Tuesday was the big drawing for the Mega Millions lottery. The total jackpot was estimated at being 212 million dollars. The cash payout would be 138 million. That’s  a little over 65% of what the original amount is. If you are the sole winner, that’s a pretty good number. Of course the Feds and State haven’t gotten their hands on that money yet. You are looking at possibly another 50% hit on your winnings. Cry me a river, I know – it’s still a huge sum of money. The winning numbers for the Mega Million Lottery for March 3, 2009: 26, 32, 35, 43,52. The powerball was 10.

Playing the lottery has been called the stupid tax. Your chances of winning the lottery are insanely high. They get even crazier when the estimated payouts skyrocket like they have if you want to be the sole winner. The probability of winning is over 175 million to 1. Think of it this way, you have a better chance of – being audited by the IRS (175:1), becoming a pro athlete (22,000:1), dying from drowning (79,065:1), being killed by lightning (2,320,000:1) than you do of winning the lottery. it’s called stupid because from the odds, it is nearly impossible to win. You’d have to be an idiot to play.

But people do win and I played the Mega Millions Lottery anyway. I gave $2 to the cause on Tuesday. I think you are only stupid if you look at this as your investment strategy rather than an entertainment expense. For those interested, I got 2 out of 6. Sorry, I’ll have to keep up this blog for at least another week.