Husbands are notorious for being jokesters. They love to play pranks, tell jokes, and make their wives laugh. For one husband, his long-running joke ended up winning him the lottery.
Lee Davies always joked with his fiancee that he won the lottery, and eventually she stopped believing him. He let it go for a few years, and then got an "unexplainable urge" to buy another scratch ticket after two years.
"I used to buy the scratchcards quite often, but I hadn't for two years or so," says Davies. "It always felt as though I would always get two matching symbols, and then wouldn't get the third. I don't know what happened on that particular day, for some reason I was just drawn to the red scratchcard. I went into J&N Superfoods in Wolverhampton, and picked up a ticket. Maybe it was because I had just picked up my wages, I don't know. When I scratched off the third symbol, I just couldn't believe it at all. The woman behind the counter was jumping up and down, and she was shaking because she was so excited for me."
But Lee's fiancee, Carryann, had a different reaction.
"Lee is always playing these pranks on the kids and me, and when he came home and said he'd won, I just didn't believe him," reveals Carryann. "He used to tell me every now and then that he'd won the lottery, back when he was buying tickets, but it always turned out to be a joke. He would tell me that he'd won £600 or so, so when he claimed he'd won £100,000, I thought it was a silly joke and didn't want to fall for it. When I realized it was real, I couldn't contain myself. I was jumping up and down and screaming, it was incredible. He never buys those tickets any more - so what are the chances of him winning like that? It's almost destiny."
"We've been planning on getting married for years now, but we've always wanted to try and save up for the dream wedding that Carryann has always wanted," says Lee. "We'd been setting aside £100 or so a month for as long as I can remember, and were hoping that we'd have enough to make it all possible. But now this win changes everything, and it means we can effectively pay for the wedding upfront."
"Almost as soon as I realized I had won the £100,000, my thoughts turned straight to the wedding," says Lee. "I said 'We can have the wedding of our dreams now'. [Carryann] didn't believe me at first, even when I actually showed her the ticket she thought it was a fake or something like that. It wasn't until I started to phone up the lottery people to confirm the win that she thought it was real. It's all been a bit of a blur since then. It's not a huge amount, just a nice tidy sum."
Congratulations to Lee and Carryann, and hey Lee...want to buy a ticket for me next time, too?
