APRIL’S FOOL

APRIL 1, 2025 – Our sons came up with the smart idea—well over 20 years ago on April Fools Day; or more precisely, late in the evening of March 31. It was a simple but effective prank. They slipped a thick rubber band over the trigger of the sprayer on the kitchen sink and aimed the sprayer toward the place where one of their unsuspecting parents would stand early the next morning to fill the coffee pot with water. It was always a two-step prank. As between the Mom and the Dad, whoever took the initial hit would immediately mop up the mess, then disappear to change into dry clothes—knowing that by leaving everything in place, the other parent would be in for a surprise shower, all to the thigh-slapping laughter of the sons.

The prank was such a winner, Beth and I continued it every year for long after our sons left the nest. An added feature, however, was that whoever was first to rig the sprayer would often forget and wind up as the first to be pranked. For some reason I was most often “first pranked,” much to Beth’s amusement. Invariably she’d take a picture and text it to our sons.

But nothing lasts forever. Last year we had our kitchen renovated. The project included a new, state of the art kitchen faucet, into which the spray hose was incorporated into the fashionably tall, arching spout. Late last night when by habit I went to set up the age-old prank, I realized that of course—the requisite mechanics had changed. With heavy nostalgia for the good ol’ days, I repaired to bed, slightly disappointed in myself: I was drawn more to an old fashioned book than to conducting a Google search for “Easy home pranks for April Fools’ Day.”

The earth turned, the sun shone. The day progressed all the way to mid-afternoon, when our son asked if we could pick up our granddaughter from school. I willingly obliged. Soon the third-grader filled the kitchen with sunshine—in contrast to the fast deteriorating weather outside. While Beth was engaged in a photo-scanning project in the dining room, our granddaughter and I hung out for a time in the kitchen, where I prepared her a snack of fresh strawberries and lemon cake. While rinsing the berries, I gave the kitchen spout and spray hose closer examination. The young girl was familiar with our family prank tradition and observing my inspection of the faucet, she whispered, “Hey, Grandpa, are you going to do the water prank?”

“I’d sure like to,” I whispered back.

Soon a roll of gray duct tape was in hand. I pulled out the spray hose, snaked it back on itself, then taped it securely to the spout. Beth was none the wiser. With hand over mouth, my young accomplice concealed her soft laugh, then left the room to join her grandmother.

I, meanwhile, had moved on to the next appointed task: preparing rice for dinner. As I proceeded, I reminded myself of all the times in history when the sprayer prank had backfired; the all too predictable circumstance of my absentmindedness—forgetting that I’d rigged the darn thing and sprayed myself before Beth would stand before the kitchen sink and turn the faucet on.

“Eric,” I told myself this afternoon. “Whatever you do, DO NOT use the kitchen faucet! HANDS OFF, understand?”

“Yes,” I said back to myself. “Understood.”

Hoping Beth wouldn’t leave the dining room, I resorted to rinsing the rice in the bathroom located off to the side of the kitchen. After dumping the rice into the cooker on the kitchen counter, I returned to the bathroom for a cup of water. Soon things were underway. So far so good.

Just then I heard an order for more strawberries. “Okay, coming up,” I shouted back to our granddaughter, who was still at Beth’s elbow in the dining room. I reached back into the refrigerator, removed the box of strawberries, opened the cover and removed three big red berries. Admiring their succulent appearance, I moved to the sink to rinse them.

It took me several seconds to realize . . . “WHAT?! YOU’RE NOT SUPPOSED TO BE USING THE KITCHEN FAUCET! But I AM using the kitchen faucet, you dummy!”

Such, a dummy, in fact, it took another moment’s worth of synapses to inform me that I wasn’t the least bit wet, and another couple of synapses to signal that the reason I wasn’t wet was that for all my duct tape wrapped around the spray hose, the sprayer wasn’t properly aimed to produce the desired effect. The spray of cold water was merely hitting the inside of the sink.

I retrieved the roll of duct tape from the closet next to the bathroom to which I then retreated—with door closed—to dampen the sound of yanking another foot-long stretch of tape off the roll. With Grandma distracted by Granddaughter, Grandpa would finally set up the prank as it was supposed to work.

When I heard Beth announce that she was now going to “fix the soup,” I retreated quickly to the doorway leading to the sitting room on the side of the kitchen opposite the dining room. With camera ready, I was in position to document the surely hilarious outcome of the now perfectly staged prank. I couldn’t wait to zap the photo of Beth yelling “Ahhhhh!” as a big water spray soaked the front of her sweatshirt. I’d send it immediately to our sons for their annual April Fools’ Day amusement.

But as I’ve known for over 40 years, Beth is not easy to fool, especially by late afternoon. She rounded the kitchen sink island to the front of the sink and paused. “E-ric?” she called out. With a laugh she said, “This is not going to work as you intended.”

With considerable effort she removed the collection of duct tape I’d wrapped around our handsome kitchen faucet. I would be left the job of using an assortment of brushes to scrub the residue of duct tape adhesive off the spout. I finally got smart and furtively removed a bottle of adhesive removal from Beth’s office. The mystery solvent did the trick.

Next year I’ll give the old prank a rest and rely instead on that Google search: “Easy home pranks for April Fools’ Day.”

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© 2025 by Eric Nilsson