Tom noticed that every morning when he went school, his mother would give him a letter drop in the mailbox on the corner. "Who you writing to so much?" he asked. "I'm trying my luck," Tom's mother told him.

A weeks after Tom started mailing out the letters, noticed that his mother was getting a lot mail. Some of the mail advertised on the that she might already be a winner. His was also getting many more magazines. Some of magazines were about things his mother didn't eve about, like cats.

"Mom, why are you getting many magazines?" Tom asked her. She told him she had been entering contests and that part the process included subscribing to magazines. "It will my chances of winning the jackpot," she told . Soon the family mailbox was filled with more announcements, magazines, and bills.

Tom's mother was surprised. didn't think that checking off the boxes of that looked interesting and affixing stickers to the forms would cost her. She was spending more more money and hadn't won anything. She wanted be like the people in the commercials she on television. People bringing balloons and oversized checks those people who entered the contests. Tom read fine print. The magazines weren't free and Tom's was not increasing her chances of winning anything subscribing. Tom did some research and found out had even been lawsuits against the companies running contests and selling the magazine subscriptions.

Tom's mother bad. "It pays to win, mom, but you 't pay to win," Tom told her. Tom's mother what she was going to do with all magazines.