A good chunk of my financial planning demands that one fine day my numbers come up, and, yeehaa, I win the lottery.
And not in some silly, $100,000, sort of a way. I dream of the full fruit cake, the groaning caboodle, the quintuple jackpot with sprinkles.
For me, the numbered balls would hover and drop on, say $25 million plus the odds and sods prizes like the red Lamborghini and the beach house. (I think it poor form to dream in halves).
I know how I'll reply when sulkily asked how I'll spend the moolah. I have a line stolen from a friend who'd received a stupendous payout selling his business.
‘‘Lucky sod. What are you going to do with the loot?'' I asked him.
There was much to consider. Tom Green, a man of owlish demeanour, polished his horn-rimmed spectacles, pondered, and put me in my place.
‘‘I think I'll paint my back fence.''
When I visualise my lottery win, crazily, I see an old Disney comic. It has the drawing of Duckburg's billionaire, Scrooge McDuck, leaping from his diving board to dog paddle through his oceans of money. (Well you would, wouldn't you?)
Probably the Disney moral was you can drown in money, but they haven't thought this through. Surely that's better than most slow deaths?
Of course a lottery winner should live incognito. Trevor, the checkout chap from Huntly who'd been broke, let his full name get published.
He opined that the whole town knew already, so what the hell? Fair enough, but within a fortnight Trev had 25,000 friend requests on Facebook, and was suddenly the country's most eligible bachelor. Not for long - he was quickly potted.
Trevor bought himself the guy fantasies - a boat, a new ute, and a speedway racer. These were small change, but nonetheless, because Trevor clearly wasn't private school, media people began tut-tutting that he'd foolishly blow it. (The poor can't be trusted with becoming wealthy).
When my own lottery cheque arrives I suppose I'll chip in for friends and family, and present gifts to charity - a lottery winner shouldn't appear mean.
But with the appearing to be decent done, I'd get on with the proper stuff. The sprawling houses, first class travel, expensive eccentricities (are their job lots of Hoteres?) and generally getting above myself.
I would, however, return the Lamborghini. Driving this would be pretentious. I could make do with a BMW 6 series Gran Coupe (the gunmetal colour).
None of this would score me an invite to join Proper Society, because there is no cachet in being a lottery winner.
It is seen as bogan money, less deserved than the old inherited wealth that the more noble have thrust upon them.
Of course the finger waggers' wisdom is that Lotto is a ‘‘bad thing'' for society because it encourages the battlers to gamble. Misguided have-nots will go out and waste their housekeeping, betting against impossible odds.
As always, the killjoys miss the point. Nobody expects to win Lotto. We all understand million to one odds. But each ticket buys us a week of fantasising how fate might change our lives.
A Lotto ticket is a chance to hope - a hammock in which to dream dreams. And where's the harm in that?
The night of a Lotto draw is a unifying national event that we don't properly appreciate. It is a time when the country comes together murmuring the same prayer. ‘‘Let it be me, me, me.''
On a typical week, this involves 1.25million Kiwis thinking in unison. (Fewer Kiwis watched the World Cup final). You'd think that all that outpouring of the same mantra must have some sort of positive metaphysical impact? Or maybe it reduces the carbon emissions?
Whatever. The one thing we can be sure of is that God can't take his tea break on Lotto nights. There's too many of us bothering him.
● John Lapsley lives in Arrowtown.
