When he climbed out of bed last Sunday the day got off to a bad start for Calgary man Emery Cressman. He needed a good, strong cup of coffee, but the cupboard was bare so he had to make a trip to the local store. While he was there he ran his lottery tickets through the self-checker and his day got a whole lot better when he discovered he'd won the CAD$ 7 million jackpot in the July 19, 2014 Lotto 649 draw.
"I thought, 'It's going to be that kind of day,'" Cressman said remembering the long line of customers at the store, but he now realizes it is a day he will never forget.
With a can of coffee in his hand, he began checking his tickets.
"I saw there was a Free Play on one, and thought, 'Right on!' and then I saw, 'appears to be a winner,'" he recalled.
Cressman originally thought he'd won CAD$ 7,000. Then he looked again and thought it was perhaps CAD$ 70,000 so headed on home and double checked the numbers online, but still found it hard to believe the size of his win so roused his wife Lorraine.
"Is this for today’s date?" he asked, and Lorraine had a little difficulty in believing her eyes as well.
"Is this a joke? Are you joking?" she said.
He wasn't joking.
The Cressmans are now looking forward to a more financially secure future.
"This is the first time I am totally out of debt since I was 16 years old," Emery admitted.
Canada Lotto 649 drawings are held on Wednesdays and Saturdays. There are seven levels of prizes and the overall odds of winning a prize are 1 in 6.6.
