I love the 1st of April. I hardly ever take it so far as to actually trick anyone, mainly because I have no talent. If I am around people, however, I am frequently the one getting tricked (one way or another), being generally gullible: I once looked out the window after having been told that there was a fun fair on the lawn outside a cabin in the middle of the Norwegian mountains -- hilarity ensued.

What I love about today is that it forces me to be critical of what I read in the papers. It is something I should be doing every day, of course; but like most people (I think) I tend to accept things at face value unless there is something glaringly wrong about how it is reported. I trust that nobody will actually set out to deceive me (unless, you know, Rupert Murdoch is in there somewhere). I am well aware that this is a naïve way of approaching the world. And I do try to keep my wits about me when I read the papers. But the heightened scepticism on April's Fool's highlights my credulity the rest of the year.

Here are a selection of NRK's jokes through history. Here is the Guardian's list of today's crop. Jessop's sent me an e-mail trying to convince me to buy their "scent camera". And I am fairly sure Geoffrey K. Pullum has been inventing stuff about the New Yorker.

Wikipedia has an interesting article on the subject. Apparently Britain only serves up untruths until midday. Do we have that rule in Norway?