Somewhere in Southern California, a winning Powerball ticket is sitting unclaimed—lost in some crevice of a car seat perhaps or jammed into the back pocket of a pair of jeans. It might be rotting away in a trash can or forgotten about after being used as a bookmark. Wherever it is, that ticket is worth a ridiculous $447.8 million and somebody needs to come get their money.
Yes, a California Lottery spokesperson confirms that no one has yet claimed the ticket—bought at a liquor store in Menifee, CA—and that there is just one winner. Guys, haven’t we been over this already?
Now listen, I understand the absurd odds of the lottery. I get it. Do not jump in here trying to explain extremely basic shit to me or pretend like you care about making me feel better. I get that I, and no one I know, will almost certainly never win the fucking lottery. I got it. thanks.
HOWEVER, this still stings. Whenever there’s a huge lottery prize in whatever area I happen to be in, my mom usually calls or texts and instructs me to go buy a ticket. I’ll be honest, I only go out and actually buy the ticket about half the time. Sometimes she catches me a little too late and I don’t feel like detouring to a gas station or standing in line at a bodega with other panicked fools. I’m also one of those people who will only buy one or two tickets because I have a hard time believing buying even 10 is going to help my odds enough for the extra $15 or whatever to feel worth it. And even if I did buy 10 or 20 tickets, I’m probably definitely not going to win the lottery anyway.
Still, now I’m thinking maybe I should have bought the damn lottery ticket. Just in case.
While I kick myself, person who won an obscene amount of money, please go claim your prize. Honestly, I don’t even understand how this happens. If you went through the trouble of buying a lottery ticket in the first place for a FOUR HUNDRED AND FORTY SEVEN POINT EIGHT MILLION DOLLAR PRIZE, wouldn’t you bother to just glance at the ticket at some point???
Perhaps the winner is waiting this out until interest dies down so they can quietly pick up their check and squander it in peace. Maybe their pet ate it and they’re desperately trying to plot a completely delusional abstraction method. I don’t know. Whoever you are, you won $447 million. You might wanna come get it.