That's the Ticket

Behold a new frontier for Trekkers over 18: Star Trek Scratchers, a scratch-and-win money game from the California Lottery. The $1 tickets, which went on sale Oct. 31 (pegged to the release of Star Trek: First Contact), are a joint venture between the lottery and Paramount Pictures, which released rights to the Trek name (all proceeds go to California public education). According to lottery spokeswoman Gina Stassi, sales have been ''out of this world — an unprecedented 1.37 million on the first day.'' Stassi estimates that all 9.6 million tickets, which offer prizes from $2 to $1,000, will sell out by year's end. Although lottery officials thought that many Trekkers would resist the urge to scratch (and instead collect all six for display at Trek conventions), Stassi says, ''we're finding that a lot of the tickets are being redeemed. The grand prize is $1,000. For that, most people would.'' So resistance really is futile.