Husband interrupts wife’s movie with news of lottery win. Then came ‘tears of joy’
A husband interrupted his wife’s movie with news of a huge lottery win — then came a burst of emotion.
“It brought tears to my eyes,” Karen Lee-Nix told the North Carolina Education Lottery. “We both had tears of joy.”
The emotional moment came after Lee-Nix was sitting in a rocking chair one Friday night. As she watched a movie at home, her husband arrived with an exciting development.
“I asked her to pause the movie,” David Nix told lottery officials in a July 11 news release. “Then I said, ‘We just won $100,000.’”
Lee-Nix didn’t believe her husband until she saw the winning ticket he bought in Archdale, near High Point. While at a Zingo Express convenience store, he had tried his luck on the $10 Million Spectacular scratch-off game.
“I always have a positive attitude and think that somebody is going to win so it might as well be me,” Nix said.
That attitude paid off when the couple discovered their $50 lottery ticket was worth much more. The husband and wife split the jackpot prize in half, with each keeping $35,757 after taxes.
The pair — who live in Randolph County — plan to put the prize money toward bills, home improvement projects and savings, officials said.
It’s not the first time a lottery player has interrupted someone’s entertainment time. In South Carolina, a man was watching football when his wife asked him to check if her prize-winning ticket was the real deal, McClatchy News reported in December.
This story was originally published July 12, 2024 at 9:25 AM with the headline "Husband interrupts wife’s movie with news of lottery win. Then came ‘tears of joy’."
