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Show Cost la vie! By JANIS STUART April Fool's Day, or, a fool by any other name, is still a fool It's the only holiday I don't like; April Fools Day. People have suffered from such jokes as ex-lax in brownies, baked foam- rubber cakes, complete with decorations, and such cruelties as moving the stories from a Clipper writer's computer so that he thought they were lost to oblivion. I personally don't like April Fool's Day because I always end up being the patsy. Clear back in second grade, I was a failure on April Fool's Day. I remember trying to play a joke on my teacher. It took most of the morning but I finally got up the nerve to walk up to her and say, "Your slip is showing. I'll admit it wasn't very creative but I was inexperienced in-experienced in the ways of April Fool's Day. My teacher turned to me and said, "What makes you think I'm wearing one?" I was shocked and returned to my seat. Since then, April Fool's Day has been a disaster for me. When I was in high school, I called to talk to my mother at work. Unfortunately, it was April Fool's Day. Her friend, who answered the phone, said Mom wasn't there. She had eloped. I began to cry because I felt terrible that Mom would elope without telling me. (My mother could not believe I was so gullible. I made up my mind then and there never to fall for another April Fool's Day joke. The very next year, I watched the calendar as the dreaded day approached. ap-proached. I was not going to be taken by surprise again. Unfortunately, my mother called before I was even awake to tell me the police had found my car. After a shock-wave rolled through me, I ran to the window to look where my car had been parked the night before. It was still there. I had been fooled before I even had a chance to clear the sleep from my head. Then we have our bridge club. We have gone through marriages, births and aging together. Who would suspect this trusted group to sink so low as to play an April Fool's Day trick? But alas, no one seems to be able to resist the lure of a good fool. It took about five "re-deals" of the cards before anyone realized the hostess for that month had removed the aces from the deck. Are we April Fools not safe anywhere? So, up early, prepared for another an-other April Fool's Day a few years ago, and prepared for anything, I answered the ringing telephone. A neighbor called and said my car had somehow rolled onto their front lawn and would I please come and get it. No way was I falling for this and I said, "Just go ahead and keep it. I don't feel like getting it." I was still snickering when the father of the neighbor called and said to get the car or he would have it impounded. In disbelief I looked across the street to see my car sitting sit-ting on the lawn of the neighbor's home. Sheepishly, I retrieved the car. I have never been able to prove that the car didn't roll there accidentally, acciden-tally, but we April Fools know in our hearts when we have been had. |