Go Grannie go!


An 85-year-old Toronto woman says a dream about a giant cheque prompted her to buy a second winning lottery ticket for the same draw.

Mary Wollens had two of the three winning tickets for the weekend Lotto 6-49 draw, giving her two-thirds of the $24 million jackpot — $16 million.

The other winner was 64-year-old Ramon Sanz, a retired telephone operator from Abbotsford, B.C., who went home with a cheque for $8.2 million.

Wollens told lottery officials she saw a lotto ticket and a large cheque in a dream a couple of days before the Sept. 30 draw and went out to buy a second ticket, using the same combination of numbers she had received on an earlier quick pick ticket.

She credits the dream with making her buy the second ticket. If she hadn't bought it, Wollens would have split the win equally with Sanz, taking home $12 million.

Wollens told the Toronto Star she plans to take a trip to Las Vegas for some gambling and will also move to a new home.

The former house cleaner has one son and one grandchild. Her daughter died 17 years ago and her husband died seven months after that.