Healthy Home Newsletter April 2018 - Volume XVl, Issue 4

April 2018 - Volume XVI, Issue 4 The Best April Fools’ Joke Ever? “The Swiss Spaghetti Harvest” In 1957 the respected BBC news show Panorama announced that thanks to a very mild winter and the virtual elimination of “the dreaded spaghetti weevil,” Swiss farmers were enjoying a bumper spaghetti crop. It accompanied this announcement with footage of Swiss peasants pulling strands of spaghetti down from trees. Huge numbers of viewers were taken in, and many called up wanting to know how they could grow their own spaghetti trees. To this question, the BBC diplomatically replied that they should “place a sprig of spaghetti in a tin of tomato sauce and hope for the best.” You can watch the funny original video on YouTube. It’s titled BBC: Spaghetti-Harvest in Ticino.  “April Fools’ Day” History On this day in 1700, English pranksters begin popularizing the annual tradition of April Fools’ Day by playing practical jokes on each other. Although the day, also called All Fools’ Day, has been celebrated for several centuries by different cultures, its exact origins remain a mystery. Some historians speculate that April Fools’ Day dates back to 1582, when France switched from the Julian calendar to the Gregorian calendar, as called for by the Council of Trent in 1563. People who were slow to get the news or failed to recognize that the start of the New Year had moved to January 1 and continued to celebrate it during the last week of March through April 1 became the butt of jokes and hoaxes. These included having paper fish placed on their backs and being referred to as “poisson d’avril” (April fish), said to symbolize a young, easily caught fish and a gullible person. April Fools’ Day spread throughout Britain during the 18th century. In Scotland, the tradition became a two-day event, starting with “hunting the gowk,” in which people were sent on phony errands (gowk is a word for cuckoo bird, a symbol for fool) and followed by Tailie Day, which involved pranks played on people’s derrieres, such as pinning fake tails or “kick me” signs on them. us at www.pcsniagara.com Get Visit Exclusive Specials When You and “Like” us at www.facebook.com/PCSNiagara www.Facebook/XXXXXXXXXX.com! Cool Blogs, Sites & Online Resources to Check Out! Cool websites to visit this month: Screen Free Ever consider a “TV-Turnoff Week?” Here’s a website dedicated to making the turning off of the TV for a week fun and enjoyable – for the entire family. www.ScreenFree.org April Fools’ Day on the Web April Fools’ Day on the Web brings you the most complete listing of April Fools’ Day Jokes that Web Sites have run each year from 2004 to present. Get ready to have some fun here. www.AprilFoolsDayOnTheWeb.com