Top-prize win is her biggest ever
She’s an occasional Lottery player, a Silver Spring woman told Lottery officials this week when she visited Baltimore to claim a prize won over the weekend. The decision to play, she reports, is always a spur-of-the-moment one. Happily, the decision, the moment and the Holiday Cash scratch-off she picked out combined to deliver a $50,000 top-prize win.
“I was just getting gas when the feeling hit, that’s how it happened.” Inside the Rockville gas station’s convenience store, her eyes were immediately drawn to the holiday-themed $5 instant ticket.
“It’s a pretty ticket, Holiday Cash. Great colors,” she said. Her decision to buy the instant ticket wasn’t followed by one to immediately scratch it. “I didn’t play it until two days later. Life’s very busy right now. I got distracted.”
When the registered nurse finally remembered her Holiday Cash purchase, she didn’t believe the $50,000 prize it revealed. “I didn’t believe it when I scratched it, when my mom confirmed it or after my sister checked it on her Lottery app. I just knew it couldn’t be real.”
Unable to sleep that night, the Montgomery County woman made an appointment to visit Lottery headquarters to claim her prize the next day. “Thank goodness I was able to get in so quickly,” she said. “Wondering about it was driving me crazy.”
Even after completing the prize-claiming process, though, she still had doubts. “How can this be happening?”
Liberty gas station at 1298 East Gude Drive in Rockville sold the lucky scratch-off, earning a $500 bonus from the Lottery for selling a top-prize winning instant ticket. Holiday Cash, which debuted in October with eight $50,000 prizes, has six remaining as well as eight $5,000 second-tier prizes. The game is included in the Lottery’s Holiday Cash second-chance promotion, which features six festive holiday-themed scratch-offs and three holiday-themed FAST PLAY tickets.
