Chronic Rants

This has been a tough week, so instead of writing about trying to avoid germs while visiting a sick relative in the hospital, I want to focus on something ridiculous: winning the lottery.

If you were in one of the Powerball-participating states last week, or even if you weren’t, you probably heard about the record lottery jackpot.  I believe it was around $579,000,000.  That’s a whole lot of zeros.

The odds of winning the jackpot are extremely slim, but many thousands of people still took their chances.  Of course, their chances were miniscule, but still larger than mine since I didn’t buy a ticket.  With or without a ticket, I think this huge jackpot being constantly talked about made us all wonder what we would do if we won that kind of money.  I did, at least.  I couldn’t help it.  Thoughts of bit lotto spending kept creeping to mind.

Over a year ago I wrote about what I would do with more money.  I just reread that post, and found it interesting how some of my goals are the same but some have changed.  A big goal then was to work less than full time.  Of course, that was before I knew that my disability leave would be long-term.  Now, I just want to not have to stress about a lack of income.  I also mentioned what I was spending at the time: under $30,000 per year.  Now, I spend a lot less, even though I spend significantly more on medical expenses.  These days, I hesitate to spend any unnecessary money at all as I watch the numbers in my bank account getting lower and lower.  I’m putting off buying new winter socks, for crying out loud!  Of course, with $579M I suppose I could afford all the new socks I wanted.  Still, I would want to have enough to live comfortably, and then I would be so happy to give the rest away.

The big difference in my thinking between the last post and this one is how I would give away the money.  With a lot of free time, and the inability to be very active, I have been doing more reading than ever.  Among other things, I have become more aware of many of the problems in the world, and also more aware of the various attempts at solutions.  I want desperately to fix so many of these problems and I wouldn’t know where to begin, even with seemingly limitless money.  I suppose the key would be to find experts in each area and get their viewpoints.  How amazing would it be to fund disease research, help end human trafficking, and promote programs to get young girls involved in math and science?  That sounds like a fantastic way to spend each and every day.  It would be a dream come true.

*Sigh* I don’t expect to ever have a nine-figure sum in my bank account, and that’s ok.  I honestly don’t want to have that much money anyway.  But it would be so nice to one day be able to earn enough money to pay for all of my basics needs and some wants, and to be able to earn it by working at some fabulous nonprofit that’s helping the world.  I’ve done that before, and I miss it.  I hope so much that that happens again one day…..

In the meantime, I’ll try to save up for some new, warm socks.