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City woman hits it big at Mohegan when slot machine spin nets $2.7 million
Tuesday, July 11, 2006
BY LAURESHA XHIHANI
WATERBURY -- Eleanor Barkauskas was worried about how she was going to pay for heating oil for her apartment this coming winter.
She figured her 13-year-old car might break down. She has been working past retirement age to make enough to get by.
But Sunday Lady Luck came knocking when Barkauskas hit the $2.7 million jackpot at Mohegan Sun Resort and Casino.
\"It was just wonderful,\" she said on Monday. \"I\'m still on Cloud Nine.\"
She said she didn\'t want to go to the casino on Sunday when a friend asked her because she didn\'t have the money. She was planning to go with another group at the end of the month and was saving up for it.
But the friend wanted to cash in some tickets she had won on a previous trip, and wanted Barkauskas\' company.
\"I gave all my excuses,\" she said. But finally, to make her friend happy, she scraped together enough money for the trip. Two other friends joined and the group of four headed east.
Barkauskas was playing alone on a slot machine winning one credit, then two, then one then two again.
She was at the end of her $100 budget with 60 credits when she hit the Megabucks MegaJackpot.
She was in shock when casino officials roped off the area around her machine. Officials and casino patrons kept shaking her hand and congratulating her.
She knew she had won, but had to ask a casino employee how much.
She called her brother on Sunday and the two talked until 1 a.m.
On Monday she went back to work at MacDermid Corp. on Freight street, where she has worked as a secretary for 20 years. She didn\'t stay long because she was tired from all the excitement from the night before.
She had called her accountant on Monday and tried to make herself believe that she was a millionaire.
\"I was poor 50 years ago and I\'m still poor,\" she said Monday.
Then she caught herself. \"Except I\'m not poor anymore.\"
She will be getting her money in installments over the next 20 years.
She said she didn\'t know what she was going to do with the money.
\"I know I don\'t have to worry financially,\" she said.
She said she was going to take her time with any decisions and continue to do what she had been doing. She was planning on going to work today, she said.
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