Mike Mamer, a wrestling coach has the habit of buying the lottery from time to time, when he feels like it. He usually buys tickets once a week, that is if he feels like doing so. On October 16th Mamer, stopped at he Deer Creek Casey’s to get a soft drink before driving to Monticello for a wrestling coaches meeting. There he decided to purchase a $5 Little Lotto ticket which, this lucky stop made him the only winner for the grand-prize in that evening’s Little Lotto drawing winning him $300,000. National lottery

As funny as it may sound Mamer almost missed the chance of winning his prize since he almost ended up not buying the ticket. He went in for his drink, the idea of buying a ticket raced rapidly across his mind and he almost said no to his hunch. And good he did!

After buying the lottery ticket when he stopped by the small town of 600 people in Illinois, he went home and life continued as usual. The next day he went to work at Mathis Kelly Construction, picked up the newspapers and he could not believe his eyes, he had actually won. Lottery numbers

“At first I thought I matched four of five numbers, and thought to myself, that’s a decent prize” he said. “Then I saw I matched all five numbers, and said ‘Holy Cow.’

His winning was even taken as a joke when he phoned his wife, Lisa to share the good news. Lisa, knowing that he loves jokes, simply did not believe him and hung up. It was after he called again that Lisa could accept the fact that is was true. No, this was not a practical joke it was real.

The Mamers family is composed three children: two girls, ages 7 and 12; and a son, age 10. Their priority right now is to save much of their Lottery windfall to help pay for college for their three children. “For now, we’re going to save and invest the money for when we really need it,” Mamer said. “The children are going to have a good Christmas,” he added. Mike and Lisa were presented an gigantic check in representation of their huge windfall at the Deer Creek Casey’s store. As with many lotto programs, the retailer of a grand-prize also gets rewarded, in this case Deer Creek Casey’s store will receive a bonus of $3,000.

Sensible people, with their feet on the ground, hard-working, focused on their children´s future are some of the words that can be used to describe Mike and Lisa. The type of couple who after winning the lottery are simply setting their priorities straight, and know that what is more important is to set money aside for education. Could you make better use of this money?