our family bond breaking from the eventual disagreements about how to use the money.  I am scared that I will spend too much on toys for myself.  Although I no longer desire the typical sports or luxury cars, at one point in time I did so what if I started to want them again?  I'd rather have my old 1997 Honda Accord Special Edition coupe again.  It is still the finest car I've ever driven.  There is so much to think about.  So much to do.  But first, I must go tell my family what we have finally won!  

All Aboard The Lottery Express!

 Something my grandma and I have in common is our passion for playing the lottery.  Not an addiction, the games were played for entertainment and family bonding.  In the late 80's before mass household computers and cell phones with lottery apps, the only ways to find out what the winning lottery numbers were required mobile interaction.  Many people went to the gas stations to check for the last drawing's winning numbers and others read the newspaper.  My grandma and I would catch the winning numbers on the news, which often showed the live drawing.  As the numbered balls were selected on the screen, my grandma would write down the lucky numbers that she can use to check her tickets later.  These days it is so much easier to find out if you won or not.  The old fashioned way is to scan your ticket at a lottery machine to see if you'd won.  But there's also phone apps and the lottery websites that display current and previous winning numbers.  The app also allows you to scan your ticket to see if it's a winner.  This Friday on August 2, 2024 will be a Mega Millions drawing for a jackpot of $358 million!  Back in the 80s all we had in California was Super Lotto and scratchers.  Now we also have multi-state Powerball and Mega Millions in addition to the classic Super Lotto Plus.  While Super Lotto Plus typically have jackpots in the $7-30 million range, Powerball and Mega Millions are often in the hundreds of millions, sometimes even a billion range.  That is such an astronomical number that if we were to win , we'd have to plan carefully how to handle that kind of life changing money.  When I say we I mean grandma and I.  Although grandma has passed on, I plan to play this game with her.  I will purchase the Mega Millions ticket at a Walmart near my house.  For Grandma!