Subes for life!

On the subject of being outraged about things, someone should investigate the gougy pricing for “necessities” in podunk nowhere towns with only one store. Now, of course the clerks are friendly and are probably part of the family in these family-owned shoppes. But, they sure do get a good chuckle at my requests for fresh fruits and vegetables, organic this and organic that, vegan prepared foods (hot or frozen, either is fine, I’m not fussy), and other delicious options which you’ll never find rolling out the back of a Sysco truck.

The real problem, though, is that they also sell lottery tickets. And me being me (i.e. not-too-bright), I decided to drop $40 on crossword scratch offs. I scratched and scratched and scratched some more, until there was no scratching left to be done and my crosswords were complete, and came away with a $10 winning ticket. Yes, you read that right: $40 invested, $10 won. The maths experts among you* will realize that it’s not that great of a deal, in either the short run or the long run.** Add in a $13 six-pack of Sierra Nevada Pale Ale, and I came away with a $43 purchase for the day.

Obviously, I can’t place the blame on the corner market. I blame the Paiutes. (Haha, kidding! I jest!) But, for reals, several months back I stopped for the night at a Paiute casino / RV park / gas station, and of course I had to go try my luck on the slots and get some AC and free drinks. The first two were a thing, but the cute server who brought my drink over said, “The drinks aren’t free,” when I dropped a crisp $1 tip on her tray. She thought I was being dumb, and I no longer thought she was cute, but we managed to complete the transaction with a $10 bill this time and she got a $3 tip out of it after all so everyone wins with the Paiutes. And, sure enough, soon after that I hit a $600 payout on the dollar machine.

So here I am all these months later still toting around a stack of hundreds, still high from my uninterrupted one-time-only winning streak, and for whatever reason I figured a crossword lottery ticket would be my next big win. I mean, what could possibly go wrong?

Oh, yeah, right. $43 for a six-pack.

*Maths experts is plural, among you is meant to be singular since I currently only have one reader. But, I do believe that gent is pretty well-versed in the maths and my $40 – $10 + $13 mind-beep trickery will not trip him up too badly.

**I ran into the SCCCC bike event organizer (Hi, Bob!) last year, and he said he only loses a little money on each event, so he does extra events to make up for the losses…. Haha. An oldie, but a goodie.