April 1st: 100th post.

Hello everyone, I hope you’re having a good day.

This post is something of a landmark occasion for my website. It is the 100th post.

No, this isn’t an April Fools Joke. It really is the 100th post.

If you’ve stuck by me all these years then thank you for your support and I hope you enjoy reading my work just as much as I enjoy writing it.

Here is a quick update on my projects:

My novel Empty Nights will be available for purchase later this year. At the moment the manuscript is at the editors, the next step will be to release the front cover and then the marketing campaign will begin. I’m really excited for this project and hope you’ll enjoy it.

I’m still uploading my vlogs for Write Up Our Alley, I’ve uploaded ten videos and you can view them all on the Write Up Our Alley Tab above or by checking out the Write Up Our Alley YouTube channel.

https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC1js9o9U8PcRhj0GSX8TW3A/videos

While my novel is being edited I’m completing various short stories and I aim to submit to competitions. Hopefully I can write another website post announcing a win shortly.

 

 

Before I end this rather unusual post I want to tell you about the history of April Fool’s Day which owes its beginnings to literature… possibly.

The earliest reference to April Fools I could find was in The Canterbury Tales by Geoffrey Chaucer first published in 1387. The story The Nun’s Priest’s Tale is set “Syn March bigan thritty dayes and two” which means thirty two days after March, i.e. 2nd May. However this line, written in old English caused some confusion as it was believed the line was understood as March 32nd aka April 1st. This humorous mistake, coupled with the fact that in the story a vain cock (an arrogant rooster) is tricked by a cunning fox, inspired readers to play jokes on each other.

However another source I found claims that the tradition of April Fool’s Day began with French bell ringers. When France swapped from the Julian to the Gregorian calendar bell ringers, unaware of the date change, rang church bells on April 1st believing the date to be January 1st. These people were referred to as April Fools.

April Fools day is supposedly linked to the Spring Equinox. On April 1st, Mother Nature was said to unleash unpredictable weather and makes fools out of everyone who believed it was spring.

Those are just some of the answers I could find. Maybe the point of April’s Fools day is that there isn’t a point. Maybe that’s the joke?

 

What do you think? Do you believe you know the origin of April Fools day? Let me know in the comments or on any of my social media platforms.

 

Thanks for reading and I’ll see you next time.