Fooled

Well I didn’t play a single April Fools joke but my favorite son Tristram did, and was rather successful.
I returned from White Plains mid-afternoon (and trips to White Plains always leave me shaken and disoriented, as if I’d barely escaped the underground laboratory of Balkan jellybean manufacturers) and there was a message from one Sam Rodman, who identified himself as the rector of St Michael’s who would be marrying Tristram and Nika in May. He said he wanted to “better understand Tristram’s religious background” and would I call back at my convenience.
I completely believed this.
But I did not call back immediately and for that I am grateful, because had I called I would very likely have said some rude and inappropriate things about Tristram’s amusing and brief career as an acolyte as well as alluded to my struggles to teach my children the most elementary hagiography in the face of opposition from my ex, the Unitarian.
I was saved by Tristram’s sister who got the same call and spoke at some length to the putative rector. Then, upon hanging up, she realized – and clearly her intuition is better than mine – that it was a hoax.
She shrieked with indignation, but also admiration. She had been truly had.
(Later, CSB pointed out that I should have turned the tables and told Tristram that I lost the phone number (it was Nika’s brother’s cell number, it turns out, their partner in foolery) and looked up the number for the real rector and spoke with the real Sam Rodman who disavowed the whole thing and was rather annoyed.)

We gave Ned B a year off, resting on our laurels from previous successes: the Incident of Parking Enforcement Officer Uriah Binfuled (U. Binfuled) and The Visit of the Green Egg™.