Probabilities

A couple of weeks ago I went to a Christmas dinner. We stuffed our faces, of course, and drank quite a lot (we’d left the car at home), and then, while everybody was feeling mellow, they brought round the raffle tickets.

Now I’m not a fan of national lotteries. Tickets for the big Christmas lottery in Spain cost €20, and your chances of winning are tiny. I think I’ve probably got a reputation in the staff room for refusing to join syndicates. I have to stop myself from banging on about the remoteness of your chances. If you buy a ticket for the British lottery on Monday, you are more likely to drop down dead before Saturday than you are to scoop the jackpot. But at the dinner I bought two strips of tickets for €20. Now obviously the top prize was tiny compared to the €3,000,000 of the national lottery, but literally millions of people buy national lottery tickets, and this raffle had only about 50 people entering it. Besides, any profits go towards next year’s dinner.

And I won a prize – a ticket to the national lottery for today, 22nd December. I thought that was pretty funny – spending €20 to get exactly €20’s worth of something I didn’t actually want. It wasn’t until I was on my way home that I realised I could have swapped it for a bottle of wine. Never mind, I thought, I could indulge in a few day-dreams until the draw took place and reality set in. My son announced that if we won the big prize, he wanted a PS2 and a Lego Dirt Crusher (it’s a radio controlled Lego car, if you’re wondering.)

Well blow me down, I’ve won. No, not the €3,000,000 jackpot. I only won €20. That number again. It was good for a laugh, at least.

And today my son got a good school report. This beats my lottery win any day. I’ll give you three guesses what I’m going to do with my winnings.

Posted by sheila

Sheila came to La Palma with a six month contract and has stayed 24 years so far. She used to work as a software engineer at the observatory, but now she's a writer and Starlight guide.