Gotcha! April Fools!

For those of you who did not read the entire article in our April 1st issue about the Sentinel closing for a week so the staff could go on vacations, April Fools twice over! We loved dreaming up our wonderful vacations and playing an April Fool’s joke on our readers! We had a lot of fun with comments we received about the article; but alas, we are here and working diligently to get this week’s paper out as always.

Most reactions were in “shock and awe” that we would actually shut down for a week. However, others were excited we were taking the opportunity to get away, even if it meant they would have to wait another week to place an ad or stop in to visit with us about something. We thought you might enjoy some of the reactions we got from our readers:

* Bart was asked how he felt about skipping a week of printing the paper, especially since the Sentinel has never done anything like this before. Bart just played into the joke and told the person that everyone at the Sentinel was really looking forward to their vacations. And he was like, “Oh!”

* One lady was really surprised to see everyone already back from their vacations and at church after reading the article in the paper.

* Our publisher had sent the paper an email wanting to confirm that the Sentinel would not be having a paper printed this week.(Oops, that was close!)

* Another lady sent in an email about our “vacations” stating that a friend of hers laughed out loud and stated, “Everybody loves a good practical joke.”

* The Museum director had fun with it and she would ask people as they came into the museum if they had read the story about the Sentinel’s vacation plans. Almost without exception they would say they glanced at it, and she would tell them, “You haven’t read the story all the way through; you really need to read the entire article.”

* One of the staff’s daughters said it really got her since her mom never told her she had all next week off, but she sure wished they were going on that vacation!

* Someone stopped by to say, “Bravo! Well played! You had me hook, line and sinker!”

* One man complimented the person(s) who thought this April Fool’s joke up since it was a good one. (We did it many years ago when the print date fell on April 1st and decided to do it again.)

* Another person wanted to know if Bart enjoyed the Opening Day game of the Royals and Rangers.

* Someone else said, “I saw where you guys are out of the office this week. I’ll just stop in next week and talk to you about an ad.”

* A tenant of Nancy’s at the housing authority asked how or when they are to pay rent. Her tenants all though it was very unusual for her to be gone during rent payment week.

* Another reader said, “It must be a wonderful feeling to take next week off. Enjoy your vacations!”

* Another comment was, “Hey I see where you are going to be on vacation next week. Glad you are taking time off…you deserve it!”

* Another comment was “So, I read in the paper you’re finally taking some time off?”

*After being told it was an April Fool’s joke, one lady said, “I did not know that! After reading Susan was going to stay home and take care of animals I felt so bad for her that I didn’t read any further.”

* One email stated, “YOU GOT US!!! After reading your front page article about taking the week off, someone in our office was smart enough to read the whole article and saw that this was, indeed, an April Fool’s joke. It sounded like a good idea to us.”