Regular Guy
Ideal_Rock
- Joined
- Jul 6, 2004
- Messages
- 5,962
What is it…megamillions? Apparently…now it’s over 200 million. Enough to get your attention, right? My office, after actually over a year’s absence, has run a collection for it, with one enterprising colleague calling it the company “retirement fund,” with tongue very much in cheek. Could I have a quarrel? He’s asking $5 a play. It’s not a huge amount, but in the space of three days, he’s collected twice now. He’ll be running this until it busts.
Certainly all in good fun. But…I groused. I told him twice informally $1 or $2 would be preferred, cause it could allow us to play, and since the likelihood of our winning by increasing that amount to $5 wouldn’t increase substantially…why not keep the entry cost low. If we get lucky, we’ll win anyway.
After collecting a second time, I followed my own google search with an e-mail to our conspirator collecting for us (and using his own time, to boot) in our office, copying my office colleagues, saying I was in…but…well, this is what I wrote:
“Thanks for doing this. I'm in. Still...
info you've probably seen...
http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&q=lottery+math&btnG=Search
I like the first one, for example....
http://members.cox.net/mathmistakes/rawdata.htm
and in the middle, where he describes the best way to play the lottery.”
But, then I felt a bit the cold shoulder from some. And now, well…who knows if I’d want to play again.
Certainly, money could be spent in a worse way. Then again, another office colleague is out for several weeks, laid up from a surgical procedure, and our manager has had to request several times for contributions for flowers. On a discussion list largely associated with expensive things like diamonds, maybe $5 here and there is laughable to talk about. Certainly, I can be thankful he’s not goosed the entry cost to be higher yet…like at $10 or even more. Still…although just not playing, as others have not done (and as I frequently did not last year) is an obvious, conservative, and “peacable” option…I was hoping to, I suppose, stir things up in what might have been a positive way…but I’m not seeing how you can get there from here, just now.
Fortunately, there are greater problems to worry about. Thoughts about this “faux paux” are welcome.
Certainly all in good fun. But…I groused. I told him twice informally $1 or $2 would be preferred, cause it could allow us to play, and since the likelihood of our winning by increasing that amount to $5 wouldn’t increase substantially…why not keep the entry cost low. If we get lucky, we’ll win anyway.
After collecting a second time, I followed my own google search with an e-mail to our conspirator collecting for us (and using his own time, to boot) in our office, copying my office colleagues, saying I was in…but…well, this is what I wrote:
“Thanks for doing this. I'm in. Still...
info you've probably seen...
http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&q=lottery+math&btnG=Search
I like the first one, for example....
http://members.cox.net/mathmistakes/rawdata.htm
and in the middle, where he describes the best way to play the lottery.”
But, then I felt a bit the cold shoulder from some. And now, well…who knows if I’d want to play again.
Certainly, money could be spent in a worse way. Then again, another office colleague is out for several weeks, laid up from a surgical procedure, and our manager has had to request several times for contributions for flowers. On a discussion list largely associated with expensive things like diamonds, maybe $5 here and there is laughable to talk about. Certainly, I can be thankful he’s not goosed the entry cost to be higher yet…like at $10 or even more. Still…although just not playing, as others have not done (and as I frequently did not last year) is an obvious, conservative, and “peacable” option…I was hoping to, I suppose, stir things up in what might have been a positive way…but I’m not seeing how you can get there from here, just now.
Fortunately, there are greater problems to worry about. Thoughts about this “faux paux” are welcome.
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