NO APRIL FOOL

Congressman Johnson ruined April Fool's Day for me.

It used to be my favorite day. Really, it's the ideal celebration for a secular humorist.

But what to do this year? Exploding dinner plates? Done that. Plastic cockroaches? Done that. Soliciting community volunteers to participate in a federal study by storing toxic waste in their basements? Done that. (On the air. Got in trouble for it, too.)

So I looked at this year's batch of April Fool's gags for inspiration. Google changing its name to Topeka? Boring. National Public Radio is promoting the sale of a 20 CD collection of their best corporate sponsorship announcements. I thought that was pretty funny.

Then there was Georgia Democratic Representative Hank Johnson, at a House Armed Services Committee meeting. He was questioning Admiral Robert Willard, head of the U.S. Pacific fleet. The Navy is planning to station thousands of additional U.S. Marines and their families on the Pacific island of Guam, an American territory.

After ponderously verifying that the island is some 20 miles long and only seven miles wide, the Congressman asked -- with a completely straight and as serious a tone as you can imagine --the killer question:

(Really, you've got to see this on You Tube. It's just not as funny in print.)

Representative Hank Johnson: "My, my fear is that ah, the whole island will become so overly populated that it would tip over, and ah, capsize."

And the admiral, to his credit, answered with a completely straight face: "We don’t anticipate that."

But the kicker is, THIS WAS NO APRIL FOOL'S JOKE! Although I just stumbled on this story today, the hearing was held last Friday.

So that's it. No April Fools pranks this year for me. I am completely demoralised. I give up, and defer to reality.