- Don't rush. If you're not used to being in front of a group of people, the tendency is to talk quickly, stutter garbled numbers and quickly develop a dry mouth. Speak as clearly as you can and try to be a little melodic in tone. Having a drink to hand helps too.
- Make sure you give the numbers a good shake-up now and then; this, most callers will tell you, is more for effect than for actual randomisation. For some reason, everyone will believe that you are a very fair and trustworthy caller indeed.
- Whenever you call consecutive numbers, give a slight shake of your head and 'tut' almost inaudibly. Most players will believe that if you call consecutive numbers, it's your fault for not 'mixing them up' enough and will occasionally shout something to this effect at you. This tactic pre-empts the players and will leave them, like you, blaming bad luck or poor equipment.
- You can avoid most problems by being clear at the start. For example, it is a generally accepted rule that if you do not call 'house' on the number that completes your ticket, you forfeit your prize. In an informal setting, it is important to make this clear as some participants may not have played before. People can get quite nasty and will blame you for 'not explaining that bit'.
- Occasionally, you might get misprinted tickets with sixteen numbers on instead of fifteen or a number printed twice. How you handle this is up to you, but again if you explain at the start that it is up to the player to ensure their ticket is valid, you can avoid the problem entirely. Ask them to check that each ticket has fifteen different numbers arranged in three rows of five, and if any are not correct change them before the game starts. This happens more often than one would expect, particularly with cheap books.
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