Cheap Dreams

A friend of mine wanted a lottery ticket last night. We were eating out in the neighborhood and the only walkable place we knew to get a lottery ticket was a convenience store on Second the other side of Congress. People buy these tickets and dream about what they would do with the winnings. (Pay off the mortgage; pay off the credit card debt; put the kids through college; buy a fancy car and house and boat.) I don't buy the tickets. I dream of finding a winning ticket on the ground. The odds are lower, but it isn't much more of a fantasy. The state spends lots of money on advertising and signage and administration. (And winnings, of course.) I guess it makes money that saves us being taxed another way.