The Stupid Lotto Scratcher Experiment – Part I

I decided to try a really stupid experiment and document it here for all to witness. Nothing should be learned from this and it should only be duplicated in stupidity.

First off, I was trying to decide what to do with my change. I had about $100 in silver coinage and the smart thing to do would be to put it in our savings account, but that wouldn’t be stupid. I needed something stupid. So I came up with the idea of buying 100 $1 lottery scratch-off tickets. Now that would be stupid.

(Not as stupid as this person though)

Then I decided to make an experiment out of it. I call it “The Stupid Lotto Scratcher Experiment”. Hopefully you gathered that from the title of the blog as well.

I have been known to buy a scratch-off here and there, and even went “all-in” with my father-in-law on large amounts before, but this time I was going to, wait for it…….do research on the lottery. Stupid, I know, but that’s the point.

First off I actually wasted the time to figure out the odds (of winning at least your money back), top prizes, and number of top prizes remaining for every $1 ticket in Georgia. Then I did some googling for tips from the pros (i.e. the poor).

First I removed the worst odds, even though they had the most top prizes left. Then I removed the ones with less than 3 top prizes left. I was left with the obvious (so, so obvious) choice of “Blackjack Attack”. Not only did it have the very best odds of all the $1 tickets, it also had the most top prizes left after my earlier removals (4 $6,000 winners remained).

(The Georgia Lottery. Where even the best odds are bad odds)

In my research on the web I learned it was better to buy from different stores than to buy from the same roll at one store. I have no idea if this is true or not (I would suspect not), but for the sake of the experiment I decided to go to 5 stores and buy 20 tickets at each store. Also this way lets me look like a semi-douche bag on 5 occasions instead of a giant douche bag once. More on this in part 2.

So, here are the rules I set forth for myself.

*Cash in change for $100 (it was actually $106.34. The $6.34 bought Charlie’s lunch).
*Visit 5 stores and buy 20 “Blackjack Attack” $1 scratchers at each.
*Scratch tickets.
*No matter the outcome, deposit the winnings in bank account.

(You can use me for any ol' thing.....wait...Lotto tickets?.....really, BoShanks?)

So with the $100 in hand I was off to the gas stations. Check back later for this journey and the meat of the experiment in Part II.

Root, Root, Root for the Bad Guy

In real life it is not cool to cheer for the bad guy, pretty much, ever. In sports it is acceptable to cheer for the bad guys if your team needs another team to lose and the team you need to lose is playing the Yankees. But, for the most part you are not going to cheer for evil.

(The Evil Empire)

In the land of make believe however, there are many times where you can cheer for the bad guy and be okay.

A prime example for me would be Wile E. Coyote. While Wile E. is clearly the bad guy, the road runner is just an asshole and it would really do me good to see, just once, Wile E. defeat him/her (who knows what sex the roadrunner is?).

(This just in....your acme shit.....it don't work)

I feel the same way about Tom as well. Jerry is a tool and Tom is just doing his job. I am definitely cheering for Team Tom here.

(Sleeping with the enemy)

I suppose the definitive “cheer for the bad guy” medium is hack and slash horror movies. Freddy, Jason, Michael Myers, etc. are clearly the “heroes” in their respective films. People don’t go to these movies to see which hot chick lives, they go to see said killers….well, kill.

("What's with kids today huh? Noooo respect...")

More recently Ben from the t.v. show Lost is a bad guy I like to cheer for. More of an anti-villian due to the ambiguity of his actions, he is still clearly not a “good guy” by definition, but just grey enough to win our hearts.

(I'd write something about the show, but it wouldn't make sense)

For Heather’s sake I will not even go into cheering for the bad guys in pro wrestling, but be warned…..it’s coming.

Comic Book Movies Much?

(Pow!)

In 1966 “Batman: The Movie” became the first feature length film to be based upon a comic book character. There was then a 12 year lull before the next comic book film, “Superman: The Movie” (why do they not put “The Movie” after movie titles anymore? People are still just as stupid).

12 years. That’s a long time. The length of time between comic book movies these days? Not so much. On the heels of “Iron Man (:The Movie)” we have “The Incredible Hulk (:The Movie)”, “Wanted (:The Movie”), “Hellboy 2 (:The Movie)”, and “The Dark Knight (:The Movie)”. And that’s just in June and July.

("I am Iron Man". Who would have thought they'd use that line in the movie?)

Most people would say that money, easy marketability, built in toy lines, and existing fan bases are some of the reasons comic books have become Hollywood’s new best thing ever. And they’d be mostly right.

But it’s also what we (and by we, I mean comic fans) have known all along. That the source material is good. Hollywood still screws it up a lot (I am not sure how Halle Berry recovered from Catwoman……oh wait, she didn’t), but they have hit a lot of home runs as well (Iron Man, most recently, was excellent).

(Oops!)

Even if you don’t think you like comic book movies, odds are you like a movie you didn’t even realize was based on a comic book.

I am happy to see them made as long as we get more Iron Man and less Batman and Robin (which I consider the worst movie ever made, comic book based or otherwise).

Arnold and The One Liners

Anybody who knows me knows that I consider Arnold a true gift to the world. As a respect to this gift I have decided to dedicate a blog to him.

Just to get it out of the way, if you don’t like his movies, you are wrong (I will give you “Batman and Robin”, though and his non-action movies have been forgotten by true Arnold fans, so I wouldn't even know what a "Junior" was).

Everybody knows “Terminator” and “T2”, but to me the true gem of the Arnold catalogue is “Predator”. It is what I consider the manliest film ever created. A: It has Arnold, which is required to even be considered, B: A dude dry shaves in this film, and if you are a man, then you have to respect that,


(Mac, dry shaving. Just seeing it makes me a man).

C: Carl Weathers, D: The one liners!

Ah, the one liners. Such an important part of any Arnold movie, even if it’s just the simple “I’ll Be Back” that was born in Terminator and went on to become his signature quote. They even made a movie for what seems the sole purpose was to create scenes that could end with an Arnold one liner. This movie is called The Running Man.

The best always seem to come just before or just after Arnold kills somebody.
*Kill a dude with chainsaw? He had to split.
*Stab a dude with a knife? Stick around.
*About to kill a dude with a drill? Screw you.
*Strangle a dude? What a pain in the neck.
*Throw a pipe (not just a small ¼” pipe, but a giant pipe) so hard that it not only goes straight through some dudes body, but also the furnace behind them, thus causing smoke to come out of the pipe? Let off some steam.

(Bennett, before "letting off some steam").

You get the point.

In closing I’d like to say, it is every man’s duty to own Predator, and every woman’s duty to be turned on by a man that owns Predator.

The Scale

Alfred Kinsey was a famous biologist who founded the Institute for Research in Sex, Gender and Reproduction. He had a scale that went from 0 to 6, that went as so……

0 Exclusively heterosexual
1 Predominantly heterosexual, only incidentally homosexual
2 Predominantly heterosexual, but more than incidentally homosexual
3 Equally heterosexual and homosexual
4 Predominantly homosexual, but more than incidentally heterosexual
5 Predominantly homosexual, only incidentally heterosexual
6 Exclusively homosexual

(By the way, I am a 5 due to the fact that I watch American Idol religously)

I have ripped off Kinsey and created the Geek Scale, which is as follows…..

0 Tom Brady
1 Mostly Tom Brady, but you watch Lost
2 Mostly Tom Brady, but you like Star Wars
3 Equally Tom Brady and geek (i.e. you play fantasy sports)
4 Mostly Geek, but you HAVE TO WATCH FOOTBALL EVERY SUNDAY
5 Mostly Geek, but you watch a little baseball if it's on
6 Uber Geek

(Hi, I do super models)

I would say I am a 4. While I am mainly a geek, there is a solid dose of “jock” in me as well.

PAAS

What do you think of when you see the word "PAAS"?

If you are anything like me you think of the tight easter egg coloring kits with the cute animals on the box.

Well, I have decided to make PAAS mean something different. It now mean "Parents Against Annie's Singing"

Anyone who has seen 'Little Einsteins' knows just how dangerous Annie's singing can be.

I will not tolerate Annie teaching my children to suck, so I have done something about it.

I wrote the following scene and sent it to the creators of the show. Hopefully it will be included in an upcoming episode.

Scene: Leo walks in and delivers the following line.....

"I have a message. Annie and Rocket were shot down over the Sea of Japan. It spun in. There were no survivors. "

I hope he looks that happy when he actually says it on the show. I know I would.

"Then I'll See You In Hell"

Mike and I had a conversation.

Why is the line "I'll See You In Hell" not used more often in television and film?

I guess my favoriite use of the line is when random knob says to Han Solo "Your Tauntaun will freeze before you reach the first marker" and Han owns him with the aforementioned "Then I'll See You In Hell" before riding out to certain doom.

I mean, what can you say to that.

The black dude with strength in Nightmare 4 also says it to Freddy right before he dies. I'm sure that made it a little less satisfying for Freddy, which is all you can hope for at that point.

Well, I guess there is one thing you can say.

In Unforgiven Gene Hackman says this to Clint. In which Clint replies "yeah" and kills his ass.

That was a pretty good comeback.

Later,
BoShanks