I wanted to cover a couple of things this week, both from events that took place last Saturday, April 1st, aka “April Fool’s Day.”

THE OZ

This particular week saw two of my longtime friends turning 80. Writing partner, Stephanie Hilbert, who had a nice event Tuesday of that week at the WAC. (Washington Athletic Club)

And then, on Saturday, my buddy Ozzie turned the big 8-0 with quite the gathering at the Leif Erikson Lodge. Oz had asked me to emcee his party and so I was there, gags in hand, waiting for the opportunity to drop a zinger or two at the birthday boy. Among them:

• Ozzie has become like a great, great grandfather to me.
• The great thing is by the time you’ve turned 80, you’re learned everything. The trick is in remembering it.
• Ozzie’s mom named him Osmund. Legend has it that it was because she had a crush on the famous Norwegian singer, Donnie Osmund.
• Not many people know that Ozzie maintained a 4.0 all four years he attended college. Oh, not his grades. His blood alcohol level.

Ozzie wanted to be surrounded by family and close friends and have a grown up kids party. The grown up part would be the alcohol, but the kids’ part would be the games we played, like “Heads and Tails”, “Ring Toss” (for wine and Jagermeister) and we even had a magician.

               

Everyone had a blast, especially Ozzie. What a great way to spend an April Fool’s Day.

NATIONAL GULLIBLE DAY

April 1st is a big day for yours truly, as it’s the day each year I debut another “National Gullible Day News Broadcast.” With this year’s effort, I’ve now done 8 of them and they all live at nationalgullibleday.org.

This year, like all the others, was an adventure in putting together. There’s the writing, then recruiting friends to get involved–some willing, some used to be, some too busy these days–it’s all part of the process. Then there’s coming up with a theme, doing the video production and fine-tuning it to perfection. Or, something close. Each year, I feel like it’s a step up from the year before and it just feels good.

In the event you never got around to watching it, here you go. It’s a fast 20-minutes but I promise you, the ending will crack you up.

A special thanks to everyone mentioned in the credits and, as always, if you think you’d be up to playing along next year, I’m always looking for fresh fools.

How many of these will I end up doing? I’ll let you know when it’s all over.

And there you have it–Ozzie’s Birthday and National Gullible Day. Two blog topics for the price of one.

A genuine Two-fer.

Tim Hunter