Category Archives: amusements

International Pillow Fight Day

Contrary to my previous post about Tartan Day Scotland, International Pillow Fight Day, which is also on 6 April, seems to be purely about having a bit of fun.

Yes, that’s right, on Saturday 6 April, there will be massive pillow fights in cities around the world! There may be one near you there are happenings in cities across the globe from Amsterdam to Zaragoza!

All over the world, groups like [the Urban Playground Movement] organize free, fun, all ages, non-commercial public events. From a massive Mobile Clubbing event in a London train station to a giant pillow fight near the Eiffel Tower in Paris to a subway party beneath the streets of Toronto, it is clear that the urban playground is growing around the world, leaving more public and more social cities in its wake. This is the urban playground movement, a playful part of the larger public space movement.

One of our goals is to make these unique happenings in public space become a significant part of popular culture, partially replacing passive, non-social, branded consumption experiences like watching television, and consciously rejecting the blight on our cities caused by the endless creep of advertising into public space. The result, we hope, will be a global community of participants, not consumers, in a world where people are constantly organizing and attending these happenings in every major city in the world.

On Saturday April 6th we will once again celebrate World Pillow Fight Day with a massive pillow fight on [London’s] Trafalgar Square. It’s the most fun you can have on a city square and on this day, it happens in hundreds of cities around the world.

Because this is supposed to be fun the rules are kept to a minimum; there are just two: Don’t hit anyone with a camera and don’t hit anyone without a pillow.

What a shame that at the time of writing the only UK event listed is the one in London, but as usual there is up to date information on their website at .

Morpeth Northumbrian Gathering

Being Eastertide here is a lot on this week and Friday 5 to Sunday 7 April sees the Morpeth Northumbrian Gathering. As their website says:

In September 1966 a modest concert of Northumbrian music and song was held to raise funds for Morpeth Antiquarian Society. It was the inspiration for a one-day Northumbrian festival in March 1968 which evolved into the Morpeth Gathering.

The festival includes a vast array of competitions including crafts, performance and writing. Events of local interest have been added to the programme of concerts, singarounds, barn dance, storytelling, theatre and street performance which includes a young people’s pageant as part of the Border Cavalcade.

The emphasis of the Gathering is firmly upon the native traditions of Northumberland and, whilst there is plenty of scope for traditional music from all over the British Isles within the festival, the wealth of local culture is well to the fore.

For the curious the guy on the left, playing the pipes, is my godfather!
More information at www.northumbriana.org.uk/gathering/index.htm.

International Carrot Day

Yes, I kid you not; this isn’t an April Fool! Thursday 4 April is International Carrot Day.

Indeed you may well ask, “Why?” I did.

Well as it says here …

Carrot Day was founded 2003 to spread knowledge about the carrot and its good attributes around the world. [It] is celebrated every year on April 4th and is the pinnacle for carrot lovers all around the world. It is the day when the carrot is celebrated through carrot parties and other carrot related festivities.

More information at http://www.carrotday.com/.
There’s even a list of Carrot festivals and a link to the Carrot Museum.

Alternative Proverbs

I found the following alternative proverbs on the intertubes. They’re probably very old, but they amused me!

Don’t change horses until they stop running

Strike while the bug is close

It’s always darkest before Daylight Saving Time

Never underestimate the power of termites

You can lead a horse to water but how?

Don’t bite the hand that looks dirty

No news is impossible

A miss is as good as a Mr

You can’t teach an old dog new maths

If you lie down with dogs, you’ll stink in the morning

Love all, trust me

The pen is mightier than the pigs

An idle mind is the best way to relax

Where there’s smoke there’s pollution

Happy the bride who gets all the presents

A penny saved is not much

Two’s company, three’s the Musketeers

Don’t put off till tomorrow what you put on to go to bed

Laugh and the whole world laughs with you, cry and you have to blow your nose

There are none so blind as Stevie Wonder

Children should be seen and not spanked or grounded

If at first you don’t succeed get new batteries

You get out of something only what you see in the picture on the box

When the blind lead the blind get out of the way

A bird in the hand is going to poop on you

Better late than pregnant

As always there is more than a grain of truth in many of them.

World Coal Carrying Championships

Easter Monday, which this year is on All Fools’ Day, 1 April, is the date of the World Coal Carrying Championships at Ossett, near Dewsbury, West Yorkshire.

Each year men and women race the streets of Ossett carrying big sacks of coal. There is a women’s race, two men’s races (all over a course of just under a mile) and also much shorter events for children. The races start at 12 noon at the Royal Oak Pub, Owl Lane, Ossett.


The Coal Carrying Championships are recognised by The Guinness Book of Records.

More details at www.gawthorpemaypole.org.uk.