With a moment to spare…just in the nick of time…at the last second; these are all phrases that would describe Birdie Finney’s down to the wire $50,000 win on Rocky Mountain Gold that she claimed at the Idaho Lottery office Thursday morning.
Birdie was switching from her winter purse to her summer purse (“it’s pink and larger”) yesterday evening, because her things weren’t fitting in her winter purse. As she was cleaning out her pink summer purse, she noticed an unscratched Idaho Lottery Rocky Mountain Gold Scratch ticket. “I scratched the ticket last night and saw what I thought was the $50,000 top prize, but didn’t want to get my hopes up since I thought it had already expired. I planned to bring it to the Idaho Lottery office in the morning to make sure,” said Finney.
Rocky Mountain Gold went on sale December 1, 2014, and was deemed a sell out by the Idaho Lottery on June 6, 2015 with the final day to claim being Sunday, December 13, 2015.
“I don’t play the Lottery very often, and to be honest, that’s why I believe the ticket was unscratched. I probably just put it in the side pocket of my purse to scratch later and forgot about it. I’m so glad that I switched to my summer purse, someone was clearly looking out for me,” said Birdie.”
“I’m in complete disbelief. I’m a giver, and stuff like this just doesn’t happen to me. I cannot believe I only had 4 days left to claim it, well 2 actually, since you’re not open on the weekend!”
Birdie has been living in her home, built by her son, for over 30 years and there are things she is looking forward to replacing. “It’s an old home and naturally things need to be fixed or replaced. The first thing I’m going to do is get hard wood floors, I’ve always wanted them! Like I said, I’m a giver, so I look forward to helping my family and continuing to donate it where I have in the past,” said Finney.
Back in May (7 months ago), when Birdie bought her ticket, she bought it at Albertsons #164 in Meridian.
