The Results

Oh, crumb! My Trivia team finished second, by a score of 79-81. Not too shabby, but we won last year. We had three answers that would have put us ahead, too, but we overruled them for wrong ones. So it's not like we drew a blank and couldn't answer, just that we made bad judgments. Or let somebody else in the group browbeat us into using his answer. Anyhoo, that's water under the bridge now. Let's move on to my latest Pet Peeve.

I dropped my #1 son off at church this morning, and stopped to gas up the LSUV for the Kathy Griffin excursion tonight. It was the slowest pump in the universe, what with taking 15 minutes to pump in $42.00 worth of gas. That's not a lot. It's not even half a tank. But with the price at $2.70/gallon, I figured I might as well get some before it went up. But gas is not the source of my peevishness. No. It is the gas-money-collector.

This guy has waited on me before. It's not my regular convenience store, but one I only use for its...well...its convenience. It is on the way home from school, and home from church-dropping-off. The guy annoyed me a few weeks ago when I bought two scratch-off tickets and he started telling me about a woman who won $20 and was so grateful that she came back and gave him $5. OK. I got the point. He expected me to give him money if I won. I started to leave with the tickets and he said, "Where are you going? Why don't you scratch them here?" I told him I let my kids scratch them, and the kids were at home. Which was true at that time.

Today, I cashed in a $10 winner from a $10 ticket that I bought last night at my regular ticket-buying store. I also had that $42 in gas to pay for. And I bought two $10 tickets. The guy said, "Well, that's $62, but we have to take off the ten-dollar winnings." I handed him two twenties, a ten, and a five. That's $55 for a bill of $52. Mr. Greedypants took out the three ones for my change, and said, "Hey! Why didn't I get a cut for the winner?" I said, "I didn't even buy that ticket here. I bought it last night." Not that it was any of his beeswax, you know. Sweet Gummi Mary! Why would he think I would give him money off of $10 that I won on a $10 ticket bought at another store? It's not like I won $10 million!

I truly have issues with this scammer. First of all, I don't see why I should tip him for doing his job. He's not in the waitress business, where he doesn't even get minimum wage. He knows part of his job is cashing out lottery winners. It's like a Devil's Playground cashier thinking I'm going to tip her for swiping my coupons. Not gonna happen. He's the only guy who's ever dared ask for a cut of the winnings. I doubt he pays off the cashier where HE buys tickets. I've had it with Mr. Greedypants. I refuse to buy a single lottery ticket from him. again. I don't care it I carry in a winner with the express purpose of buying more tickets. I will carry that sucker right back out to the LSUV if he's working. And if he asks, I'll tell him that I don't feel like being solicited for a donation to his Beggars' Academy. Fair is fair (can you tell I saw part of The Legend of Billie Jean yesterday?). I don't owe him a flea off a rat's behind.

Those are MY fleas, off MY rat's behind, and I'm not sharing. Got if?