COLUMBIA, SC – In a bizarre incident that has left officials baffled and a local man scratching his head, 32-year-old Bubba Jenkins was left utterly bewildered when he received a phone call from the South Carolina Education Lottery claiming he had won a whopping $1 MILLION DOLLARS!
According to eyewitnesses, Jenkins was sipping sweet tea on his porch when the call came in, and his initial reaction was to burst out laughing, thinking it was his buddy Jimmy Bob trying to pull off the ultimate prank.
“I thought it was just Jimmy Bob trying to get a rise out of me,” Jenkins said in an exclusive interview. “I mean, who wins the lottery, right? I told the guy on the phone, ‘Dude, Jimmy Bob, you’re really milking this one, aren’t you?'”
But the “Jimmy Bob” on the other end of the line persisted, insisting that Jenkins had indeed matched all six numbers in the lottery drawing and was now a MILLIONAIRE!
“I was like, ‘Okay, Jimmy, okay, I get it. You got me.’ But then the guy started telling me about the different prize tiers and the tax implications of winning such a large sum,” Jenkins recalled. “That’s when I started to get a little worried – not that I was going to win, but that Jimmy Bob had apparently taken a course in lottery winnings or something!”
Jenkins claims he was on the phone for over 20 minutes, going back and forth with the “lottery representative” before finally agreeing to meet at the lottery office to collect his prize.
“That’s when I realized, wait a minute… this might actually be legit?” Jenkins said, still shaking his head in amazement. “I mean, I’ve heard of people winning the lottery, but I never thought it’d be me! I started sweating like a sinner in church, I kid you not!”
When Jenkins arrived at the lottery office, he was greeted with a sea of congratulatory balloons and a giant novelty check.
“I swear, I almost had a heart attack,” Jenkins exclaimed. “I looked around and saw all these people smiling at me, and I’m thinking, ‘What in tarnation is going on here?'”
The South Carolina Education Lottery has since confirmed that Jenkins is indeed the winner of the $1 million prize, and he plans to use the windfall to buy a new truck, pay off his mom’s mortgage, and invest in a Jimmy Bob-proof phone case.
In a statement, lottery officials said, “We’re thrilled to have a winner like Mr. Jenkins, who’s taking his newfound wealth in stride. And to Jimmy Bob – if you’re reading this – you might want to consider a career change. You almost got away with it!”
