You must be my lucky star

M and I went to one of our favorite local restaurants Friday night and had a great meal. We decided to cut through the bar to get to the car quicker in the pouring rain. (That sounded like a song lyric. But I digress.)

Anyway, we passed a scratch ticket machine on the way out. Something made me stop to buy a ticket. Now, these machines don't give change, and all I had was $5. So I decided to splurge on one of the new Red Sox scratch tickets -- as the Red Sox played away behind us in the bar.

You were given four numbers and 10 baseballs, and if the baseballs matched the numbers, you won that prize automatically. I revealed my four numbers, then started in on the baseballs.

First baseball: $10. "Wow," M said. "You doubled your money back."

Second baseball: Another match, another $10. "Twenty bucks!" M said.

Third baseball: Another $10.

You guessed it: I won $10 on each baseball. One hundred smackers, ladies and gentlemen. I couldn't believe it. So I've been plotting what to do with my found money for the rest of the weekend. We went to a birthday party last night, and I bought a few rounds of drinks. Maybe shoes? Sheets? Something for the house? Jewelry? A few DVDs I've been wanting? I'm sure I will find something.

In any event, I did better than the real Red Sox that night -- they lost bigtime.