head in handsI'm not an avid lottery player -- recently I've been dabbling a bit, nothing noteworthy -- but my number one rule regarding this form of gambling is: If a bunch of people are going in on some tickets or whatever, get in on that action. 'Cause there truly can be few feelings worse in this world than almost winning a crap-load of cash. Particularly when everyone around you did win a crap-load of cash.

This terrible occurrence happened to this poor dude in Spain. See, he was the only person in his 70-household village that didn't go in on the lottery. And he was the only person who didn't win. The only person who didn't win the $950 million prize.

His name is Costis Mitsotakis, and he lives in the small village of Sodeto, Espana. And, see, in the village of Sodeto, things work differently. The lottery is annual, tickets are $26, and people from the town's homeowner's association go door-to-door selling the tickets. This year, there were 1,800 winning tickets, each containing the same number (58268), resulting in a cash prize of $520,000 for everybody in the town. Well, everybody but Costis. Thing is, the reason Costis' household didn't purchase a ticket is because the sellers missed his home. That's right, it wasn't even homie's fault.

Don't feel too bad for Costis and his family, though. Apparently, thanks to the lottery, he just made himself some money. Some newly-rich neighbor bought some property from him that he's been trying to sell for some time.

Yeah ... that's better than $520,000. Totally.

Do you play the lottery?

 

Image via Alex E. Proimos/Flickr