Do you play games of chance, visit casinos, buy lottery tickets, raffle tickets?

fuzzybuddy

fuzzybuddy

SF VIP
Location
The Sticks, Northeast PA.
I love winning money. I could win money all day long. Yeah. But, as much as I love winning, I HATE loosing a cent. My ex has a gambling problem, which colors my outlook on games of chance. But how about you? Do you play games of chance, visit casinos, buy lottery tickets, raffle tickets?
 

I've never been to a casino.

I used to buy a square or two in the office sports pools.

I do buy raffle tickets for charity fundraisers.

I buy a couple of lottery tickets every year when the Powerball or the MegaMillions jackpots are very high.

In my life, I've won a couple of $2.00 scratch-offs, a frozen turkey, and $100.00 in a barroom raffle.

The $100.00 really doesn't count because it ended up costing me more than $100.00 by the time I bought the customary round of drinks and tipped the bartender to celebrate my win.
 
scratch off lottery ticket every so often.... but I hate losing money so I spend maybe $5 a month on it? I'm cheap and I hate giving the government any more of my money than I have to.
 

We go to the casinos in Atlantic City when we can get a complementary room and a little slot play.
Most of the time the hubby will play the slots while I go to the pool or metal detect on the beach. After dinner I play the penny slots for awhile.
These days the comps are few and far between and I don't feel like sitting for any length of time with a mask on just to play the slots. I've heard the machines are separated because of the virus so I wouldn't be able to sit near my hubby which I usually do and gasp every time he loses. Maybe that's why he wants to go now. lol
 
We've been casino fans, for years. On average, before this virus hit, we usually spend about 20 days per year at the casinos. We sometimes win a bit, but usually "donate" more. Our annual win/loss statements show that we blow about $5000 a year on this "entertainment", but considering the costs of something like a 5 day cruise, these casino days give us much more bang for the buck.....and 4 times as many days away from the routine.

I play the State lottery for a dollar or two every week, and buy an occasional Powerball or Mega Million ticket...might blow a couple hundred a year on that, but much of that money goes to the State education funds, so I just consider it a voluntary tax....and it helps keep the property taxes stable.

We have adequate income, and no debts since the mid 1980's, so I figure we might as well get some enjoyment from our funds, while we are still able to do so.
 
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I've won $1,000 and also $100 in lottery several times. Not a bad return for $2. 😀

I never wait until the jackpot is big - the lower tier prizes are very nice. Forget about millions, $100k is a good chunk. My aunt won $5,000 a few yrs ago.

I don't buy scratch offs.

Lots of people who sneer at lottery ticket buyers actually buy them on the sly.
 
I don't play any games of chance. I visited a casino once, when the new Encore casino opened in the next town to me. It was hilariously garish, all red and gold and gaudy. We had gone their to have lunch and look around. The first shocker was that my husband's lobster roll (a rather stingy one at that) cost $60. We were used to paying in the vicinity of $20. for a very generous one at the local seafood places at the beach. He wanted to try a slot machine, but got bored very quickly. We didn't really understand most of the other games, so ended up going outdoors and walking around the beautifully landscaped grounds. The casino got permission to build there by offering to clean up a contaminated area of land, something the city and state had never been able to afford. They did an incredible job, with gardens and walking trails along the river. Thehighlight of my visit to the casino was seeing an egret.

As you can tell, I'm definitely not a sophisticated high roller...
 
Yes. We live 5 hours from Vegas. We would take a certain amount of money that we could afford to lose. If we won money, the winnings went into our pockets, if we lost then we were done. There is a lot to do in Vegas besides gamble. But, because we are careful we always came home with money in our pocket.
 
In order to get to our timeshare in Atlantic City, we sometimes took the casino buses which left from our neighborhood. They gave bonus coupons for slot play of between $25 and $30. The Showboat (now closed) used to also give a $5 food voucher. Not being gamblers and since Muslim's are prohibited anyway, we'd use that slot coupon and not put another cent into those machines. Now that he's gone, I have no choice but to bus it down there. The most I ever got back was $52. In 2019 I started taking the New Jersey Transit bus which does not give a slot coupon and that was fine with me but it involved taking another NJT bus to Port Authority in N.Y.C. then lining up to board the A.C. bus (same as with Greyhound). Now that another, nicer bus company has taken over the direct to A.C. runs, leaving from close to home, I'll be using them and getting slot coupons once again.
I remember when casinos used to give cash instead of vouchers. I'd go with my mother who would wear a nickel machine out. She used to tease me by telling people "her daughter doesn't waste money in the machines. She takes that bonus, goes on the boardwalk and buys shoes". LOL I bought sandals with my cash one time when I went with her. I've only bought lottery tickets a couple of times and that was a long time ago. Back in March I bought a raffle ticket for $5 just to be charitable, because I wasn't even interested in the prize (some sporting event), but normally, I don't buy those either.
 
Every few months I will buy a lottery ticket and then dream about all the good things we could do with it. The really big jackpots would come with enormous stress and I would not want to deal with that. After the numbers are drawn, I always tell my wife how lucky we are that we did not win.

I have been in big casinos several times, but they just don't interest me. (The food can be good.) When I was stationed on Okinawa, I often played the slot machines with the change left over from lunch. Those machines returned 94% of what they took in, and some days it took awhile to get rid of the change.

One of the guys I worked was very unhappy with the way life changed when his father-in-law won a fairly large lottery and started using his money to dictate everything to the entire family. It was not too long afterwards that his wife left him and took the kids.
 
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OneEyedDiva said:
In order to get to our timeshare in Atlantic City, we sometimes took the casino buses which left from our neighborhood. They gave bonus coupons for slot play of between $25 and $30. The Showboat (now closed) used to also give a $5 food voucher. Not being gamblers and since Muslim's are prohibited anyway, we'd use that slot coupon and not put another cent into those machines. Now that he's gone, I have no choice but to bus it down there. The most I ever got back was $52. In 2019 I started taking the New Jersey Transit bus which does not give a slot coupon and that was fine with me but it involved taking another NJT bus to Port Authority in N.Y.C. then lining up to board the A.C. bus (same as with Greyhound). Now that another, nicer bus company has taken over the direct to A.C. runs, leaving from close to home, I'll be using them and getting slot coupons once again.
I remember when casinos used to give cash instead of vouchers. I'd go with my mother who would wear a nickel machine out. She used to tease me by telling people "her daughter doesn't waste money in the machines. She takes that bonus, goes on the boardwalk and buys shoes". LOL I bought sandals with my cash one time when I went with her. I've only bought lottery tickets a couple of times and that was a long time ago. Back in March I bought a raffle ticket for $5 just to be charitable, because I wasn't even interested in the prize (some sporting event), but normally, I don't buy those either.
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My husband once one 5000 on a nickel slot machine which he played for four hours. Last summer I won 2000 on an automated roulette machine. You just have to watch what you are doing. I don’t want to lose money. We have not won sometimes, but we take so little I don’t consider we lost.
 
Pecos said:
Every few months I will buy a lottery ticket and then dream about all the good things we could do with it. The really big jackpots would come with enormous stress and I would not want to deal with that. After the numbers are drawn, I always tell my wife how lucky we are that we did not win.

I have been big casinos several times, but they just don't interest me. (The food can be good.) When I was stationed on Okinawa, I often played the slot machines with the change left over from lunch. Those machines returned 94% of what they took in, and some days it took awhile to get rid of the change.

One of the guys I worked was very unhappy with the way life changed when his father-in-law won a fairly large lottery and started using his money to dictate everything to the entire family. It was not too long afterwards that his wife left him and took the kids.
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I want to go buy a lottery ticket. Have to go to a different state, tickets are not sold in Utah. There is NO gambling here.
 
I've only played the slot machines in Adelaide .. "Pokies", they call it. The food in the adjoining dining areas was very good. That's what we mainly went for. The most we ever played was around $10 each .. then, we sat and chatted over free coffee and biscuits :)

Once or twice, I've won $5 on a scratch card someone gave me. Also, others have won a few dollars on scratch cards I gave them.

I wish they would distribute the winnings differently .. say, 16-million dollar prizes, rather than $16 million.
 
DH & I haven't been haven't been to Vegas in at least five years. We're not big gamblers - more like penny slots.

When our children were in their early-mid 20s, we, the three kids, and their SOs would caravan there for two nights, three days. As part of their Christmas gift, DH & I picked up hotel expenses and most meals, plus gave each some play money that was NOT to be saved for other uses. We'd travel around as a pack and have a laugh riot, often screaming with excitement when one of us hit a $2 jackpot. Great times and wonderful memories.

That phase ended when our first grandchild was born. Ages and stages...

We buy lottery tickets a couple of times a year, if that. We'd love to go back to Vegas with one or more of our kids when things settle down.
 
I don't go to casinos but do play the lottery every week and I win frequently, but so far just small amounts. But one day I'm going to win the jackpot!! And invite all of you over to my mansion for a PARTY!!!! If you don't play, you can't win. If you don't risk, you don't drink champagne.

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I used to love playing poker with my friends while I was in high school. Since we were all low on cash we'd each get $10 worth of chips each and usually ended the game when someone lost all of their chips. It was a lot of fun since we enjoyed playing a lot of different games. I haven't tried poker anywhere else because it costs too much and with the game that's usually played (Texas Hold'em) someone with a lot of money can generally make it difficult to have fun since the chances of losing a lot are higher.

My wife is really good at blackjack and has added extra bonus cash to several of our trips, sometimes on cruises, sometimes where there are casinos. We generally don't really plan trips to areas with casinos but we've taken a few in our years together. One time we visited Santa Fe, NM and it wasn't quite as interesting as we thought it would be so we visited one of the local casinos for fun.

We occasionally buy charity lottery tickets.

I'm not especially drawn to go gambling, but I don't really object to doing it occasionally.
 
Gaer said:
I can think of no worse hex to have upon me than to win the Powerball or MegaMillions. All my life would be trying to rid myself of the money. Every decision from that point would be concerned with money. There are so many other things of life.
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I'll gladly volunteer to help you get rid of it....lol.

I've been playing the same number on the Florida lotto since it started. I'm scared to stop playing. Can you imagine if I decided to stop and the number won? It's only $2 a week.
 
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