Area woman wins trip from ‘Live with Regis and Kelly’ show
Jill McCracken of Rices Landing feels grateful that her husband picked up the phone Thursday morning. That single phone call was connected via a live broadcast on the “Live with Regis and Kelly” show.
“I was feeling sick,” said McCracken. “I felt horrible the night before. I thought my husband left for work, but I then heard him pick up the phone.
“That’s when he came running up the steps to me and said, ‘Jill, I think you better answer this.’ He told me who it was, but I thought he was lying.”
McCracken quickly learned that her husband, Scott, was not lying. In fact, on the other end of the phone was a representative for the “Live with Regis and Kelly” show, informing McCracken that she had been chosen to answer that day’s “Travel Trivia” question.
Quickly learning that if she answered correctly she and a guest would spend a week at a travel destination of her choice, McCracken realized that the pressure was on. The representative told her to be waiting for the live, on-air phone call from Regis and Kelly at 8:55 a.m.
“I ran across the street and got my neighbor,” said McCracken. “I told my husband that he could not leave for work. I needed him. I figured that if there were three of us, someone had to know the answer.”
In addition to gathering those to assist her, McCracken hurriedly jumped online and reviewed the content of the previous day’s show. Also, in the time spanning the initial 8 a.m. call and the winning 8:55 a.m. one, McCracken called her sister in Pittsburgh, telling her to watch the show, while her husband threw a blank tape in the videocassette recorder to tape the live call.
According to McCracken, the call came at exactly 8:55, the time she was told it would.
After small talk with Regis and Kelly on McCracken’s children, husband and occupation, Regis asked her if she was ready, telling her she had only 20 seconds to answer. Regis then asked her the “Travel Trivia” question: “Where did the music duo Hall and Oates meet?”
Although not a fan of Hall and Oates, McCracken immediately knew the correct answer from doing her homework.
Her voice broadcast live on a national television show, McCracken replied, “Temple University.”
This correct answer won the McCrackens an all-inclusive, expense-paid vacation to the Cascade Resort and Spa in Vail, Colo., a trip valued at $4,500.
Having one year to go on the trip, Jill and Scott McCracken plan to spend their sixth wedding anniversary in July at the resort. Six days of horseback riding, hiking, bicycle riding and fine food await the McCrackens.
The vacation is a much-needed one, according to McCracken, who said she and her husband fail to get out too often, due to their need to stay at home and watch their 3-year-old son, Brady, and 2-year-old daughter, Meghan.
“We’ve never been away from them before,” said McCracken, who noted that a baby sitter has been pre-arranged.
Since she’s driven through Colorado before and knows how fickle the weather can be, especially in the Rocky Mountains, McCracken is now concerned about what to wear.
“I don’t know what we will pack,” she said. “We once drove through from Seattle without coats and learned that it was snowing.”
According to McCracken, she first became eligible for the trip by submitting her application via the show’s Web site. Two months later, McCracken received the phone call leading to her and her husband’s future getaway to Colorado.
“I was totally shocked. I was shocked that they called, period,” said McCracken.