Chaffee woman claims lottery prize

CHAFFEE, Mo. -- On the day after Christmas, Mary Lizenbee drove to the Breaktime gas station just to get fuel for her vehicle. She received a dollar in change, so she bought a Powerball ticket.

Lizenbee now is $100,000 richer.

The 62-year-old Chaffee woman matched all five white-ball numbers in the Dec. 27 Powerball drawing. She barely missed the sixth number that would have enabled her to share in the $221.5 million top prize.

Lizenbee, who only buys lottery tickets when the stakes get big and lets the computer choose the numbers, discovered her good fortune on Sunday but almost couldn't believe it was true. "I still don't believe it," she said.

She doesn't think the money will change her life much. She plans to keep her job as a housekeeper at the Chaffee Nursing Center. "I just like the people, the residents that are out there," she said. "I just like my job."

And she plans to keep the home she has owned for the past 20 years. A big trip is out of the question, too. "I'm not much of a traveler," she said.

The first person she called when she found out she won was her daughter, Jennifer Dunning. "She didn't believe me either," Lizenbee said.

She has received lots of congratulations.

"Everyone wants to hug my neck so the good luck with rub off," Lizenbee said.