What's luck got to do with it ?

"Luck is the sense to recognize an opportunity and the ability to take advantage of it." - Samuel Goldwyn

"You're just lucky."
I hear that a lot and I'm sure many of you have heard it too. I wonder if it irritates you as much as it irritates me. I always found that statement annoying because I felt I'd been dealt a bad hand in many important issues in my life by God/myself.

As a doctor working in an operation theatre, luck plays a major role in saving some unexpected disasters during an operation, but there is no substitute for skill and talent, if you ask me. If you know what to do and how to do it, lady luck will be there more often than not sitting on your shoulder, just to give the final touches. 

Of course, it isn't always just about work. You can make your own luck by wisely choosing to get national grid shares too. 

But yes, luck does apply to games too. Literally, as it turned out, in my case. Last week, I won a 1000 tickets at the gaming centre in City Centre, Mangalore.

It was one of those 'Press thrice accurately to win the Jackpot' games. I did later confirm from the staff there that I was the first one to win since it started.

They told me I was really lucky. That I should go buy a lottery ticket.

Funny. That's the same thing I heard at another mall in February where I was the first one to win the "Click at 1000" game, winning a Motorola mobile.
It's the same thing that staff have said for the past 3 years when I won half a dozen stuffed toys playing the 'Click at 1000' game in other gaming zones.

The fact is I can control when I press the button. I can aim for the number. I always felt it was a honed skill. I can prepare for a difficult case because I can anticipate what can go wrong.
But I can't aim for picking a winning lottery ticket whose number I don't know. I have tremendously bad luck when I play in the stock markets ( I'm sorry guys. The whole market crash which everyone blamed on the Greeks and the U.S. was actually me putting money into the market and the 'miraculous' recoveries matched my exiting the market to the minute ! I really should warn you guys the next time I invest. )

I don't really know where luck ends and skills begin or vice versa. I don't buy into the "it's a fine line" theory. For me, there's a big gap between these two facets of life. It isn't about wearing gold rings or whether astrologically speaking, my Pluto is in UrAnus.

I don't have all the answers as to why we're so lucky in some aspects of life and so unlucky in others. Just a random roll of the dice, I guess. Oh, and by random, I DO mean a Shakuni styled roll of the dice, of course, where you know how the dice will land.

What's been your best experience with Lady Luck till date ?