First Time Player Scoops $90 Million Jackpot

A first-time Powerball player won a $90 million jackpot last week after buying two tickets on impulse.

Lisa Quam had taken a break from her Thanksgiving cooking to nip to the local grocery store. When the cashier asked if she’d like to play Powerball, feeling full of holiday spirit she decided to throw caution to the wind and give it a whirl.

Bye Bye Boeing

Lisa and her husband Everret are the first ever Powerball winners from Washington state. Both hail from the suburban outskirts of Seattle, home of the American aerospace giant Boeing. Lisa worked there for 25 years and her husband Everret was a mechanic at the company for 16 years.

Note the use of past tense there. Following their win they’ve decided to quit their jobs.

They didn’t even find out until Sunday night, when they were utterly bowled over by their win. Lisa, by her own admission, was “freaked out” and it appears nobody got much sleep that night.

No Ferraris Please

Now if you won $90 million in the lottery what car would you get? A Ferarri maybe? An Aston Martin like 007? Or a lightning-fast Bugatti Veyron? Maybe a Rolls Royce limousine for that extra class? Or if you want horsepower too, perhaps a Bentley like all those oil sheiks drive? Or – here’s an interesting one – how about a Subaru?

Yep, they’re going to buy a Subaru! And I don’t mean a top-of-the-line Impreza rally car either, but a Subaru Forester – a standard four wheel drive SUV.

So, with this practical and somewhat understated purchase it’s fair to say the couple aren’t going to let their newfound wealth go to their heads.

Apparently they’re still deciding how they want to get paid, to go for the significantly smaller, lump-sum payment, or to get the full jackpot paid out in instalments annually, as is standard with US lotteries.

Over here we don’t have to worry about that, however, because if you play with Lottoland not only can you get to play all those massive American lotteries with their mammoth jackpots, you can also do something that Americans can’t do – collect your full jackpot win in a single lump sum.

This week the jackpot stands at $60 million, though we reckon it might actually roll over to make for an even bigger Christmas jackpot. And, as if all that isn’t enough, if you play with Lottoland you can also use the DoubleJackpot option, bringing it up to $120 million – now that’s what I call a serious stocking filler!