Well, we're not going to win the lottery

Short household management decided to take a break from the norm and push bedtime back an hour tonight.  Because the sun was out late, and gosh darn it...livin' on the edge is just what we free-wheelin' risk takin' folk do.

In the name of bucking routine we strapped Jonah to my chest in the backpack carrier instead of tossing him in the stroller and we three crazy kids headed out for a late night (6:00) promenade in the 'hood.

We then decided to go even wilder and get sodas at our neighborhood gas station.  While we were there Howard repeated something he has told me all 6.5 years of our marriage: if you play the lottery, you probably won't win, but if you don't play, you definitely won't win.

Straight from a Ph.D.'d mouth, people. 

Naturally, I sighed and rolled my eyes.  But then I thought, you know what?  I could use 7 million dollars right about now.  LET'S DO IT!

(Please don't tell Dave Ramsey.)

(Also please don't tell Jesus because I'm pretty sure gambling is not excellent stewardship of the money God's entrusted to us to manage.  But $14 French cheese at HEB?  For that stuff, I'm always prepared to give a defense for the Camembert that is within me.)

So our adventure began.  Howard and I stood at the little Lotto kiosk trying to figure out how this thing works.  Once we located the right paper (or ticket, or bill, or card...I'm not really sure what you call it), we were UNSTOPPABLE!

13. 5 minutes later at our own little counter we were assigned because we were taking too long (because we're not into getting rich quick - we're willing to give it a few hours), we had finally figured out how to fill in the card. 

Yes, we're teachers.  Why do you ask?

At this point I was cry-laughing because filling in the lotto card had proven to be quite a challenge for us. 

Don't forget about Jonah.  All the meanwhile he's facing forward in his backpack carrier absorbing the genius that is his parents.

Howard and I proudly marched to the counter and presented our card / ticket / lotto-paper-thingy and the man at the cash register seemed pretty proud of us too.  He ran the paper through what I can only describe as a scantron machine. (I told you, I'm a teacher.)

But the scantron machine said we failed our lotto ticket because there were too many errors with the filling in and crossing off of bubbles and rows and what not.

So. 

We started over.  I mean, if we're going to teach our son that playing the lotto is wise, we might as well throw in the actual virtue of perseverance, right?

We were quicker this time.  More experienced.  Smoother.  Now after just 4 minutes we completed our card and walked back to the cash register. 

The man ran it through the scantron machine and presented us with a receipt.  Just as we were about to ask how we find out if we've won, we learned that you can't put a lotto paper on your debit card.  You have to use cash.

We didn't have cash. 

Let's review, shall we?  We are so poor we sold our values and stooped to playing the lottery, which we could barely figure out, and then which we could not pay for. 

(I was going to avoid ending the previous sentence with a preposition, but it just seems appropriate right now to throw grammar to the wind.)

We left our dreams of new cars and a custom home and books galore and made it back to our little life of pureed sweet potatoes all over everything and bathtime and trying to stay awake for a rerun of Frasier. 

And I wouldn't trade it for 7 million dollars or anything. 

(But to be clear, I would definitely ADD 7 million dollars to it.  But if that happens it won't be because we won the lottery.  Because we didn't play.)