"Easter Eggs"

Last week a new friend paid me a great compliment by saying:  "You're a mischievous devil, aren't you?"  I had to laugh because I hadn't heard the word mischievous in a while.  However....  It certainly fits yours truly. 

I have always said that I feel like I'm still in 10th grade.  I love jokes and puns - and PRACTICAL JOKES.  Oh goodness - I've masterminded some hilarious ones that I'll share in later stories. 

I was given this particular skill directly by my father.  Nature?  Nurture?  No idea!  But the skill is there nonetheless.  Here's proof that my dad was a jokester...

Although this happened before I was born, I still remember my dad telling this story:

Dad was one of the deacons of his church.  He went to the Congregational Church in town, and my mother and whatever brothers she could still control went to the Roman Catholic church.

Apparently, the church had hired a new minister and my dad didn't really care for the guy.  I remember dad calling this minister a "pretty cold fish" which is Swedish for "no sense of humor".  Dad said that this guy was a very pious man who had no room in his life for laughter or mirth.  Enter my dad...

Dad's best friend was Fred Wadhams.  Dad and Fred both worked at the bank with similar careers.  Heck, Fred may have been dad's boss for all I know.  I know this - they were cut out of the same piece of cloth.  They would tell stories and giggle.  Fred always had a joke.  Always.  And dad always had another or at least a comeback...

Dad and Fred thought it would be particularly funny to mess with the new minister.  They thought out a master plan.  Two Saturdays before Easter, they snuck into the minister's henhouse (yes - the minister had a henhouse in Goshen CT in the 1940s).  That night they took all the eggs in the henhouse.  Apparently, the minister was in a particularly foul mood as he delivered the sermon that Sunday morning.

One week before Easter this time on Friday night, they snuck into the henhouse with an extra two dozen eggs and essentially doubled the hen's yield.  Palm Sunday morning again the minister didn't seem amused, but looked at Dad and Fred during the sermon, sizing them up.  

Easter Sunday morning the two of them met at about two in the morning, snuck into the henhouse, and replaced all the eggs with hard-boiled pastel-colored easter eggs.  Dad said that during the sermon - the minister stared at Dad and Fred so much that the two of them started giggling.  The minister knew.  Dad and Fred knew that the minister knew.  But the minister (again - with no sense of humor) never said a word to them.  Dad said that the minister didn't last long at that particular church.  Dad thought that was hilarious too.  

Dad would tell that story and GIGGLE AND LAUGH as he told it.  I heard that story many times, and each time was as good as the first.  When I write about some of my practical jokes- at least you'll know where they originated. 

Till Next Week!