Woman Finds $7.3 Million In Kitchen Drawer

[matcom]

<snip>

WHEN most people rummage through their kitchen drawers, they rarely uncover anything more exciting than a mislaid knife. Joanne and David Austin, however, found a lottery ticket that made them rich.

The couple, from Hull in northern England, were oblivious to the fact they had bought a winning ticket in Britain's National Lottery a month ago, on January 8.

However, the lottery operator, which can identify where winning tickets were bought, ran an advertisement in a local paper saying someone from Hull had not yet claimed a 3 million pound ($7.31m) prize.

Joanne Austin, 38, ransacked a kitchen drawer and pulled out a pile of old tickets, only to be "shell-shocked" when one of them contained the winning numbers.

"I opened the kitchen drawer where I keep our Lotto tickets and got them all out to check as I hadn't done it for ages," she said as the lucky family were unveiled as winners by the lottery operators.

"When I found the one for that date I kept staring at it and then the numbers in the papers. I just couldn't believe it."

Her husband has resigned his job working for a caravan manufacturer, but Mrs Austin said she would stay working at an estate agent, to "keep my feet on the ground".

http://www.news.com.au/story/0,10117,12172901-13762,00.html

[NewJeffCT]

1. Something similar happened to me, only I didn't win

A year or two back, I remember hearing a radio story about an unclaimed lottery winner from several months back... then, a day or two later, when cleaning up the house, I noticed an old lottery ticket lying somewhere and thought to myself that the date sounded familiar.

So, out of curiousity, I went to the CT lottery website and, sure enough, the date on the ticket matched the date of the lottery jackpot nobody had claimed. To make things more exciting, I matched the first 3 numbers on the ticket... and no others. What a downer. The brink of ecstacy, only to be left dangling.

[Quakerfriend]

2. Oh well, atleast you've got a story to tell

My husband missed winning $1.6 mil by one click of the wheel, while waiting for his plane in Vegas. Instead he won $250 in quarters and almost missed the plane trying to collect them all!

[marzipanni]

5. Yikes, running through the airport with $250. of quarters

in his pockets must have been a noisy and awkward experience. Maybe they provided a canvas bank bag?
Once, at the airport in Denver, on the way home from Boston to San Francisco, my husband and I ran a long distance to the connecting flight with a half-gallon of maple syrup in each hand and carry-ons slung over our shoulders. The altitude was noticable! Another passenger commented that he sent a gallon tin of maple syrup in a box once and someone pierced holes through it so when it got to its destination nothing was left!

[Donailin]

3. o man.

diggy diggy dang dang. lucky people.

[SoCalDem]

4. I wonder if she watches "At Home with the Braithwaites"

I love that show:)