No, not the election of a black president with the middle name Hussein — please, give me some credit. 

It appears that an investment banking Wharton and Engineering alumnus has won the lottery, guaranteeing him one million dollars per year for the rest of his life.

Kenan Altinus, a 1997 Penn graduate, struck it rich recently, which is great because before he won he was only kind of rich. During his time at Penn Mr. Altunis was not only a dual degree masochist but also a member of Alpha Chi Rho. (Note to brothers: now would be a good time call in the alumni card).

The winning comes at a superb time for Mr. Altinus, as he is headed off on a Caribbean vacation — that was already paid for prior to his win. The opportunity to get away from it all will give him a chance to think about the correct allocation of his freshly augmented wealth. It is rumored that he may swap out his toilet paper for dollar bills, use his winnings to make hundreds of origami animals or possibly torch the whole pile of cash just for funsies.

If you were looking for the typical screaming/crying/jumping up and down reaction from Mr. Altunis, I’m afraid you’re in for a bit of a disappointment. Rather than yelling to his trailer park neighbors about all the front row NASCAR tickets he can now afford, Mr. Altunis offered, “Is it going to materially change my life? No.” 

Whoa, whoa, whoa, try not to get so riled up.

And if you were looking for taxes to put a damper on his winnings, I’m afraid you’re in for additional disappointment. While Mr. Altunis may be subject to New York duties, as a resident of Great Britain he is exempt from federal dues, so he’ll see almost every dime of that one million dollars every year.

Bottom line? 

Suffer through Wharton and Engineering. Move to Europe. Work as an i-banker. Make completely haphazard lottery ticket purchase. Win millions. Get struck by lightning, bitten by a shark and swarmed by African bees.

This entry was posted on Thursday, November 6th, 2008 at 11:20 am and is filed under Uncategorized. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.