Friday, April 1, 2011

April Fool's Day

Happy April Fool's Day From Wikipedia: April Fools' Day is celebrated in the Western world on the 1st of April of every year. Sometimes referred to as All Fools' Day, April 1 is not a legal holiday, but is widely recognized and celebrated as a day which tolerates practical jokes and general foolishness. The day is marked by the commission of good humoured or funny jokes, hoaxes, and other practical jokes of varying sophistication on friends, family members, teachers, neighbors, work associates, etc. Traditionally, in some countries such as New Zealand, the UK, Australia, and South Africa, the jokes only last until noon, and someone who plays a trick after noon is called an "April Fool".[1] It is for this reason that newspapers in the U.K. that run a front page April fool only do so on the first (morning) edition.[2] Elsewhere, such as in France, Ireland, Italy, South Korea, Japan, Russia, The Netherlands, Germany, Brazil, Canada, and the U.S., the jokes last all day. The earliest recorded association between 1st April and foolishness can be found in Chaucer's Canterbury Tales (1392). Many writers suggest that the restoration of the 1st of January as New Year's Day in the 16th century was responsible for the creation of the holiday, but this theory does not explain earlier references. What is the best (harmless) prank you pulled on another?

9 comments:

morgan said...

I was playing cards with my daughter when she accidentally flipped a nutshell fragment in my eye. I pretended to blinded the rest of the game. It was hard work keeping my eye closed the entire game. My daughter felt horrible until she found out I was messing with her, then she hit me.

Jill James said...

Morgan, you must be the cool mom in the neighborhood. Pretty good joke.

Jill James said...

Obviously the blog was playing April Fool's with me and left me with no formatting of my post.

Paisley Kirkpatrick said...

My husband says he is still scared for life because of the April Fools joke I played on him all those years ago when he was in Vietnam in the military. I sent him a letter every day he was gone (366 days) and thought I might just mention that I was bored and bleached my normally brown hair platinum. Then since I thought my eyebrows looked out of place, I bleached them, too. Well, he was so angry he only read the first paragraph and stormed around all day slamming his fist into walls and growling. THEN when he read to the end of the letter and saw that it was just an April fools joke, he really got angry... You gotta love it when a plan comes together. At least he had something else to think about for several hours. :)

Jill James said...

Paisley, that's a good one.

Clarissa Southwick said...

Great post, Jill. I don't think I've ever played an April Fools' joke. I'm usually the one playing the role of fool. I'll fall for anything and have a heart attack while doing so:)

Jill James said...

Clarissa, that is me too.

Josie said...

Jill,
I'm late in my response, but I don't think I've ever pulled an April Fool's prank. How's that for boring?

Jill James said...

Josie, better late than never. Not boring at all, just well-mannered.