The lottery of Life
When Camelot first won the franchise to run the UK Lottery in 1994 [I’ve just googled the date: the first-ever lottery took place in November of that year and Camelot was re-awarded the franchise in 2001 and 2007 with the current franchise period running from 2009 to 2019], along with just about everyone I knew (and every other Tom, Dick and Harry), I piled in and bought tickets every week, convinced that it was only a matter of time before I won the main prize and lived happily ever after.
I’m not a gambler by nature, that is, bar schoolboy sweepstakes – at my prep school I once had the thrill of being pulling Kilmore of a metaphorical hat and winning a bag of sweets on the 1962 Grand National – and occasional other flutters on the gee-gees down the years.
However, it was about the time I read in a newspaper that, according to the bookmakers who of course never lose, the odds of winning the winning the Lottery were slightly less than Elvis being discovered alive and well living on Mars, I weaned myself off the Lottery merry-go-round.
That was until about ten days ago when in passing I read somewhere that the Euro Millions Friday night jackpot had rolled over once or twice and now stood at £130 million.
£130 million.
It didn’t take me long to work out that a sum of that order could just about sort out my debts, set my kids up with somewhere to live, buy me a retirement pad (or three) in some pretty pleasant parts of the world and still give change left over with which to fund myself through my dotage’s slow descent into dribbling dementia.
And so, dear reader, I bought a Euro Millions ticket with three lines of numbers on it from my local newsagents.
Yes, throughout the period leading up to the draw last Friday night I remained fully aware of the ‘Elvis’ odds. However, then again there’s the indisputable fact of life’s lottery that ‘You have to be in it to win it’ – and, if I hadn’t bought my ticket, wouldn’t it be just my luck for this to be the week when my numbers came up … and thus I’d miss out what was (rightfully) mine solely because I hadn’t bothered to put myself ‘in the game’?
You’re probably ahead of me here, but you know how these things inevitably go.
Within hours of buying my ticket, I found myself returning again and again in idle moments to the subject of working out how I’d apply the jackpot for the benefit of mankind.
Obviously I’d like to ensure my kids and descendants were comfortable and untroubled by future money worries – say, a £1 million property and then £10 million in cash each, just to keep their proverbial wolves from the door.
Then I’d probably sell my current hovel and buy a penthouse suite overlooking Tower Bridge as my ‘lock up and leave’ London pad; a five-bedroomed cottage somewhere in the Cotswolds as a weekend getaway; then, of course, a £10 million villa on the Costa Brava within ten minutes’ drive of a half-decent championship-standard golf course.
I’m not the swanky kind, so I wouldn’t waste my money on buying a £15 million sailing superyacht or a private aeroplane costing God knows what.
Mind you, if I could find a loyal and trustworthy couple in their thirties or early forties who could combine chauffeuring and Man Friday handyman (him) and housekeeping (her) duties, I wouldn’t say no. They could look after me wherever I was spending my time and then go ahead and open up the Spanish villa when it was ‘that time of year’ a week ahead of me so that I wouldn’t have all the bother of having to do it myself.
When it came to cars – and I’d want to emphasise here I’m no petrol-head – I think I’d like to try one of those new little BMW electric cars, which currently cost an arm and a leg but are sure to come down significantly when the market ‘mass’ builds up as it surely will, to go with my London pad.
I’d probably travel down to my weekend place in the Cotswolds by train but have my Man Friday pick me up at the station there in a Range Rover (good for the weather all year round and perhaps a bit of ‘off-roading’ as well, if I knew what that was).
Out in Spain at the villa I’d have a classic ‘cabriolet’-friendly Land Rover Defender for doing the everyday dog-work such as picking guests up from the airport and the shopping – and then something a little bit sporty for my personal use (e.g. a red Lambourghini Aventador coupe), just for taking the odd afternoon off to wend my way up the unspoiled and car-empty roads leading into the hills behind the villa.
And that was about it, really.
By last Friday morning, however – 12 hours to go to the draw itself – I’d been having second thoughts on one or two items.
Maybe, at £271,146 ‘on the road’, the Lamboughini Avantador was a little extravagant. And, when you think of it, a tad impractical.
Maybe a blue Ferrari California T (at £154,314) was more my – understated- style and also certainly more versatile.
It’s important to consider these things carefully before spending one’s hard-earned money.
By tea-time last Friday, having gone through a list of my debts, pals I’d like to give a helping hand to, a couple of thousand pounds going to charities of my choice and making sure I’d got enough left to pay Mrs May’s ‘dementia tax’ (if she ever brings it in now, given the current state of the government we can only hope), I had reached a rather sobering conclusion.
When you go through this very necessary planning exercise after – or even before – a big lottery win, you find that the speed at which you rapidly use up your cash is borderline frightening.
Having worked out the ball park figures in my list on a torn-off page off a little yellow desk pad, I wasn’t sure that £130 million was going to be enough. Not even close.
Anyway, as was probably inevitable, I didn’t win last week’s Euro Millions Lottery jackpot of £130 million so the escalating number of anxieties that were bothering me never came into play.
In life we can always be thankful for small mercies.
However, for the first time ever in my life I did have a lottery win. One of the lines on my ticket won me £4.50, which I collected from the newsagents last night just before buying my ticket for tonight’s Euro Millions draw.
Does anyone know what the jackpot is likely to be tonight? I cannot seem to find this out anywhere …
