ITUNES | SPOTIFY | STITCHER

Why I Don’t Want to Win The Lottery 

Alright, today I’m sharing a handful of my least popular opinions. These fall into the most random of categories from finances, the lottery, lattes, credit scores, and more! These are things that you might l.o.v.e that I cannot stand, or maybe you’ll discover something that you despise that I adore. Read on to hear the things that make my friends shake their heads when I assert them over wine at book club!

I DON’T WANT TO WIN THE LOTTERY

Ok – yes, this is SUPER unpopular. Even if you don’t buy lottery tickets, I bet that you WOULD want to win millions of dollars in the lottery. 

I wouldn’t want to win the lottery because… 

Lottery winners file bankruptcy at a rate 2x the general population each year. 

Studies show that 70% of lottery winners go on to file bankruptcy.

Less than half of them report improved happiness.

Which, in case you are wondering, is really great data to support that money doesn’t buy happiness. THINGS don’t make us happy. 

Winning a crap ton of money doesn’t make you happy.

What money does… is it serves as a magnifying glass – it makes you more of what you already are.  I honestly feel like we have established healthy habits and a set of sustainable systems around managing money… but not millions of influx at once. That kind of surge of energy has the ability to short out even the sturdiest of fuse boxes and I wouldn’t want it. 

A chance to earn an extra 100k a year? Sign me up!

Even better — the understanding on how to manage our money well for our family and feel confident in that ability? I’d buy a ticket to that lottery. 

COFFEE IS TERRIBLE! 

Yep, you read that right… I don’t like coffee. 

I joke that I’m naturally caffeinated but the truth is that I’ve never consumed a single cup of coffee in my life. 

In college my grandfather passed away in his early 90s, after living alone and independently with the most epic garden you’ve ever seen. I drove from Pennsylvania to Maine on a Friday to attend his viewing and celebration of life, and came back down to Pennsylvania, 500 miles and an 8+ hour drive, on Sunday. Sunday morning I left Maine at 4am to get home in time to study for an Immunology test on Monday. I was emotionally and physically exhausted. I called my Mom and told her I was going to fall asleep at the wheel – and could she stay on the phone with me for 8 hours?! She told me to go to Dunkin Donuts to get a coffee with extra extra cream and extra extra sugar – and to drink it!

So I did – I tried. Every sip I gagged. YUCK! I cannot STAND the taste of coffee. But do you know what? That cup of coffee kept me awake because in my trusty old silver Saab the cup holders were TERRIBLE and I had to hold the piping hot coffee and stay awake to avoid spilling it on myself.

OK… so I recently discovered that I’m what’s called a super taster…. A super taster is a person who tastes certain flavors or foods more strongly than other people. 

So our tongues are covered in taste buds, these bumps are covered in taste receptors that tell our brains what they are eating. Some of us have more taste buds with more receptors and we are more sensitive to taste than average. They are known as supertasters. Supertasters are particularly sensitive to bitter flavors in foods such as broccoli, spinach, coffee, beer, and chocolate.

I googled it… and 25% of the population is considered to be super tasters and interestingly more women are super testers than male supertasters. 

Supertasters like more salt, sometimes try to cover up these flavors with other flavors, often avoid alcohol and smoking, and it can lead to picky eating. 

Discovering this supertasting super power made me realize that, despite all the times I tried to love coffee – no amount of cream and sugar  made it tolerable. 

There are these supertaster test strips you can get on Amazon – to see if you can taste the bitterness of the strips. Give them a try. Have your kiddos give it a go. Maybe that picky eater of yours will suddenly make sense. 

If you DO have a picky eater, you aren’t going to want to miss this blog post and this podcast episode with Alyssa Miller of Nutrition for Littles.

BORROWING MONEY ISN’T FOR ME 

I don’t borrow money – even on a credit card that I pay off every month – not even for the points.

I get the draw – I would LOVE to travel for “free” with points from a credit card – but the game of switching balances, paying it off each month – and the potential to overspend the budget on a card with a seemingly unending limit, isn’t worth it. I’ve never had a credit card and I have no plans to get one in the future. 

I’m not saying this is the way for you – It’s just the way I do it. 

Also – I love to earn money, save money, or get “money back” – so I think that my spending would be impacted by that carrot – which is why the credit card companies do that. They want you to, in your mind, justify the $1,000 purchase with the 1-2% cash back rewards… “don’t worry that we are spending $1,000 on this flat screen TV to watch the Superbowl on, even if it might not be in the budget, you’ll get $20 in cash back.”

Don’t just take my word for it… 

Dun & Bradstreet conducted a study, where they found we spend on average 12%-18% more when using credit cards instead of cash. The Federal Reserve Bank of Boston recently found an even sharper disparity between cash and non-cash transactions. According to a 2016 report from the bank, the average value of a cash transaction was $22, compared with $112 for non-cash transactions — a 409% jump.

According to the Federal Reserve, the average credit card interest rate is 16.61% as of Q1 2020. Approximately 45% of credit cardholders carry a balance from month to month according to the latest Federal Reserve Survey of Consumer Finances.1  Credit cards that offer the most generous sounding rewards programs also often carry the highest fees and interest rates, compared to a similar card with a lower rewards program, or none at all. 

CREDIT SCORES AREN’T ALL THEY’RE CRACKED UP TO BE

I’d rather have a positive net worth than a desirable credit score. 

I would rather have control of my money, have a positive net worth, be moving in the right direction with our money as a family than have a high credit score. 

In fact – I have no credit score whatsoever. My kids have no credit scores. I have frozen their credit reports. We have identify theft protection.

I don’t believe in “building credit” for my kiddos. My college aged son has a debit card, a checkbook, and a checking and savings account. When he graduates and goes to rent an apartment, he’s going to have to get a rental where they are willing to actually look into his employment history and savings and income as benchmarks to prove that he is able to pay his rent. 

We teach our kids to build wealth, not to build credit.

PUMPKINS ARE PUTRID & PUMPKIN SPICE LATTES ARE GROSS!

I don’t enjoy pumpkin – not in pie, not in beer, not in a spiced latte. 

I just don’t like it. I don’t like pumpkin pie, pumpkin beer, pumpkin roll or pumpkin spiced lattes. Come at me, bro. Is that a thing that teens are saying these days?

No seriously, don’t come at me. 

I know that pumpkin is so trendy. I know you love it. I know your friends love it.

I’d drink a swiss miss hot chocolate from home (the packet) made with piping hot water over a coffee or a pumpkin spiced latte. 

While I’m at it – I don’t really love Starbucks.

I DO have a couple of colder drinks at Starbucks that I like… but I would choose a Dunkin Donuts hot chocolate over a Starbs one everytime.

Girl, I hope we can still be friends, even though you know I don’t like pumpkin, coffee, credit scores, or winning the lottery. I feel like we know each other so much better now!