SAN ANTONIO – Two huge multistate lottery jackpots are capturing the dreams of people all across the country, including some in San Antonio.
The estimated jackpot for the Mega Millions on Friday drawing has reached $1 billion, while Powerball sat at a cool $470 million as of Friday afternoon.
"I really don't play that much but since it's so big, I'm here. So I said, 'I might as well try my luck,'" Donnie Dawson, who purchased one ticket for each game, said.
The Louisiana native said that, if he wins, he will pull up stake in Texas and head for home, saying he would figure out how to spend the rest of his winnings later.
Dawson was among a handful of people who decided to try their luck at a downtown store called Lucky's.
Melvin Luckey was hoping his last name and the name of the store would combine to bring him good fortune.
"All I want to do is retire," he said, holding up his Quick Pick ticket.
With all that money on the line, Luckey was expecting to have to stand in line to buy his tickets.
"I thought it would be busy here this morning, but the (rainy) weather is keeping everybody away," Luckey said.
Retailers in the downtown area told KSAT 12 they also were expecting big crowds as a result of the big jackpots.
But they said they never saw more than a handful of people at a time purchasing tickets.
The situation was the same at another store with a lucky track record.
Big’s Aztec Corner Store sold a ticket worth $5 million in the Mega Millions game on Tuesday.
As of Friday morning, the lottery commission said that second-tier winner still had not come forward.
A worker at the store blamed the slow sales on what he called a "winner’s curse." He said there is a superstition among some people that once a business sells a big winning ticket, it won’t happen again.
According to a news release from the Texas Lottery Commission, though, the huge jackpots have been generating a lot of excitement across the state, and ticket sales have been "outstanding."
It said this is only the second time in history that advertised jackpots for the Mega Millions and Powerball games have exceeded $400 million at the same time.