Gerard Murray picked up a Set for Life Scratch’N Win ticket on his way to work and when he saw the three Set for Life symbols, he asked his coworker if he could borrow his glasses so he could be sure of what he was seeing, Atlantic Lottery said in a news release Friday.
“Boys, I think, I think I won Set for Life,” he remembers saying.
Because Gerard hadn’t been able to get hold of his wife Kim — who was on in her work parking lot —he asked his sister to call her. When she heard the good news, Kim started to cry, Atlantic Lottery said.
“I couldn’t speak,” Kim said in the news release. “I couldn’t talk, I couldn’t hardly walk.”
She said Gerard remained calm about the win.
“He scratched it (the ticket) and threw it in his lunch can, not signed or anything, and walked out of the room, left it on the table in the lunchroom,” Kim said. “I nearly had an aneurism when I heard. Someone told him to sign it and take it to the store.”
The ticket was validated at the same store where Gerard had purchased it, and then confirmed by Atlantic Lottery.
The top prize for Atlantic Lottery’s Set for Life Scratch ’N Win ticket is one of two options; $1,000 a week for 25 years, or a lump sum payment of $675,000. Gerard and Kim will receive the lump sum payment.
Gerard has picked out a new truck.
The couple also said they will give some money to family and will renovate their house by upgrading their kitchen.
A trip somewhere warm is also in the plans.
“I guess now, we don’t even have to stop to think about it,” she says. “Now if we want to take a trip now we can. Everything is going to be a lot easier now.”
Moorland Ultramar in Whitbourne sold the winning ticket and will receive a one per cent seller’s prize.
This win marks the fifth Set for Life top prize awarded in Newfoundland and Labrador in 2018.
