Speaking of being careful about what one wishes for.....
You like this "lottery stuff", don't you? (So do I) And you wanna be rich, don't you? (So do I) Well then, consider the case of Jesse Livermore. Unless you work on Wall Street, you probably haven't ever heard of Jesse Livermore. Well, until a few days ago, neither did I. But you're NOT gonna believe what I'm about to write.
Jesse Livermore died on November 28th, 1940. Jesse was born in 1877 and when he was 14, he left his family's farm and headed to Boston. He got a job working as a "Board Boy" in what was then called a "Bucket Shop", which was a place where people bet on whether the price of a stock would go up or down. (They didn't buy or sell stocks, they would simply bet on whether the price of a certain stock would go up or down.)
Being a Board Boy gave Jesse a lot of insight to the stock market, and how it worked. (Buying and selling stocks is gambling too, just like the playing lottery is) He got so good at it, that when he saw The Panic of 1907 coming, and by selling stocks short while every one else was buying, he made 3 million dollars. But by 1912, he was one million dollars in debt and he declared bankruptcy.
Not to worry. World War I's Bull Market was coming, and Jesse did very well. So well, that he owned mansions around the world, yacht's, and a fleet of limousines. It's now 1929, and The Stock Market is about to crash, but Jesse saw that coming too. So he started selling stocks short while everyone else was buying, and he made 100 million dollars. Remember, that's in 1929's dollars, which is billions in 2016's money.
But by March of 1934 Jesse had to declare bankruptcy for a second time. He never told a soul how or why he lost his 100 million dollar fortune, but he lost every dime of it. He somehow made it to November of 1940, but by then he'd had enough. On November 28th, 1940 Jesse entered the cloakroom of a hotel on the corner of Fifth Ave and East 59th St in Manhattan, took a 32 caliber pistol, put it up to his head, and blew his brains out!! He left an 8 page suicide note. But that don't make no neverminds to me. I still wanna be rich. G5