By Caitlyn Morral
Staff Writer
A day filled with tricks and pranks is right around the corner. Students and teachers are eager to use this day to play jokes on their friends, they said.
For some students, April Fool’s Day is just an amusing day to trick those around them.
“You can get away with things that you normally can’t, and it’s April Fool’s day, so people can’t hate you too much for it,” freshman history major Bill Friel said. “I’ve always wanted to see the boxing glove on a spring, like in “Jackass.” I think that would be pretty funny to watch.”
But for one professor, April Fool’s Day is a day that he has been waiting for all year.
“April Fool’s Day is like my Christmas,” journalism and mass communication professor Paul Wieland said.
For over 50 years, Wieland has been pulling fun pranks every time April 1 rolls around.
“It’s the one day of the year where it’s acceptable to goof around without getting fired,” Wieland said.
Wieland has made sure to incorporate his jokes into his jobs over the years. While working for the Buffalo Sabres, he said he made an announcement that the Sabres had been officially named “America’s team” by the president. Afterward, he said he was threatened for arrest because he used presidential stationary. He had also enlisted the help of British announcers in the past to pretend that BBC was covering a hockey game.
At one point, Wieland said he even announced the ice the players used to skate on would be plastic from now on, in which a Buffalo station made into their lead story.
“I do the jokes broad enough so that most people should be able to catch them,” Wieland said. “The jokes aren’t to deliberately embarrass anyone, but to have fun.”
Wieland has played his fair share of pranks on April Fool’s Day in past years at St. Bonaventure as well. He said he has placed fake parking tickets in the windshields of students and faculty and produced false newscasts starring President Sister Margaret Carney, O.S.F. One year, Wieland, with the help of Dean Pauline Hoffmann, was able to trick two top university officials into believing that the SBU TV truck would be taken to London to film the Olympics.
With April 1 quickly approaching, Wieland is keeping what he has planned under wraps.
“I have something planned for next week, but I’m not going to reveal it,” he said. “You can be silly, you can be nonsensical, and you can fool anyone that you want.”
morralce14@bonaventure.edu
