Everytime the powerball or mega millions jackpot heads near $100 million, my interest in winning the lottery increases.  Now, don’t get me wrong, i’m interested in winning anything, but as that jackpot heads toward and past $100 million i start having my “millionaire” dreams.  Well, they aren’t really dreams, since i’m awake, it’s really a daydream/fantasy.

My dreams include the normal new home or 2, a ferarri or the like, and various first class trips to cities around the world.  While living this way is quite rare, i’m sure the fantasy isn’t.  Most of have some material dreams for our prize, some have dreams for their families, their friends or their favorite charities.

Tell us about some of your dreams of lottery riches, just register and post.

Next time you open an email that says you’ve won the Lotto, it’s probably worth thinking things over, prior to telling the boss to go jump in the lake.  In fact there are so many lottery scam emails that are circulating, i would suggest that it’s nearly a 100% chance that it was sent by criminals hoping to separate you from your money.  Here are a few rules of thumb for determining whether or not you’ve actually won.  Contrary to traditional advice of “if it sounds too good to be true”, i present these even more basic rules:

1. Did you buy a ticket for this lottery?

if you answered no, then you didn’t win, because you didn’t play.

2. Did your numbers match those drawn for the lottery you’ve allegedly won?

if you answered no, then you didn’t win, because you don’t have the winning numbers

3. Do you have the actual winning ticket in your hands?

if you answered no, then you didn’t win since you need the actual ticket to collect your prize.

If you answer no to any of these 3 questions, they you know it’s a scam.  Finally, if all else fails to keep you away from these people - Don’t EVER send money or banking information for collecting your prize.  The goal of the email they’ve sent you is to steal your money.  Don’t let it happen to you.

See some actual email lottery scams at www.AllLotteryScams.com

There were 2 tickets sold that match all 6 numbers in Saturday’s Powerball drawing.  The tickets were sold in Delaware and Pennsylvania and each ticket hold will share half of the jackpot which was expected to exceed $173 Million.  The jackpot for the Weds March 4th Powerball drawing has been reset to $20 million.

This leaves the $212 million Mega Millions, alone as the only $100+ million jackpot in the US.