I’ll admit, I bought a ticket for tonight’s Megamillions drawing. With the jackpot at an estimated $640 Million, I thought, “What the heck, it’s a buck, I’d probably just spend it on a cheeseburger anyway.” I walked into my local gas station, threw down my dollar and walked out with my little red paper. Since I did that last night, the jackpot estimate has actually risen over $100 Million, meaning that a virtual monkey load of people followed my example and decided to ride it out, too.
I’ve talked about what I would do if I won the lottery before. Most of that probably still applies, but this time the numbers are way higher and I have some free time at work this afternoon, so I thought I’d let my brain make some addendums to the list. After all, we’re talking about a $17 Million a year income. That’s not something you would take lightly.
Here is a few new ideas that have popped up in my head of late:
Philanthropy
Kickstart some Great Projects – I am constantly forlorn by the fact that I can only donate a couple of bucks to the rare kickstarter (or other crowd funding site) project. I’ve found dozens that I think are truly genius ideas, and I’d love to be able to donate more to them. With the kind of chump change laying around that just clutters underfoot, I’d probably spend a great deal of time floating through the Kickstarter cloud, picking up great ideas and throwing some money at them. Maybe not enough to earn the super-mega-awesome kickbacks, but enough to ensure that they would succeed.
Kiva – I love the idea of what Kiva represents. Everyone could use a hand every once in a while, and I don’t see it as being a huge risk. Everyone benefits when you invest in people and making the world a little bit easier on everyone is a goal I’ve always found to be incredibly noble. What I like about a site like Kiva is that you can make small loans that can really make a difference in someone’s life, but since it’s done through a service, the person asking for the loan doesn’t have to feel like they’re beholden to anyone. That emotional shame of needing help can be more crippling than the small amount of money that someone might need.
Start Some Good – Start some good is a crowdfunding site, like Kickstarter, but unlike most sites that are built to fund creative endeavors or company start ups, Start Some Good is a social cause site. It is all about helping someone out with a project that will make a real difference in the lives of people all over the world. It’s like having thousands of microcharities.
Business
Angel Investing – I would love to spend some time finding people with brilliant ideas and helping them get them going. Unlike Kickstarter or things like that, where you give someone money for a few perks, Angel Investing is a business arrangement. I’d love to spend a some money taking risks that could lead to being in on the ground floor of something amazing, like Google.
Half Drunk Studios – When I wrote about winning the lottery last time, I said I would like to start a business. I think I know what that business would be now. Halfdrunk is a podcast I do with my friend Chris Brown (Yeti_detective). We talk about branching out into other media as well, like video shorts, comics, etc. With the right amount of money and the right employees, I think we could see it grow into a New Media content producer in a way that is often left a little flat right now. I have grandiose dreams of being part of the launching platform for internet media. Like an ABC or NBC, but completely on the web.
Self Discovery
Suddenly becoming massively wealthy wouldn’t stop my appetite for writing. It also wouldn’t immediately turn me into some sort of mature, sage like wise man. However, it would give me the resources I needed to dedicate myself to learning about myself and the world in a completely new way. For starters, I’d like to just buy a comfortable but fuel efficient vehicle and road trip all over the United States. It’d be a trip that would take a couple of years, me, the open road, 4G internet and the world. After that, I’d spend a lot of time searching the far corners of the world for answers to all of life’s questions, even the really hard ones like, “Which is better Swedish or German Chocolate?”
Experience is the key to writing, and I’d really love to experience more of the world. Also, thanks to the great hive mind of Twitter and the ever increasing global absorption of the internet, I have friends that are basically everywhere, and I’d very much like to visit them all in person. Maybe even bring them all together in once place and force them to re-enact the Hunger Games have a giant multi-day party, possibly on a boat.
Airship
Of course, I’d pick them all up in my Airship.
That goes without saying, I think.