The One That Got Away

Every now and then, the Wife's zheng musical group is asked to perform at some social function, whether for money or not I don't know. Most recently the group helped provide entertainment for some CUNY Asian group called AAARI at a banquet. Someone close to the group was a student in the music school so she made sure the performers and their entourage had their own table. During the dinner, AAARI sold raffle tickets so I bought three, just to show my support for the group. Later, one of the three tickets was actually picked and I won a $100 gift certificate to some electronic store in Flushing. The top prize was a Dell Inspiron 6400 laptop but before the winning number was called, many people started to leave the banquet already. I suppose most people there already had decent jobs and didn't need yet another computer in their houses. At my table, the performers and their families also started to go home. When I told them the grand prize hadn't been drawn, they even gave me all their raffle tickets. Not long after ward, I myself wanted to go and just left the raffle tickets on the table. Before we got out of the dining area, the winning number was called and some elderly woman in the general direction of our table had the winning ticket. The winning number sounded very much like one of my tickets. Let's say I bought tickets numbered 200119, 200120, and 200121. 200119 was the winner of the $100 gift certificate. I was almost sure 200121 was the number that was called. The winner probably sat next to our table and helped herself to the abandoned tickets. If only I stayed for a few more minutes, I would have won the Dell laptop. While it's not a MacBook Pro, it's still a new, free laptop computer...

I tried to convince myself that it was just fate. Maybe I wasn't meant to own a Dell laptop for free. I already have a PowerBook, the Amiga, plus Dee Dee's Friday XP PC, so it's not like I really need yet another computer. I told myself not to be so materialistic, not to be what's called in Vietnamese a túi tham không đáy, or bottomless greed bag. After all, I already won the $100 gift certificate.

I should be thankful for what I already have. Family, work, and health. Besides, this past weekend I used the $100 gift certificate and the device that I got is pretty good...