Celebrating Positives (offset of the Gripes Thread)

[old man emu]

The problem with corporate taxation is that so many things can be deducted from gross income as business expenses to reduce taxable income. 

 

However, consider the deduction ACME Industries receives from the cost of employing a person. That money is not really lost to Treasury because the emplyees pays income tax before getting money in the hand. Then from that money, a further 10% is paid because the person purchased goods and services. If the employee squirrels some away it will most likely earn a tad of interest, which jacks up the employee's taxable income. The deduction ACME gets is not really lost to the whole Economy. They say that money is made round to go round, and that is what it does.

[old man emu]

I don't gamble using most common forms. If I happen to go to a club, I might have a little tickle on the pokies, but with the idea that playing them is a form of entertainent and I expect to have to pay for the time I am being entertained. Therfore I set a limit, usually not very much, on how much I am willing to pay for the entertainment. If by chance (and the pokies are pure chance) I should win some money, that makes the entertainment better.

 

Do you gamble with Scratchies? I don't, but they are a convenient way for someone to give you "a little something" along with a birthday card. My sister gave me ten dollars worth of assorted scratchies today for my birthday. That was five Scratchies.  My experience with Scratchies is that you scratch them; look at them, utter "Oh, well", and toss them in the bin. My expectations were met with three of them. Any further disappointment I expected was dispelled when I saw that I won $2 on one of them. As I started to scratch the final one, I thought that I was just going through the motions, and I would have four out of five duds. You could have knocked me down with a feather after I completed scratching the last card. I'm no expert in these things, but I think I won $5000.00! If not, I've won something with three of a kind.

 

I won't tell my sister until I have confirmed the win, but I think the right thing to do would be to give her a thousand, at least. Because of her generosity in giving me a place to live, I've been able to build up a bank roll that makes me feel somewhat financially comfortable. If it is a win, it's a windfall. I think I should share the joy.

 

Begging letters will be returned marked: "Receiver to Pay Postage"

[Jerry_Atrick]

It would seem the honourable thing to do; she may decline, in which case, aa weekend away for her (and her partner/husband if she has one) or a good night out would be great options.

[Marty_d]

31 minutes ago, old man emu said:

I don't gamble using most common forms. If I happen to go to a club, I might have a little tickle on the pokies, but with the idea that playing them is a form of entertainent and I expect to have to pay for the time I am being entertained. Therfore I set a limit, usually not very much, on how much I am willing to pay for the entertainment. If by chance (and the pokies are pure chance) I should win some money, that makes the entertainment better.

 

Do you gamble with Scratchies? I don't, but they are a convenient way for someone to give you "a little something" along with a birthday card. My sister gave me ten dollars worth of assorted scratchies today for my birthday. That was five Scratchies.  My experience with Scratchies is that you scratch them; look at them, utter "Oh, well", and toss them in the bin. My expectations were met with three of them. Any further disappointment I expected was dispelled when I saw that I won $2 on one of them. As I started to scratch the final one, I thought that I was just going through the motions, and I would have four out of five duds. You could have knocked me down with a feather after I completed scratching the last card. I'm no expert in these things, but I think I won $5000.00! If not, I've won something with three of a kind.

 

I won't tell my sister until I have confirmed the win, but I think the right thing to do would be to give her a thousand, at least. Because of her generosity in giving me a place to live, I've been able to build up a bank roll that makes me feel somewhat financially comfortable. If it is a win, it's a windfall. I think I should share the joy.

 

Begging letters will be returned marked: "Receiver to Pay Postage"

Congrats OME! Hope it was a biggie.

[onetrack]

You don't even have to go to all the trouble of scratching and matching dozens of letters and symbols on a "scratchie" to find if you've won anything or not. The barcode along the bottom of the scratchie can just be scratched and scanned without scratching anything else, and the barcode scanner will tell you straight away whether you've won anything.

 

Edited March 18 by onetrack

[Jerry_Atrick]

Part of the fun is anticipation, though
 

[onetrack]

I find most of the scratchies pretty tedious, and greatly time-consuming, though - and I like fast results, so I can get back to productive work!

[Jerry_Atrick]

I haven't done one for over 30 years. They are popular here.. The offer all sorts of different prizes and themes. You can stand behind someone at the counter who chooses them like kids at a lolly shop.

 

Amazing how much speople spend on them both in money and at the counter selecting them.. the latter being a pain. 

 

 

Edited March 18 by Jerry_Atrick

[old man emu]

My cup runneth over!

 

It began to rain last night as I went to bed, and has continued to do so throughout the night and into the morning. It has not ben the flooding type of rain, just a steady fall which allows the water to soak in. Now all that is needed is for the seeds laying in the soil to sprout for winter feed.

[onetrack]

The weather chart shows you're in for a wet weekend, OME. It sure is nice to see a decent fall of rain after a long dry spell. Everything seems to freshen up.

[facthunter]

Sorry to say this, but the weeds grow first and fastest. Nev

[old man emu]

My Dad used to caution me not to piss before my water came. 

 

I checked that Scratchie that I thought was worth a motza. I was wrong. It wasn't a winner. So all the plans I had for using the money are cancelled. The funny thing is that I'm not broken-hearted. For a couple of days I got enjoyment thinking about what I would do with the winnings. I know now that Lady Luck does not give her smiles freely. I'm no better nor worse off than I was before I was given the Scratchie. However, I haven't changed my opinion that Scratchies are a was of money, like all other forms of gambling.

 

 

[facthunter]

Only gamble when you can afford to Lose. Most situations have the Odds Well stacked against you and desperate people continue playing to recover the Money they Lost. It's evil to exploit desperate People. When Pokies come to  a place, economic activity in that Town suffers noticeably. Addicts secretly throw away a Families money. Nev

[onetrack]

Well, what a bummer that is! I never count on any ticket checking until it's done at the Lotto counter by the agent or the scanner.

I've had multiple tickets that I'd checked, where I thought I'd won nothing - then when I scanned the ticket, there was a prize line I'd missed, and I had a winner!

 

We had an 80 yr old war veteran here a few days ago, who thought he,d won a few hundred dollars - then when he checked, he'd won the jackpot, a million dollars!

He said he knew he had 6 numbers and thought he needed a supplementary number as well, to win the jackpot.

But you only need 6 numbers on one line, and that's it, you take home the first division prize.

[red750]

I don't know about scratchies, but for other lotteries, there  is an online ticket checking facility on the The Lott website. It will happily tell you NO PRIZE WON. You are not one of the 52,768 winning ticket holders. Play again?

              

                           

[facthunter]

NSW ran a lottery specifically to fund the Opera House. Nev

[onetrack]

Well, I have a great piece of positive news. My Hilux is suffering from noisy rear wheel bearings, so I thought I'd get a couple of new ones. I started looking around, and you have to buy a kit with seals and collar, as well as the bearing. The best price I could find was around $104 each.

 

Now, I'm a bit fussy with bearings, and I much prefer to buy German, American, Japanese or even Taiwanese bearings, as I consider them superior bearings to Chinese, and even Thai-made bearings.

As my Hilux was built in Thailand, I suspect it has Thai, or even Chinese bearings. I think that's the reason they haven't performed as well as I'd expected (the Hilux has done 190,000kms and has done a lot of heavy hauling).

 

So I kept looking around, and I was amazed to find a website throwing out Timken bearing kits to fit my Hilux - on "clearance" - at - wait for it - $4.89 each!!

The company is in Doncaster in Vic, so I ordered them last night - and blow me down, they were delivered this afternoon!! The two bearing kits cost me a grand total of $25.79 including delivery!!

The company is Precision International, and I reckon they must have packaged them at first light, and run them out to the airport to catch the early morning flight to Perth!!

What is even better - I opened one of the packets and the bearings are actually Made in Japan!! Bonus!  So this little exercise has made my day!! Thank you muchly, Precision International!