Day Sixteen - Calahonda

For several years now I've had the princely sum of £1.00 a week on the national lottery. When my numbers come up, which is less frequently than I would like, I tend to put the tenner back on with a series of lucky dips. A couple of months ago I won £10.00. It was the week that the robbing gypsy bastards at lottery HQ decided that £1.00 was too cheap and they would double it...

To cut a long story short I won £50. I decided to reinvest it, speculate to accumulate and all that shit. Anyway, the last of those draws was on Saturday 7th December.

As I was travelling, I had no access to the internet. Stopping off at a service station in south west France I logged into the internet to get my emails and up pops that email from the lotto people that started ' we have some news about the ticket you purchased on Saturday December 4th'

Generally, you would sign into your account and check your lotto messages which would tell you what you had won. But when abroad it's not as easy as that. Until last year you could sign into you account when you were overseas. You just got a warning that they thought you were overseas and if you bought or changed a ticket it would be void. You can't play lotto from other countries.
Obviously that didn't dissuade people enough as now you can't even check your account if you are outside UK, Northern Ireland or the Isle of Man.

This happened to me twice before, once when I was in Thailand! a few days before I was due home, and once in Australia last year. When in Thailand the ticket that won was one that was on direct debit and the winnings are paid into your bank account within to days. I got notification of that so I knew I hadn't won the 'big one' even so, the front wheels of the aircraft hadn't hit the ground at Manchester before I was on to the lotto site to see how how much I'd won.

It's not that I'm greedy. Seven years ago I got five numbers. I was like a dog with two dicks. The £1400 paid for a very enjoyable trip to Peru and Machu Pichu. All my friends could say was how unlucky I was not to have got the six and scooped a 3.5 million share of a £14 million double rollover.

As this latest winning ticket was not on Direct Debit there was no way of finding out if I was a millionaire or £25.00 better off.

Last night, exchanging a few texts with my friend back home. I couldn't wait three months to find out. I gave her my user ID and password and asked her to check. I'm really not sure what I'd do if it is a big win. But we'll soon find out......

And as I write this a text comes through "not the big one, £25.00"
Bollocks, Bollocks, Bollocks.... As I said, I'm not greedy :-)







At least the wind has dropped and the sun has come out.

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Location:Cabopino Camping - Calahonda - Andalucia - Spain