Cellar Scribblings

[CellarDweller]

It mystifies me that most of the April Fool's pranks were perpetrated by government entities. It began early in the day with an announcement by the dept. of agriculture that phylloxera was found on Colorado grapes and it went downhill from there. What really threw me was the prediction of a blizzard next Monday. . .I actually called and cancelled an appointment! Now I'll have to see if I can get it back again. 

Oh  geez!  I hope you were able to get the appointment back!

[Jeff Wrangler]

It mystifies me that most of the April Fool's pranks were perpetrated by government entities. It began early in the day with an announcement by the dept. of agriculture that phylloxera was found on Colorado grapes and it went downhill from there. What really threw me was the prediction of a blizzard next Monday. . .I actually called and cancelled an appointment! Now I'll have to see if I can get it back again.  

Wait a sec. If that report of phylloxera was somebody's idea of a joke, that wasn't very funny. I'm not sure what's worse, making a joke about it, or if it's true. Phylloxera nearly destroyed the French vineyards in the 19th century. I seem to remember reading that the French had to import root stocks, or something like that, from America. I don't consider phylloxera a joking matter. I hope that report was just a very, very bad joke.

[serious crayons]

April Fool's pranks are the worst this year. They're all just organizations making announcements that weren't actually true, but conceivably could be.

The only good one I saw was National Geographic saying it would no longer publish photos of nude animals and then offering a slideshow of vintage photos of animals wearing elaborate little clothing outfits. It wouldn't actually fool anyone, but it's entertaining.

[Front-Ranger]

Yes, I could enjoy pranks like National Geographic's. I agree with you, Jeff, that the phylloxera prank was tasteless. And it went on and on, talking about ripping out vines and such. And this from the official dept. of agriculture!! The weather one threw me because it was on the official weather.org site and it had all the official tags and logos, etc. Plus, there has been a snowstorm in Colorado every Wednesday during March. I'm so glad April 1 is over!

[brianr]

I really think weather is too important to be making April fool's jokes unless it is something obviously ridiculous.
I follow a local (Christchurch) Anglican (Episcopalian) priest who has  a blog and apparently facebook and twitter on Liturgy. He is supportive of same-sex marriages in the church and a very nice guy although he does get caught up in minutiae of liturgy but I guess that is his profession.

On April 1 he put up a post beginning "The earliest collection of the sayings of Jesus, written down in Hebrew by Jesus’ disciple Matthew, has been found. These sayings, older than our gospels, now leave us with unprecedented questions: if they disagree with the gospels, which do we follow? Should we add this to the Bible? "
It looked authentic but little giveaways like experts Prof. Ida Claire and Dr. Richard U. Shure told me pretty quickly

Anyway his website crashed with the most visitors ever. (40 to 50,000 and 100,000 on Facebook) There are 115 replies. I have not read many of them  but Many seem to believe it.
The funny thing to me is many Americans and one from the UK complain because it was put up on (to them) March 31.
His following post today is titled  "The World is Round" pointing out if he put it up on April 1 in USA it would be April 2 in NZ.

[CellarDweller]

Well, it's all behind us now.  LOL  No more pranks until next year!

[Jeff Wrangler]

Yes, I could enjoy pranks like National Geographic's. I agree with you, Jeff, that the phylloxera prank was tasteless. And it went on and on, talking about ripping out vines and such. And this from the official dept. of agriculture!! The weather one threw me because it was on the official weather.org site and it had all the official tags and logos, etc. Plus, there has been a snowstorm in Colorado every Wednesday during March. I'm so glad April 1 is over!

Well, at least the vineyard owners can be glad it was just a prank.

[Jeff Wrangler]

Well, it's all behind us now.  LOL  No more pranks until next year!

Yup!

Meanwhile, has anybody heard anything about this year's Swiss spaghetti harvest?

 

 

[CellarDweller]

Meanwhile, has anybody heard anything about this year's Swiss spaghetti harvest?

 

 

I heard that drought conditions wiped out the crop.   I could be wrong.   

[CellarDweller]

Hiya BetterMost friends!

Hmmmmmmm

I don't think I did anything this weekend that was that offensive. 

And when you live alone, who can you offend?   

Crazy weather on Saturday night.  I was still up (about midnight) and I saw lightning flash, so I opened the window a bit to hear outside, suddenly, there were loud crashes of thunder, pounding rain, vicious winds.  It was pretty wild.

Sunday was sunny, but still guts of wind that were harder than usual.

Today I woke to sleet falling from the sky, but it didn't last.  Tonight's temps are going down to 29 degrees, and we're told we can wake to snow tomorrow, but no major accumulations.