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This is a question Unexpected Good Fortune

Travelling through Seattle a good 15 years ago, I remembered an old friend I used to blow up Action Men with. We were bored, nothing to lose , so I looked him up in the phonebook. He was the only one of that name in there. "Come and stay," goes he.

Me and my mates were living in a car at that point so a bed was a novelty. After searching for a while, we rock up to a very posh mansion on Puget Sound with its own Helipad. "Come flying," goes he.

Has your luck held out recently?

(, Thu 14 Sep 2006, 18:43)
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This question is now closed.

the only time I played poker for money

against a group of people who used to play every fortnight...

their story was that I was giving out signals, but that I was so bad at the game I didn't know what a good hand was so my signals were all wrong, and that's why I ended up beating them all.
(, Mon 18 Sep 2006, 13:54, Reply)
Free johnnies.
Uni girlfriend bought her first flat. Went down for a week for lots of shagging. Ran out of johnnies one night at 3am. Gatwick airport very close. Legged it in to North terminal, shops shut (strangely) but found mens bog, nicely empty. Put in first pound coin, and the vending machine door just swung open. Fucking result. 11 x 10packs of durex featherlites. Filled me boots and legged it back to the car with waiting girlfriend.

110 shags for a quid, thanks Gatwick & BAA.

(i was 19, they lasted a week - honest. Including some broken ones)

Ok a fortnight.
(, Mon 18 Sep 2006, 13:48, Reply)
Went to the GGs yesterday
I went to Plumpton horse races yesterday for the first time. I've never placed a bet on anything in my life but the mates I went with are total gamble-a-holics. They studied the form in the Racing Post and had placed loads on Betfair (gambling website) beforehand and taken cash to punt on the day. I didn't have a clue what to do and chose horses in each race. Out of six bets I won 5 netting £41 profit - they were small bets. My mates lost out big time.

Beginners luck?
(, Mon 18 Sep 2006, 13:34, Reply)
Clerical error?
Ordered a washing machine from electricshop.com which cost £500, delivery in 7 days.

A week later no washing machine. I chase them on it and am told it'll be another week.

That week goes by and I call again and am told it's coming direct from the manufacturer but they don't get the stock for another 2 weeks and then it'll take a week to deliver.

SO, I complain that 5 weeks is not the 1 week they advertised and I cannot wait that long. So I cancel the order, get a refund with the intention of buying elsewhere.

Next day I get a phone call, "Hello, it's whoever washing machine manufacturer here. When can we deliver your new washing machine?"

"Tomorrow please!".

They turn up, Mickey mouse signs for it, never been charged for it. Still going strong after 2 years. :-)
(, Mon 18 Sep 2006, 12:21, Reply)
Thanks Mr Catalogue
Me girlfriend a few years back (the future Mrs Jeccy) got a catalogue (not naming, for financial reasons, but it weren't Argos), and they had a local warehouse. She needed a telly as her one blew up, and she got her account ready and bought a half-decent 21 inch telly from this company. I huff this telly to her home, only to find out that the sound was next-to-fucked. So I reload the car, hoist the twatting thing back down to the store and point out the fault. They apologise, and give us a replacement similar-model-telly instead, which worked fine.

A few weeks later, and Mrs Jeccy received a statement asking her to pay for both of the tellys (including the replacement one). Cue one quick phonecall of complaint, and after explaining everything the helpful member of staff credited the mistake off the account.

And the other telly too. She didn't have to pay for neither.

No wonder they went bankrupt a few months later; giving away free returns :)
(, Mon 18 Sep 2006, 12:18, Reply)
Wikipedia tales
Whenever I have nothing to do and can be stuffed watching the tele, I look up crap on wikipedia. And it seems the world is watching.

I was looking up something on some giant clawed crab and later that weed a mate was doing a report on crabs or something, i just fed it out

Again with the term 'treason' another uni friend doing law. Neededstuff on treason, spat out what i knew.

The world is messed up
(, Mon 18 Sep 2006, 12:05, Reply)
complete c*nt rear shunt!
My Mrs had just set off to uni in our car and within a mile of home got cut up by a Mercedes. Being Milton Keynes they proceed onto the roundabout where it seems Mercedes boy isn't totally familiar with the concept, wants another lane and hits the brakes to stop on the roundabout (left lane was blocked by traffic). My Mrs goes in the back of him leaving a small scratch on his bumper but breaking a headlight and front bumper on our Golf.

She comes home in tears and it's down to me to sort it all. I decide to be prepared and get a couple of outline quotes for respraying a Mercedes bumper (£150).

Eventually I get a call and it turns out the guy works for Mercedes and wants us to pay for the damage. He reckons it'll be £600!!! No way I say, it'll have to go through insurance as I reckon it should only be £150. "Ah, but is that an approved mercedes repairer?" I get in return.

A little perplexed I say, "why should that matter? Do you honestly think my no frills insurance company will send it to Mercedes for a bit of paint?".

After much arguing (he was being a total git) its starting to look like he's hiding something. I ascertain being a company car he's not the owner or insurer so I decide to go for broke. (He's already shouted at my Mrs so I'm happy for revenge).

Me:"Well as I understand it the accident wouldn't have happened if you hadn't been driving so inconsiderately. In fact as I understand it you overtook us at well over 70mph, that's above the speed limit. It's no wonder you caused an accident when you decided to cut us up. As it's not your car I think I'd better speak to your boss to sort out getting the car collected for an insurance repair."

He bricked it. I think the idea I might mention wrecklessly driving like a penis to his boss scared him and he said the scratch would probably polish out! Paid nothing, didn't hear from him again.

So, my Mrs crashed into a Mercedes and I talked my way out of paying for it.
(, Mon 18 Sep 2006, 11:47, Reply)
Unknown chum
Work Xmas party last year, we're renting the back room in a pub (well, it was a separate building altogether actually).

I walk to the main pub as the bar in our room has no cider. I order a pint and some bloke next to me says, "don't worry mate I'll get this one"! He paid for my drink, I left and went back to our party.

No idea who he was (not from our company) and I don't live in the area. Total stranger, free drink. Sorted.
(, Mon 18 Sep 2006, 11:34, Reply)
When I got engaged to my wife,
back in 2003 I decided that I'd had enough of a) commuting from Rugby to London every day and b) sales.

So I decided to look for a new job - something like an IT Trainer perhaps. So I went for a job as an IT Trainer at Kettering Hospital.

And got it! Surprised myself - I thought I'd done alright in the interview but was bound to lose out to someone with more experience.

Then 10 months later a vacancy appeared at Northampton Hospital - same job, 50% more money.

So I decided to go for it.

And got it! Surprised myself again.

To top all that off, if I'd still been working at my old job in London, I'd probably have been walking past that bus when it blew up on the 7th of July too...
(, Mon 18 Sep 2006, 11:22, Reply)
Blackpool B&B
A last minute lads weekend in Blackpool and I was a bit skint. I borrowed £40 off a mate and a great night was had.

Upon arriving back at our bed & breakfast I was fumbling for my keys and as I looked down I saw something on the doorstep. I picked it up and unfolded EXACTLY £40 in cash! :-)

Gave it to my mate and said, there ya go. All square :-)
(, Mon 18 Sep 2006, 11:15, Reply)
The Weekly News.......
.....was a newspaper which was essentially the first "Chat" magazine in circulation. It was more of a rag-mag than a newspaper; loads of odd articles concerning family crisis, and a two-centre page spread of puzzles and the Weekly Competition. The prizes were in fairness crap; was like the kind of things you see on "The Price Is Right", but grannies all around the country entered them every week, such as me nan.

One week, somehow me nan won, and had her name printed in the paper. She'd won......drum roll please.....duh duh du duuuhhhhhh!!!!! A Soda-Stream!!!!! She didn't need it, so she give it to us :)

But....unexpectedly...the newspaper competition judge must've been on holidays for a while (or got fired), so the following week...lo and behold, she won....duh duh du duuuhhhhhhh!!!!! A collection of "Constable" porcelin.

Then the following week....duh duh du duuuhhhhhhh!!!!! Some selection of dishes.

Then again....duh duh du duuuhhhhhhh!!!!! A new Deep-Fat Frier.

Then AGAIN....duh duh du duuuhhhhhhh!!!!! A collection of writing pens.

Then finally once more....duh duh du duuuhhhhhhh!!!!! Season one on VHS of "Baywatch" (nice one gran *warms hands*).

Once a week a parcel of goodies would turn up, and once a week we'd be given the goodies. Nice one nanny!
(, Mon 18 Sep 2006, 10:55, Reply)
Japanese Air Lines
I was travelling to Australia to see a mate get married. Had to go via Tokyo with JAL and onwards to Brisbane. So, after 11.5 hours, i land in Tokyo at some stupid time. I've then got a 6 hours stopover. Not wanting to read all of my book I purchase an origami book, take some notelets from the telephone box and go around leaving little paper animals all over the terminal. 6 hours are up so I head down to to my gate, get on the plane and head in the normal direction to my seat only to be stopped by the stewardess. Lucky old me, I'd only be upgraded to business class for the 8.5 hour leg to Aussie. Business class and sexy Japanese Air Stewardesses. 'Ow's yer luck?!
(, Mon 18 Sep 2006, 10:50, Reply)
Harry Potter
I used to do voiceovers for things, and, since I was only about 12, £50 for a day's hard work seemed ridiculously high. That was until Electronic Arts employed me for some silly Harry Potter video game or other.

10 lines of voiceover, each 4 times. So altogether about 20 minutes. Then repeated about a week later, another 20 minutes. So far, so good

First pay cheque comes through - £250. Fanbloodytastic i thought. Next week, £250 again, for the second session. Result! I'm the richest 12 year old in the world, surely! Week after, a contract arrives. If I sign and give EA all the rights to use my voice, i get another £500. At this point I think they've got to be joking, but they're as good as their word

The only bad side is that I'll probably never earn £1000 in 40 minutes again. Ever. Ah well, those were the good old days, eh
(, Mon 18 Sep 2006, 10:46, Reply)
My brother is a lucky git...
Me and my older brother were at Bluewater looking for shoes, our minds set on getting a pair of Sketchers each. After about 3 shoe shops no bugger had any in our size so we get to the fourth and my bro being the git he is not only found the exact pair he wanted in the right size but they cost him £15 less than everywhere else was selling them, I ended up paying £10 more!
There are other occasions where he has been a jammy git but I can't really remember them off the top of my head.
(, Mon 18 Sep 2006, 10:22, Reply)
One Christmas...
After copping off with the office mook I woke up in a strange part of London, and quickly made my excuses and left. When I got to the tube I realised my wallet had been stolen. I tried to fare-hop home to Brighton, but was caught by the guard. He was sympathetic to my plight, and took all of my details. When I got home it turned out that my wallet had been stolen by the taxi driver, who had spent £200 on each credit card at a string of East London petrol stations. A week later a court summons for fare evasion appeared through the door. I wrote to explain the situation, but no reply.
So I bought a new suit, shirt and tie for my appearance at East Croydon magistrates court, took a day off work and waited nervously with my fellow criminals for my name to come up. 4 hours later, the magistrate emerged flanked by two police officers, and sternly called my name. As I virtually sank to my knees to beg forgiveness, he told me that there had been a mistake, that my case had been cancelled but they forgot to tell me. So that was a bit of luck, wasn't it!
(, Mon 18 Sep 2006, 10:18, Reply)
Festival souvenir
Back in 1999, I was working for Virgin Megastores and won a competition to work at Glastonbury. This basically meant serving herbal tea to happy stoned people for three hours a day, on full salary - spending the rest of the time enjoying the festival for free. Myself and my fellow winners also got to camp in the VIP area with two luxury Winnebagos full of booze and recreationals. Yay!

Paired off with a mucky type from the Oxford Street branch on the first day and spent a blissful weekend getting shitfaced, seeing bands and shagging in tents. Double yay!

He's now my husband. No punchline, just a big "aaaaaaaaaahhhh".
(, Mon 18 Sep 2006, 10:14, Reply)
From Bad to Good Riddance
Was working for a local computer company for about 5 years; on minimum wage and just hitting 21. The management of this store knew this, and created some cock and bull story saying that I was not working well in the job, and reduced me to part time. The tight cunts.

2 days into this, and I'm accused of mass theft. After alot of arguing, I walk out feeling completely drained and upset that I've been fired for something I haven't done. I meet up with the missus (at the time) and drown me sorrows.

The missus lived in a pub at the time at the top floor; a public listed Inn called "The Bush", which is now currently a gay-house (oh how times change). At that time, her landlady was going through a "lets invite anyone back to party till dawn" phase, which was driving the residents insane due to the lack of sleep. In these parties, she was giving away freebies and running up a sizeable debt, which she was happily blaming the workers for.

A week's worth of me staying there and hunting for a new job was going nowhere. The landlady, all tired and partied out, decided to go on hols and this left her job open for a relief manager from the brewery named Rachel to clear up her mess. After two days of Rach realising how much of a mess the pub was in, cue me accidentally mentioning the midnight freebie parties. A day later the ol' landlady gets the push, and Rachel takes over full time.

The next week I was working for her, and earning £50 a week more than the previous job. Was the best job I ever 'ad too guv'nor, and no mistake.

Also found out last week that the original computer company have gone tit's up, and they've done a runner owing sizeable debts to alot of people....hope they get burnt :D
(, Mon 18 Sep 2006, 10:13, Reply)
During my Grandfather's Wake....
..needed some fresh air (as during the procession me gran just informed the family that me grandad was a wifebeater, nasty piece of work) and walked down to Spar (about 100 yards down the road).

Bought some drink and a scratchcard, which won me £25.

Cue me walking back into the wake surrounded by shocked family members bouncing about and cheering smugly that I just won some drink tokens :)

I suppose I could have picked a more subtle time to announce my good fortune.
(, Mon 18 Sep 2006, 9:32, Reply)
A little one
My automobile association (where I am, the RACV - where you are, probably AAA or NRMA or whatever the fuck they're called in Britain) gives you four free roadside visits for your basic $60 membership. After the first time you leave your lights on in the carpark you like to not waste them.

I was once parked in a side street and was off to lunch with a workmate when I needed to get something out of my car. I was most mortified to see my car keys hanging in the ignition of my locked car, and, not being a pikey, I had no idea how I'd break in without smashing a window. (This was in a comparatively posh area and no pikey had kindly smashed a window for me. I usually have the shittiest car in any street I park in.)

"Damn" I said to my friend, "I'm gonna have to call the RACV." "Them?" she said, pointing at the humongous RACV tow truck parked right behind me. I got my car broken into and didn't use a free visit. Well, it felt pretty good at the time.

Apologies for lack of bigness.
(, Mon 18 Sep 2006, 9:20, Reply)
Received a letter the other day...
...saying that I may have already won €7,300,000!!!!!!

All I have to do is pay the 5% deposit to this Nigerian account (to cover bank handling fees), and I'm landed.

Didn't even realise that I'd entered the Spanish Lottery, how unexpected is that!
(, Mon 18 Sep 2006, 9:13, Reply)
Near death experience
One evening I was driving along the highway in Ottawa, which is not only the capital of Canada, it is also the world headquarters of freezing rain in the winter. If you aren't familiar with freezing rain, it's what happens when the temperature is right around zero and falling rain turns to instant skating rink.

So there I was driving along the highway when all of a sudden I noticed the cars up ahead start sliding and weaving all over the place. "Not good," I thought -- I later guessed that the roads must have been salted to a certain point and then the salt trucks had gone off for another load. It was three lanes of pure ice.

I managed to slow the car as much as possible while avoiding another car to my right that was drifting in my direction. Another car went across inches in front of me and hit the median, while a third veered into my lane from the other side. Somehow in the huge pileup of about 20 cars I managed to slip through completely unscathed -- the last thing I saw was a big transport truck barreling up behind before I accelerated out of there; I didn't look back to see the end result.

The road was nice and clear of traffic after that.
(, Mon 18 Sep 2006, 7:02, Reply)
Good fortune that turned bad....
My friend got out his last $20, and the ATM starting spitting notes at him. He walked off a bit later with $600.

I told him not to spend it, they have to keep some kind of records (who was using, when they were etc). He went and blew it all anyway, then he was SURPRISED when they sued him because he couldn't pay it back.
(, Mon 18 Sep 2006, 5:45, Reply)
Inner-city karma
This isn't my story, but a friend's tale.

The sister of a friend of mine was recently driving in a large city. Through the bad driving of another, she was forced into a bit of maneuvering that ended up with her rear-ending another car. The car in question happened to be a Mercedes. A brand-new Mercedes, driven by a very rich, very unpleasant man. The young lass in question, is, like many young ladies, not exactly over-burdened with funds at this point in her young life, so her first response was panic. He unpleasantly informed her that he expected her to "pay for every bit of damage" on his shiny penis extension.

So far, gentle reader, not exactly good fortune.

However, the Mercedes driver was so unpleasant that when the police arrived, they basically decided that she was a nice young girl, and the Mercedes driver was a right bastard, and decided that it was a "no-fault" accident and didn't issue her a ticket.

Score one for unexpected good fortune, as a ticket would have meant that she would have been wholly responsible for all damage to his precious Mercedes. With a no-fault judgement, not so much.

But she's still stranded by the side of the road, her sad little car undriveable.

Until, that is, a drinking buddy of hers drives by. This drinking buddy happens to own a car repair service, and happened to be in his tow truck at the time.

Score two for unexpected good fortune, as she gets a free tow to a good mechanic.

Altogether, not a bad ending to a tale.
(, Mon 18 Sep 2006, 2:51, Reply)
Finish him!
About ten years ago I entered a competition in the official Nintendo magazine to win a Mortal Kombat II arcade machine, full sized and everything. The task was to create a new kind of finishing move a la 'fatality' (mine included the 'diary-ality' and the 'football-in-the-face-ality' - lame, even by my standards) and to my surprise, I only bloody won! Full size arcade machine, blood and guts in my own living room, absolutely top fucking stuff.

It took about three months for the thing to arrive (in the meantime, the magazine sent me free stuff to compensate) and it was pretty damn great when it finally turned up. However, the dream turned sour: I got bored of it pretty quickly (once your mates get bored with it, you know you're onto a loser) so I decided to sell it and make good with the cash.

How much for an arcade machine? A grand? Two grand? Best offer was £150. Shit. Two pikeys from Southend arrive at my door, and in the absence of a parent at the time, managed to finagle their way to £100 instead, which I agreed to - I'd never seen that much money. Only now as a full-grown adult do I realise how much it would kickass to have an arcade cabinet in my front room.

Next day, I took £35 of it into school intending to go on a spending spree post-class, only to have some fucking pikey cunt nick it during PE.

Still, he got hooked on meths so he's probably dead now. Fatality!
(, Mon 18 Sep 2006, 1:52, Reply)
I never thought being a hooked nose was lucky

until I had to break up with a girlfriend for the first time. "I'm sorry, I just can't go out with you anymore, I'm Jewish and you're a pig".
(, Mon 18 Sep 2006, 1:23, Reply)
The Accident Group
Was a graduate without a career (aren't we all?) and was going around various call centre jobs for a month or two at a time.

Started working for the above company on the first of the month, realised I DESPISED it (pressure pressure pressure) so left after the first week without telling anyone, and went to work (i.e. doss) in my mates comic shop. three weeks later, company goes under (you probably heard about everyone getting sacked by text?).

A few weeks later, nearly a full months salary appears in my account. My highest paid job ever - £850 for a week. Result.
(, Mon 18 Sep 2006, 0:23, Reply)
When I was at school I was bullied...
...by a cunt called Martin Newton. Little gobshite.

Anyhoo, fast-forward many years later and I'm at work at an inbound tele-response company (ie, we get called instead of doing the calling and pissing people off) taking calls for a hamper company at Christmas. This nice woman calls from the village I used to live in when I was at school with Martin and I mention that I used to live there and was friends with a chap called Andrew. She says "Oh, he's my cousin!" so we chat a bit and then I mention Martin Newton, and she tells me that his house just burned down.

Best Christmas ever!

Apologies for kinda' drifting off-topic, but he was a cunt.
(, Sun 17 Sep 2006, 21:51, Reply)
I'm not one for luck.
But.......

It was really more my friend who was lucky.....that he's not sterile

one day after eating way too much sugar at lunch time in year 9, he put my school bag in the lift and pressed the "up" button for a joke, so that I'd have to go all the way upstairs and get it, he wasn't counting on me scissor kicking him in the balls instead, so after said kicking, he passed out into the door way, me and my other mates were laughing our heads off, instead of checking to see if he was OK, it also turned out that the lift was broken and the door didn't close, so I got my bag back as well,


Like I said, he was bloody lucky he still has the use of his testicles
(, Sun 17 Sep 2006, 20:50, Reply)

This question is now closed.

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