The minute I heard the numbers on the news station， I knew. I knew my wife would kill me because I had misplaced our lottery ticket several days ago. I heard the announcer read my lucky numbers. The jackpot was a record 240 million.
Then I relaxed for a few seconds， I thought maybe I had more time to find the ticket. My wife always listened for the numbers on the televisions in the bar where she worked， but she told me that morning her boss would be shutting them down to install new ones. So I figured I had at least six to eight hours in my search.
A minute later I received a call， my wife screamed：“Hello Mr. Millionaire？” Trembling， I asked how she knew about the numbers. Apparently my bigmouthed sisterinlaw， who is so lazy， she has nothing to do but stay at home and watch TV heard the numbers， and called her. (She remembered the numbers I used because all of them were the scores of her previousprevious adj.在前的， 早先的adv.在……以前 IQ tests.）
She said：“My sister，s picking me up. We，ll be over in an hour.”
After she hung up， I tore apart my apartment. In a few minutes it looked like a half dozen tornadoes had spent the night in our living room. I heard the sweat from my face hit the wooden floors.
Where did I place that ticket？ I tried to retrace my steps over the past several days. Ok， I thought after work I would go home， grab a beer， sit on the couch， and turn on the TV set. Actually this was my pattern for the past ten years.
I had to relax. I opened a can of beer and laid with my legs outstretched on the sofa. Maybe the lotterylottery n.抽彩给奖法 officials would just give us the money， after all I，ve used the same numbers for the past six months. I mean I could show them my previous lottery stubs. Surely they would much rather give the money to us rather than donating it to some worthlessworthless adj.无价值的， 无益的 cause like the state educational fund. What good would that do？ Look how much it educated me.
I picked up my cellphone to call the lottery claims office：“Listen I won the 240 million dollar jackpotjackpot n.［桥牌］ 累积赌注， 累积奖金， but there seems to be a slight problem. I lost the ticket. Would you accept my word that I bought the ticket？” I heard the employee scream with laughter.
“Miss， this isn，t a joke. I，m willing to submit to a lie detector test if that would help.” Seconds later I heard her mumblingmumble n.喃喃而语， 咕哝， 闭嘴细嚼 v.喃喃而语， 咕哝 off the phone， and then I heard everyone in the office howling with laughter. Her supervisor then picked up the phone， still dying with laughter， she said：“Sir for 240 million anyone in this room could make themselves pass a polygraphpolygraph n.复写器， 多种波动描写器. ”She hung up.
