Lucky Dudes: Man Finds Old $2.9 Million Winning Lottery Ticket While Cleaning Truck; Another Man Discovers $95,000 Stash Wife Kept For 50 Years In A Shoebox
Two men in separate circumstances discovered wealth hidden from them for some time. The first man from New York found a winning lottery ticket worth $2.9 million while cleaning his truck, while the second one found his wife saved $95,000 inside a shoebox.
The first lucky dude, 47-year-old Jerry Ritieni, bought $25 worth of lottery ticket in July but placed the tickets in his truck instead of putting them inside his pocket as he usually does. He then forgot about the tickets until in August he found them and checked the tickets at his Extreme Auto Body Repairs in Massapequa from the lottery's Web site if it won.
To his astonishment, as we was checking the winning numbers, he discovered he was holding the winning ticket and ran out of his office to share the wonderful news with his 17-year-old son who at first didn't believe because Ritieni loves to joke.
The son initially gave a wry, "Yeah, OK response," but when shown the numbers finally believed that his dad is a millionaire. The pair from Long Island, New York got confirmation from the lottery office in Plainview that Ritieni beat the 1-in-47 million odds.
Co-employees of Ritieni knew he had good news when he returned to the office because he had a big smile, while the man was known for never smiling. Co-workers described it as a $3 million smile.
Ritieni is still deciding if he would get the lump sum of $2.9 million or choose 26 yearly payments.
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The other man was not named nor his location identified. According to Blog.petflow.com, he was a grandfather married to the same woman for 50 years. The old couple shared everything, except the content of a shoebox that the wife placed on the top shelf of her clothes cabinet.
When the wife became sick and felt her time was up, she told her husband to open the shoebox where he discovered two crocheted dolls with bills inside totaling $95,000.
He asked her how she was able to save that much, and her reply was, "Right before we got married, my grandmother told me the secret to a happy marriage was to never argue. She said if I ever got angry with you, I should keep quiet and crochet a doll."
The response made the man think in 50 years his wife got angry twice. But the dying wife added that the money inside came from selling all the dolls she had crocheted over their 5-decade marriage.