Lately, millions of readers have asked me about the strangest thing I ever inherited. Well, I received something from my Wealthy Grandpa Jeff. We were always close; I think. Many people said winning the Powerball made him eccentric, but I loved hearing his many stories, and sure, they could be doozies, but that just made them more fun to listen to. When he passed and they read the will, he left me an envelope with two papers in it. The outside of the envelope simply said, “For Coffee’s eyes only.”
The letter inside read:
“Dearest Coffee,
I am sharing this letter with you in confidence. Of all my grandkids, you most enjoyed listening to my stories. So I am sharing this one with you and you alone. Or at least you and some third rate blog you somehow put together.
This is the true story of how I won the Powerball Lottery. Back in the early 1990s, as a young man, I loved to go cave exploring here in Nerbly County. One day, I was deep in a new cavern when I could have sworn I saw a flickering light. It was maybe a 20-minute walk later. I again saw the same flickering light, this time much larger, and a heard crackling sound along with it.
Now, I was known the whole county over for my bravery. But I don’t mind saying the idea of going forward gave me the heebie-jeebies. I took a deep breath and pressed forward. What I saw, I did not believe with my own eyes. The light was coming from an entrance to an enormous cavern. And inside the cavern was a flying saucer! It was easily 100 feet across and looked like a large upside down a silver plate with a large upside-down bowl on top of it. You know, just like the ones in the movies. Like that one movie with the blond feller and that brunette woman? You know who I am talking about? That actress with those teeth?
And all around the flying saucer, little humanoid like space creatures scurried around working on it. The flickering light was from some sort of welding device they used for welding, by someone who welds, but the name for it eludes me. For the record, I am proud to say I almost didn’t pass out or urinate myself.
It didn’t take long for the little creatures, about 3-4 feet high at the most, to notice me. They must not have seen a human before, for they all stopped what they were doing, stared at me with their enormous black eyes, their tiny mouths agape, and alien hands in their tiny silver overalls.
Not knowing what to say, I blurted out what I learned from the movies. “I am Jeff. I come in peace.”
Well, it didn’t take long before their leader (I assumed he was the leader because of his large brainy looking forehead) waddled up to me and extended his claw-hand. ”Welcome, Jeff. I am Commander Dale of our Flying Saucer named the Star-Chasm. We are sooo happy to see life here on this planet.”
”Really? Wow? You mean I am the first human you have seen?”
”Yes. And such a fine specimen indeed. Clearly this planet…”
”Earth. This is the planet Earth.”
”This planet Earth must be inhabited by intelligent, and might I say, ruggedly handsome, life! Are you the leader of …Earth? If not, you really should be.”
I blushed and said, ”Gosh no. But you’re right. I’ll probably be President of Earth someday.”
Captain Dale nodded his head slowly and said, ”Uh-huh.”
”What are you all doing here underground?” I asked to move this story along.
”Well, we were out space exploring and what such. Young Travis over there just got his learner’s permit, so we thought we would let him take a turn driving the flying saucer.” Unlike the other little aliens in matching silver overalls, Travis wore a ‘Nirvana’ concert shirt, a flannel shirt tied around his waist, torn jeans, and work boots. He nodded his head at me, as if to say “S’up.”
Young Travis stood under what must have been the bumper of the ship, because it had large yellow bumper stickers that read “Student Driver, Please be Kind” and “Honk all you want. We’re in space.”
Dale continued. “Yes, Young Travis was driving and wanted to change the music, but his Soundgarden CD fell under the seat, and instead of WATCHING WHERE HE WAS GOING…” At this, young Travis looked down at the ground. ”We crashed into the Earth’s crust. So we have been stuck here until our flying saucer is repaired.”
”Wowsers! You know, I’m pretty genius when it comes to taking stuff apart.” I offered.
”Have you ever repaired a flying saucer?” Asked Captain Dale.
“No. But I’ve never crashed one either… Travis.” I gave Young Travis a disapproving look. This gained me a sprit of camaraderie with Captain Dale.
”Sure! Why don’t you recorgulate the fractional input stabilizers?”
After making several dents using a heavy wrench, I started randomly cutting wires. The space aliens, obviously impressed with my mechanical abilities, widened their eyes, like, enormous! Captain Dale quickly waddled up to me. ”Hey there…um…guy.” (That was the start of our little inside joke. Captain Dale pretended to forget my name each time we met.)
”You can just call me Earth President Jeff.”
“Yeah. Okay. Say. Good job with that…what you did…But, we are turning in for the night. You know. Busy day tomorrow and what such.”
”Oh. Okay. I can. I can just hang out here then. Until you wake up. Or I can get a head start on cutting wires and making dents.” I gave the ship one more dent-making thwack for good measure.
Captain Dale grabbed the wrench away. “No! I mean. I’m sure your followers on the surface will be lost without you, or whatever. Plus, we are kinda here in secret, too many cooks in the space kitchen and what have you. So… ” Dale rubbed the back of his little alien neck.
I understood, but was a little sad. ”Maybe I should go home for a bit. But I’ll come back tomorrow. Promise! Is there anything I can bring you from the surface?” Captain Dale raised one eyebrow, or he would have, if he had eyebrows, which he didn’t.
And that, dear grandson, is how I became the most important member of the team!
Captain Dale pulled me aside and whispered a secret. You see, this flying saucer ran on a special, secret formulation of fuel. One so secret that even the crew didn’t know all the ingredients, in case it got into the wrong hands and used as a fuel weapon, or something. But they couldn’t find all the extra, super-secret ingredients needed to make enough fuel for takeoff. And Captain Dale didn’t feel safe going up to the surface.
So, several times a week, I secretly brought Captain Dale the special ingredients he needed to mix into the fuel. Things like a medium vanilla latte with whip cream, or three chocolate frosted donuts. He took them to his captain’s quarters to keep them safe from others, who didn’t understand flying saucer fuel like him and me.
It turned out that the flying saucer’s fuel also needed other ingredients only found on Earth’s surface. Like chili dogs, french fries, two orders of gristle poppers, a double bacon cheeseburger with extra ketchup, fish and chips with extra tartar sauce, and so on. Each time I returned with a secret but critical fuel ingredient, Captain Dale would sneak off to the captain’s quarters.
One day I asked him, since the secret fuel ingredients were ground up and put into the fuel tank anyway, wouldn’t it be easier for me to use my blender at home? I could mix everything beforehand then bring the liquid goop?
Captain Dale burped in surprise and wiped mustard off his chin. He frantically waddled over to me, and since he had gotten rather pudgy lately, was out of breath when he said ”No! No! I must mix them in a very specific sequence, the fuel gets ruined , or something, and the flying saucer won’t work at all. Trust me, um… guy.”
”Earth President Jeff.”
”Sure. Trust me… Jeff. This is the only way. You are saving us! But next time, no olives on the pizza. I mean. I can pick them off, but really, that’s just wasting food.”
”Fuel,” I said.
”What?”
”Fuel. Wasting fuel.”
Captain Dale quickly said, ”Exactly. That’s what I meant.”
And so it went. Then one day, I guess it was about two months later; I entered the cavern and my heart sank. The flying saucer was gone, and there was a big hole in the cavern ceiling. All that was left was this note I have kept with me. Now I pass it along to you, so you may see the truth of how I won the lottery.
Love,
Granpda Jeff”
Along with the letter from my grandpa Jeff, there was another note on a much smaller piece of paper.
”Hey Guy,
We got the ship working. We couldn’t have done it without your help. Anywho. Gotta go now. So long, and thanks for all the fish and chips.
To pay you back for all the… fuel supplies, we used our transglopitronator to generate the next Powerball lottery numbers. They are 5-23-24-32-44 and the Powerball is 15 for the drawing on July 27, 1994. Get a ticket with those numbers before then and you will have 40 million dollars, which we hear is a lot.
Your friend,
Captain Dale”
So that’s how my grandpa won the lottery! I know they are just two pieces of paper, but I’ll treasure them always. And his mansion. Oh yeah, he left me his spooky old mansion – if I can survive one night in there alone.
But that’s a story for another day.