Wednesday, April 1, 2009

April Fools' Day

So, I woke up this morning and realized that today was April Fools' Day. It got me wondering where we came up with this crazy "holiday" where people try to make other people look silly and most people spend the whole day being skeptical of anything anyone tells them. So I went on a very brief search to find the origins of April Fools' Day. My search began and ended on Wikipedia, where I learned it has been a holiday for a long time and nobody really knows the origin. Who knew?

So all this work looking for the origins of the day reminded me of the only time I have really been involved in an April Fools' Day prank. It is a funny story, so I figured I would write it down for the few people who read my blog to reminisce about the good old days (if you weren't involved in this, feel free to enjoy the story for the first time). Probably the best thing is that while this was supposed to take place on April Fools' Day, nobody who was pulling the prank had the guts to pull it off when the day came, so the prank was actually pulled of a couple of days later. As I remember, the story goes something like this (feel free to add your perspective/rebuttals in the comments. I actually had very little to do with the whole thing so I won't be offended).

It all started as we headed up to Lamar's house for our semiannual conference weekend retreat. Kip was driving, and for some reason we stopped at Wal-mart. As Kip went to find whatever he was after, I split off with Clint to see what we could find in Wal-mart (there may have been a 4th person in the car, I only remember the three). As we got out of earshot, Clint tells me that when he had been in Wal-mart months ago with Med, they had found these dog cookies that looked like real cookies and had decided they would e a great April Fools' Day joke. So, we went to the pet section and he bought the cookies. I guess if I hadn't been with him I wouldn't have been in on the joke, so apparently I was lucky to be in the right place at the right time.

So, as I said before, we were too chicken to pull the prank off on the day at Lamar's house, so we waited until we got back to our apartments. It seems to me like it must have been a Sunday afternoon when it finally went down, because everyone was around, but I could be wrong. Since the whole thing was Clint's idea, and since he was the one who had money invested, it fell to him to take the cookies to the apartment across the hall (where everyone was for some reason) and offer the cookies to the roommates. I was laughing too hard to try it anyway. So, he went across the hall and gave the cookies to everyone, and surprisingly everyone took one with only a little suspicion. They all ate them, and apparently they tasted fine because nobody said anything. Clint went back and offered everyone another, which had to raise some suspicions, but pretty much everyone accepted again. So, Clint decided to leave the box on the table and tell everyone they could have more, so they would read the box and see they were dog cookies. As the legend goes, Murt happily obliged to take another cookie, and while looking at the box remarked "Lick 'n Crunch, that's a funny name" and proceeded to eat another before anyone realized the implications of the statement (don't know if this was the second or third cookie, could have been either). We all enjoyed a good laugh afterward, and got some good mileage out of what was left in the box. The best was the person that came over and just took a cookie without asking if he could have one. So, that is the only real April Prank I have ever been involved in. Not great, but it sure made me laugh at the time.

4 comments:

Mike said...

As I recall, it was my third, and I proceeded to have at least a fourth after we found out they were dog treats...and maybe a fifth. I don't remember. They really weren't bad, except they didn't seem to have much sugar in them.

Emma said...

The dirty Lick and Crunch joke: I think one of the most suspicious things about it all was Clint coming over to tell us we could come get a cookie at your guys' place, that was very unusual. I remember noticing that it smelled like peanut butter, but didn't taste like much of anything. I also heard that Gary was ticked off and chucked his cookie on the ground when he found out. TheEe Pope didn't make it home for a few days and so by the time he got his cookie (April 4th 2006, I believe)everyone else knew they were for dogs and he was pretty ticked off after he found out. So Clint generously offering cookies should always be a warning sign. After all, he was part of the community and they are picky on who they share with.

Hayley Parker said...

I remember being forced to eat one... they tasted like peanut butter. And I hate peanut butter. The worst part was the cover was taken off, so I couldn't see the packaging to be suspicious. So mean. I do remember that I was sitting on BWJ at the time of consumption of the sugarless cookie...

Emma said...

I also figure I will add that TheEe Pope was so ticked off that he actually swiped "Bill's" favorite cubs shirt. This resulted in them losing one of their first games of the season, which was on Clint's birthday I think, thus ruining their season and continuing the seemingly never ending curse. There is a good reason not to tick off TheEe Pope.