It's the oldest excuse in the book. You happen to break a bill and oh, why not: lotto ticket, please! We've been guilty of it, but the sheer odds usually keep us at bay. Not so for a 69-year-old retired bus driver from Staten Island who just won $72 million after he was forced to break his bill at a counter, rather than a ticketing machine. "I only wanted $5, but in the machine, I couldn't get change back" he tells the Post. "We can't comprehend the value of this amount of money. We were never hungry. But we always just made it." Beat THAT, Nicholas Cage.
John Gillen bought five tickets at a ShopRite and "couldn't believe" that his numbers flashed on the screen. Gillen intends on taking the lump sum payment (around $28 million, thanks to this "lump sum lottery calculator" that has been cruelly feeding countless dreams for years) and giving each close to $7 million.
One daughter is a stay-at-home mom, while the other is a teacher's aide. Gillen's son John Jr. is an NYPD officer, who isn't retiring anytime soon. "My kids are fairly young. I don't want them to see their father sitting around," he told the Daily News. Let's hope it stays that way before he gets his hands on a copy of Catamaran Quarterly. Here's video of Gillen picking up his check:
