I Hate April Fool's Day

The BBQ Pit
41

I liked it; it was nicely done. It woke me up more than my morning cup of coffee until the penny dropped. Of course, I was then prepared for the piece in Marketplace Money where they interviewed a “professional wallet carrier” for a Fortune 500 top executive. They ruined it at the end by having him say that he only worked one day a year (the first of April), and that “Joe King” was a co-producer.

And it hardly needs to be said, but my “history” of April Fool’s Day above was of course a complete fabrication.

42

When we lived in Saudia Arabia, a Saudi told my husband he was turning Saudi! Then he laughed and said 'Abril Lie, Abril Lie"!

43

This year, apparently, lawns are dying all over the Bay Area because of the sod mites. The little buggers are everywhere.

44

I fell for this one, regarding the availability of Kosher for Passover gasoline in New Jersey. The original article was in the NYT, and the last paragraph spelled out for the humor impaired that it wasn’t true. I took it seriously all the way until that last paragraph. D’oh!

45

As I recall, the new year used to start on the Vernal Equinox, March 20 or so. When the calendars were adjust to Gregorian, 11 days were instantly added, so March 20 became March 31.

But about the same time, they decided to make the new year start at the beginning of January. Only fools were the ones that still celbrated New Years at the end of March/beginning of April. So April 1 became Fool’s Day, or more specifically, April Fool’s Day.

46

I hate it because we don’t have it. I hear all these weird news and wonder what ass(hole) did they get that out of, and then I realize the date. Oh. D’uh. Anglos-being-idiots-day, gotcha…

Spanish newspapers have been confounded by April 1st stories a couple times. Some of them have started having a yearly report on “April 1st news”; a friend who’s a reporter says they do it, in part, to remind themselves to be extra-careful when reading any wires generating on that date.

Spain’s own version is December 28th (the Feast of the Innocents), I don’t particularly enjoy it since I’m no prankster but I’ve gone to bed the day before knowing that there will be some stupid invented news; I don’t find myself wondering what’s the people on El Mundo been smoking, like I do on April 1st re CNN.
AWB, January comes from “Janus”, the two-faced god of doors, who closes the old year and opens the new one. The (civil) new year started in January since the Romans, at least in Southern Europe.