MONROE... Mark Therrien appreciates a good joke … but not necessarily one that involves money. So when an Ohio Lottery official called to inform him of being the winner of a Top Prize Drawing (TPD) worth $150,000, he wasn’t biting.
 
“I said, `Get outta here, who is this?’” Therrien said Friday. “I really thought somebody was pranking me. When I realized it wasn’t a joke, I’m glad I was sitting down.” And as long as he was sitting down absorbing the realization that it wasn’t a joke, he took the liberty of figuring up his after-tax take-home. “Let’s see, that’s $103,500 after taxes, I think,” he said.
 
He’s right. As the winner of the Top Prize Drawing for the $5 Golden Ticket game, 60-year-old Therrien, of Monroe, has some plans for his $103,500. Besides refinancing and paying off a second mortgage, he wants to add re-sale value to his home. “I’ll add a sunroom and finish the basement and make it a family room,” Therrien said. “That’ll add about $40,000 or $50,000 to the value of our house.”
 
Therrien should know – he works at The Home Depot.
 
“I’m not going to get crazy with the money,” he said. “Fix the house, repair the cars, have some paint work done. That’s all I’m going to do.”
 
Well, that and keep playing Lottery.
 
“I like the instants,” he said. “I’ve hit for $1,000 three times in two years. And we have a Mega pool at work, 15 of us, every Tuesday and Friday. I look at it this way – if I don’t play, I can’t win.”
 
A note about how TPD works: Ohio Lottery instant tickets of $5 or more have the TPD feature. If the winning combination on an instant ticket lists “TPD” as the prize, the winner receives an instant cash prize and automatic entry into a drawing for the top prize offered in that game. The drawing comes after the close of the game, which sometimes means that the ticket was purchased a year or so before the drawing actually occurs.

Therrien purchased his Golden Ticket in November 2006, at which time he won an instant $1,000 prize. When he made that claim, he was automatically entered into the drawing for the $150,000 top prize.