Good morning, there’s Monday. There’s something really satisfying about starting a brand new month on a Monday. New week. New month. New beginnings. Isn’t that what spring is all about?
I tried hard to think of some appropriate April Fools’ Day content that would really surprise everyone, but failed to come up with anything even remotely worthwhile. I am just not a funny person. (Just ask my spouse and he will tell you that I take everything far too seriously).
I know it’s true that I am a rather intense person, which is not for everyone. Anxious. High strung. Tightly wound. Prickly (this is my Mom’s favorite adjective to describe me). I know I should learn to relax and laugh more – if for nothing else then because it would be good for my health.
The saying that laughter is good medicine actually has some science behind it. Laughing has been clinically proven to reduce stress, release tension, boost your immune system, improve your mood, and increase overall personal satisfaction.
Of course pranks of the sort that are popular on April Fools’ Day are not always funny (and for the record, yes, that IS the correct punctuation – I checked). Some of them can be downright dangerous.
Exhibit A: The spokesman of a Philadelphia science museum who caused mass panic in 1940 when he put out a press release “confirming” the imminent end of the world. (He was swiftly relieved of his job).
Or how about the South Carolina mom who thought it would be downright hilarious to text her college-age daughter that there was an active shooter loose on her Virginia campus? The daughter wasn’t actually ON campus at the time, but she couldn’t reach her mom and didn’t (who would?) think for a minute that the whole thing might be a joke.
She called 9-1-1. The authorities were not amused.
Unfortunately, there are a lot more stories where those came from. For some reason, more people than you might imagine – smart people, arguably, who ought to know better – don’t think things all the way through when they come up with what strikes them as an incredibly humorous prank, like, say, announcing you’ve purchased the Liberty Bell and renamed it the “Taco Liberty Bell.”
Apparently, a lot of patriotic Americans don’t take kindly to the idea of a big fast food corporation appropriating an history symbol of freedom and independence. Go figure.
So, where did this wacky tradition originate, anyway?
Well, there are about as many origin stories as there are April Fools’ Day tall tales. SOME people think that it started back in 1582 when France switched to the Gregorian calendar, which moved New Year’s Day from April 1 to January 1, but, since word didn’t travel all that terribly fast back then, some people were slow on the uptake.
Those who mistakenly continued to celebrate New Year’s Day on April 1 were ridiculed and called “April fools.” Some rogues glued paper fish to the unsuspecting revelers backs. (Fish are easy to catch and therefore gullible, get it? Yeah, I didn’t really get it, either).
This is one of those weeks when it’s best not too look too far ahead, weather wise. Today looks pretty good, with a mix of clouds and sun and temperatures in the high 50s. Let’s just leave it at that and live in the moment, shall we?
In the headlines…
The White House is pushing back against top Republicans’ misleading criticism of President Joe Biden for issuing a proclamation in support of transgender people on the same day as Easter.
A spokesman for the president rejected the attacks from the House speaker and others that Biden’s message for the Transgender Day of Visibility goes against Christianity.
The Democratic president issued the proclamation on Friday, calling on “all Americans to join us in lifting up the lives and voices of transgender people throughout our Nation and to work toward eliminating violence and discrimination based on gender identity.”
Trump posted a video on Friday to his social media website that features an image of Biden with his hands and feet tied together.
Trump indicated the clip was filmed in Long Island last Thursday while he was there attending the wake of Officer Jonathan Diller, a New York City police officer gunned down in the line of duty.
Trump launched yet another attack against the daughter of New York Supreme Court Justice Juan Merchan, who is overseeing the trial regarding the former president’s alleged hush money payments to adult film actress Stormy Daniels.
Lawyers for the Manhattan district attorney have asked Merchan to clarify the case’s limited gag order and “direct that defendant immediately desist from attacks on family members,” according to a letter sent to the judge.
Trump’s aides are vetting potential vice presidential candidates at Mar-a-Lago as the former president floats an expansive list of names in private conversations.
In a potentially worrying sign for Biden, Trump’s message on immigrants appears to be resonating with key elements of the Democratic coalition that Biden will need to win over this November.
An ex-associate of Rudy Giuliani, Lev Parnas, accused Trump of working with Russia, stating that “it’s blatant.”
Pope Francis made a strong appeal for a cease-fire in Gaza and the “prompt” release of all Israel hostages during his traditional Easter message “to the city and the world” on Easter Sunday.
The address came after Francis presided over Mass in the morning and made several loops around the piazza, greeting some of the tens of thousands of people that the Vatican estimated to be in attendance.
Thousands of Israelis filled the streets outside the Knesset, the Israeli Parliament, in Jerusalem to call for early elections, in one of the most significant demonstrations against Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s government since the start of the war.
The protest in Jerusalem occurred one day after thousands took to the streets of Tel Aviv in an anti-government protest, and as Netanyahu faces mounting anger from Israelis who feel he has put his political survival ahead of the interests of the Israeli people.
Netanyahu’s office says the Israeli leader, 74, was to undergo surgery for a hernia discovered during a routine checkup. The prime minister will be under full anesthesia and unconscious for the procedure.
Netanyahu held a news conference before the procedure, his second hernia surgery since August 2013 and less than a year after he was fitted with a pacemaker.
Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg and Maryland Democrats urged Congress to authorize additional federal dollars needed to rebuild the Francis Scott Key Bridge in Baltimore after it collapsed last week.
Crews in Baltimore on Saturday were working on pulling the first piece of wreckage out of the water after the collapse of the bridge, a tangible sign of progress in the daunting effort to reopen the busy waterway.
Top federal government and Maryland state officials stressed that the health of the US national economy depended on the success of removing the bridge wreckage.
As U.S. officials work to prevent the Baltimore bridge collapse from snarling global supply chains, the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey has been offered as an alternative route for cargo, officials said.
From roughly 100 yards away, the site of one of the worst bridge collapses in the country’s history is haunting.
New York’s George Washington and Verrazzano-Narrows bridges are vulnerable to the same domino-effect catastrophic collapse that brought down the Francis Scott Key Bridge in Baltimore, a new analysis warns.
At least 17,000 structures in the US have “fracture critical” construction like the Key Bridge did — among them some of the nation’s largest and most famous bridges, the Wall Street Journal reports, citing the National Transportation Safety Board.
AT&T said it has begun notifying millions of customers about the theft of personal data recently discovered online.
The telecommunications giant AT&T announced on Saturday that it had reset the passcodes of 7.6 million customers after it determined that compromised customer data was “released on the dark web.”
Gov. Kathy Hochul defended her decision to attend the wake of a fallen NYPD officer amid accusations she was not welcomed at the Long Island funeral home.
On Saturday, speaking at an Easter event at the governor’s mansion, Hochul said she did not regret attending the wake Friday despite being confronted by a mourner as she left.
Videos of Hochul allegedly being turned away from the wake of NYPD Officer Jonathan Diller have gone viral online.
A spokesperson described a meeting between Hochul and Diller’s family behind closed doors as cordial, polite and pleasant, where both the governor and the officer’s loved ones talked about the need for policy changes.
While eulogizing her husband, Diller’s wife demanded change from lawmakers. She called her 31-year-old husband’s death “devastating” and “senseless,” as the couple’s young son was held steps behind her on the altar of St. Rose of Lima Church.
“How many more police officers and how many families need to make the ultimate sacrifice before we start protecting them?,” Stephanie Diller asked.
Mayor Eric Adams took aim at a liberal criminal defense lawyer who downplayed Diller’s murder as a “rare occurrence” — and instead focused on cops who have “killed” citizens.
Progressive attorney and advocate Olayemi Olurin accused Adams of promulgating harmful rhetoric around subway crime in the five boroughs during a contentious radio interview.
Echoing the White House, Hochul issued a proclamation declaring March 31st as Transgender Day of Visibility.
One World Trade Center, the Empire State Plaza and Niagara Falls and other locations “will be lit light pink, white and light blue” to mark the day, a press release from the governor’s office stated.
A landmark Queens deli is raising funds for Diller’s family by peddling “The NYPD” sandwich in the fallen hero’s honor.
A new bill aimed at protecting wolves in New York proposes collecting more data from the hunters and trappers who could mistakenly kill the endangered animals when believe they are coyotes, which can be legally hunted.
In the halls of the New York State Capitol, with a budget deadline bearing down, it seems that all that anyone wants to talk about is adultery.
New York state budget talks will drag on in Albany this week as lawmakers remain optimistic despite signals that there’s little agreement on major issues such as housing.
Ex-Gov. David Paterson ripped into Assembly Speaker Carl Heastie for refusing to back a law to toughen up criminal sentences for violent shoplifters and other thugs who assault retail workers.
It’s ethnic discrimination to force Big Apple pizzerias and matzah-makers to cut the smoky pollutants from their wood- and coal-fired ovens, according to a new bill sponsored by a Staten Island Republican assembly member.
Hochul and other top New York Democrats were accused of turning a luxury suite at the Buffalo Bills stadium into a private party room during a marquee game last year.
Mayor Eric Adams marked Good Friday by receiving a jailhouse baptism from the Rev. Al Sharpton, joining in on the religious rite with a group of men incarcerated at the troubled Rikers Island jail complex.
“Having been arrested and then elected mayor, I reminded these young men that where you are is not who you are,” Adams said in a statement.
Tensions between top mayoral adviser Timothy Pearson and an NYPD chief who backed a sergeant now accusing Pearson of sexual harassment reached such a heated point in April 2023 that the mayor’s brother had to step in to try to play peacemaker.
The head of the company whose weapon-detection system was showcased by Adams as a potential solution to subway violence had told investors earlier this month that underground subways were not a “good use-case” for the new technology.
Adams’ administration, bowing to the drumbeat of innovation, said that it would begin to permit operators to test drive autonomous autos on city streets, in an announcement that divided street safety advocates.
Adams’ administration has awarded a no-bid $33 million contract to a Rikers Island food concessionaire that has charged incarcerated people and their families prices twice as high as those at local stores.
New technology, correctly deployed, can obviously be a boon to any city, but in New York City, Adams is on a long streak of tech missteps, showcasing what debacles can unfold when leaders don’t understand what can go wrong.
Five months after launch, it’s clear that while the city’s AI chatbot appears authoritative, the information it provides on housing policy, worker rights, and rules for entrepreneurs is often incomplete and in worst-case scenarios “dangerously inaccurate.”
Carlton McPherson, accused of fatally shoving a stranger in front of a subway train last week, had been placed by New York City in a specialized homeless shelter for people with serious mental illness. It was not enough.
A trio of attention-seeking protesters were cuffed and hauled out of St. Patrick’s Cathedral after disrupting Easter Mass with shouts of “free Palestine” on Saturday night, cops say.
The demolition of a Chinatown jail complex to make way for a bigger one has damaged a neighboring building and raised concerns about years of dust and disruption.
FDNY brass ordered an East Village ladder company to remove its “red line” American flag honoring six 9/11 victims, after a neighborhood resident complained it was “fascist” and Councilmember Carolina Rivera called it a “politically charged symbol.”
When she wasn’t ducking questions about the Washington Post, LSU coach Kim Mulkey questioned the equitability of Albany hotels in her Friday morning press conference.
A United Airlines flight was forced to make an emergency landing at Stewart International Airport on Friday night after experiencing severe turbulence due to high winds.
Albany’s Spectrum theater has a new operator and will reopen, assuming things go to plan, in less than a month.
Saratoga Springs officials are considering going with paid parking for all visitors who use lots and garages from Memorial Day to Labor Day.
Less than a month after Kevin Monahan was given the maximum sentence for her murder, Kaylin Gillis’ boyfriend is suing Monahan and his wife for causing emotional distress.
The city of Troy and a regional transportation organization are seeking feedback on a pedestrian infrastructure study, which found more than a third of sidewalks are inaccessible to disabled residents and about a quarter of intersections lacking curb ramps.
Though spring has arrived, it’s unclear how the state Department of Environmental Conservation will provide access for people with disabilities to Great Camp Santanoni in the town of Newcomb, something it is legally required to do from May to October
Photo credit: George Fazio.
