Use April Fool’s Day this year as an excuse to ditch the routine and share a few laughs with your family.
Use April Fool’s Day this year as an excuse to ditch the routine and share a few laughs with your family.
Last April, there was little laughter in our house, myfamily having just lost a mom and grandmother after a long,grueling sickness.
And, it was missed.
Funny is FUN at the Bozzos’. All those private jokes,silly sayings and stories we share cement us together as afamily.
Not only does laughter bond families, it makes us allhealthier, less stressed, more fun to be around and yes, happier.So why don’t we laugh more often?
Sometimes our lives are too fast and furious to findfunny. But not this month, with April Fools’ Day providing theperfect reason. I went looking for ways to make my family’s daysmore funny. And you can, too, with these eight ways to get youstarted.
1 Make funny a sport
The folks at ComedySportz Theatre make funny good sport. Catch their all-age
improv show where teams clad in red and blue sports jerseys compete
by creating scenes, songs and games based on shout-outs from the
audience. The team with the most claps wins! Best for children 10
and up.
You can catch the show six times a week, Thursdays at 8 p.m.,Fridays at 8 and 10 p.m. and Saturdays at 6, 8 and 10 p.m. Ticketare $22-$24 available at (773) 549-8080 or throughTicketmaster.
2 A laughing hyena
Laughter is infectious. The sound of roaring laughter is farmore contagious than any cough, sniffle or sneeze. So if you need aquick dose of the wild variety, check out the pair of spottedhyenas at the Lincoln Park Zoo. Kai and Phika are the first hyenas to live at
the zoo since the 1970s. So why do they call them laughing hyenas
anyway? Because they sound like people laughing their heads off!
You can find Kai and Phika on the northeast side of the zoo in
between the Sun bear and the Andean bear.
3 A flub club
Laughter is a serious subject for the Park Ridge HystericalSociety, a club dedicated to celebrating the joy of laughter
since April Fools’ Day 2008. Join in for a free laughter session
Tuesday nights at the Park Ridge Chamber of Commerce; participate
in monthly events or call in daily at 9 a.m. to laugh with others
on a 20-minute conference call: (712) 432-3900, pin 6071292.
4 Squeal over this meal
Try the Grilled Laughing Bird shrimp and fried oyster po’ boy atthe friendly organic joint, Nana’s in Bridgeport. Nana
packs a meal-and-a-half-size baguette with grilled Laughing Bird
shrimp and fried oysters.
5 The funnies
Back in the day, I’d save my allowance for the Archies comicbooks with good giggly fun. I realized my girls have probably neverseen a comic book and in today’s digital age, they don’t even read”The Funnies” in the Sunday paper. So this month, I am going toslip comic books in the most unsuspecting places and gear up forgiggles. Check out GrahamCrackers Comics, the largest comic store chain in the U.S. With
nine Chicago area locations, there is sure to be one near you.
grahamcrackers.com.
6 Laugh on the way
With all the time we spend driving, I velcroed the Original 365 Jokes and Puns, America’s bestselling jokes
calendar, to the dash of our Suburban. Now a fantastic joke is only
a reach away! Who needs green lights to make the ride go fast? This
month, I laugh at red lights!
8 Tickle spa?
Moms, would you pay $60 an hour to be tickled? That’s whatfolks are doing at the world’s first tickle spa, Cosuille Arte,which opened last June in Madrid, Spain. There you will findmasseurs or “tickologists” who lightly caress clients withfeathers, fingers and a wire head massager in a candlelit room.Wonder if tickle spas will make their way to the states? Or try onyour own on your next at-home date night.
