QUICKLINKS: Obits NEWCOMERS GUIDESearch Browse by date Thu, Mar 30, 2006Wed, Mar 29, 2006Tue... APRIL CALENDAR : Longer days f

April is a month of flying saucers and bouncing bunnies, of jokers and porkers, of clocks that change and taxes for certain. 1 April Fools' Day. Mr. L. E. Phant called. Important ! Call him back at the zoo. No, really. And a French gentleman, Mr. Faux Pas called, and his associate, Ms. Take. And her twin sister — one Ms. Take after another.

HAVE A SCOW Antique Boat Show through April 2 at Garvan Woodland Gardens, Hot Springs. Call (501 ) 262-9300. See birds, bird seed: Birding Basics Weekend through April 2 at Mount Nebo State Park near Russellville. Call (479 ) 229-3650. 2 Daylight-saving time starts at 2 a. m. in the pitch dark of night — the government at work again. 3 National Workplace Napping Day. Heigh-ho, heigh-ho ! It's off to sleep I go; The boss conked, too; He'll never know — Heigh-ho, heigh-ho ! 4 National Home Improvement Time, National Southern Belles Month.

"Tara ! Home ! I'll go home, and I'll think of some way to get him back." — Scarlett O'Hara (Vivien Leigh ), Gone With the Wind. 5 Paraprofessional Appreciation Day, but never trust a paraprofessional parachutist. 6 National Fun at Work Day. Heigh-hoo, hee-hee ! A laughin' fool, that's me. I shirk my work To give a snerk — Heigh-hoo, hee-hee ! 7 Sooey, baby: Hogskin Holidays through April 8 in Hampton, with diving pigs and pork cook-off. Call (870 ) 798-2100. NEST EGGS Eggshibition sale of plaster eggs decorated by artists and celebrities benefits Youth Home Inc., 7 p. m. at Clear Channel Metroplex Event Center, Little Rock. Call (501 ) 821-5500. Cadillac Invitational Golf Tournament at Harbor Oaks Country Club benefits the National Kidney Foundation of Arkansas. Call (501 ) 664-4343.

FIRE SALE Halley Volunteer Fire Department rummage and bake sale through April 8 at the Halley Fire Station east of Dermott in southeast Arkansas. Call (870 ) 538-9352. Arkansas Choral Society's Broadway Music Madness includes songs from West Side Story and Phantom of the Opera, 7: 30 p. m. at First Christian Church, Little Rock. Call (501 ) 225-5656. 8 Honk if you love the Car and Truck Show at Goodsell Truck Accessories, Jacksonville, for the Jacksonville Boys and Girls Club. Call (501 ) 982-2245.

Honk if you love Second Saturday Festival in downtown Calico Rock: cooking, swap meet; again each second Saturday through summer. Call (870 ) 297-4422.

Honk if you love National Tooter — correction: Tutor Appreciation Day. 9 This is a test of the Anxiety Alert System. This is only a test. Had this been a real anxiety, you would have been advised of National Stress Awareness Month. 10 National Siblings Day spats in the back seat. 11 National Networking Week, National Kite Month, National Garden Week. Hey there, high there, hoe there. 12 Tomb it may concern: Talk and book-signing with Marilyn Johnson, author of The Dead Beat: Lost Souls, Lucky Stiffs and the Perverse Pleasures of Obituaries, noon-1 p. m. at the Cox Creative Center in Little Rock's River Market District. Call (501 ) 918-3032.

BLACK WEDNESDAY National Licorice Day. The licorice root not only goes into delicious candy... 13 ... but also chewing tobacco, fireextinguisher foam and insulation, and International Plant Appreciation Day. 14 Sky's the limit: Ozark UFO Conference through April 16 at the Inn of the Ozarks, Eureka Springs, with speakers including Harvard astrophysicist Rudy Schild on dark matter and UFO propulsion. Call (501 ) 354-2558.

PLAY-BY-PLAY Community Theatre of Little Rock's Arsenic and Old Lace through April 16 and April 21-23 in Woolly Auditorium, Arkansas School for the Blind. Call (501 ) 663-9494. Rogers Little Theatre's A Few Good Men through April 15, again April 20-22 and 27-30 at the Victory Theatre, Rogers. Call (479 ) 631-8988. 15 The past recast: Frontier Day at Old Washington Historic State Park near Hope. Call (870 ) 983-2684.

Peter Yarrow of Peter, Paul and Mary, but this time with Bethany and Rufus, 7: 30 p. m. at Ozark Folk Center State Park near Mountain View. Call (870 ) 269-3851.

Tired Iron of the Ozarks antique tractor show through April 16 in Gentry, Northwest Arkansas. Call (479 ) 524-0450. 16 Easter Sunday. Community Easter Sunrise Service, 7 a. m. at Riverfront Park, Little Rock. Philander Smith College, Central Christian Hispanic Assembly of God, Christway Missionary Baptist Church, Alison Presbyterian Church and Pulaski Heights United Methodist Church lead the service. Call (501 ) 664-3600.

YEAH-H, THE TAX MAN 17 State and federal income tax pay-up-or-else day. April 15 is the usual deadline to fork it over. But the 15 th came on a Saturday this year, so the 17 th is cough-it-up day, instead. And a Monday, besides. 18 National Coin Week remembers the jingle a man used to have in his pockets before taxes. 19 Day after Hayley Mills' 60 th birthday — a senior moment for the whole generation of yesterday's baby-boom schoolboys who had a crush on her.

Rally for the Cure golf tournament at Maumelle Country Club benefits the Komen Foundation. Call (501 ) 851-8731. 20 TAURUS (April 20-May 20 ): Careful, Taurus the bull. Tiptoe through the china shop. Aries the ram and Leo the lion — it's plastic cups for you guys, too. Otherwise, you could wind up like Bumbles the rhinoceros — poor Bumbles — once an upand-coming sign of the Zodiac, now disgraced and forgotten because of a china shop incident.

No bull here, just listen. The Little Rock Wind Symphony celebrates spring in song. Call (501 ) 666-0777. 21 Dress accordingly: Intimate Apparel through May 7 at Arkansas Repertory Theatre, Little Rock. Call (501 ) 378-0405. FOCAL book sale through April 23 at Little Rock's Main Library. Call (501 ) 918-3086.

WHAT'S THE BUZZ ? Carving in the Ozarks chain-saw artists' festival through April 22 at U. S. 62 East and Rockhouse Road, Eureka Springs. Event ends with a charity auction. Call (479 ) 253-2080. CHAIN SAWS OR BAGPIPES ? Arkansas Scottish Festival through April 23 at Lyon College, Batesville. Call (870 ) 698-4211. 22 Earth Day — from the ground up.

CHAIN SAWS, BAGPIPES OR... 23 National Karaoke Week. 24 Day after National Egg Salad Week. Some eggs are deviled, others just rotten. 25 National Decorating Month: When puce comes to shove.

Steve Martin's play, Picasso at the Lapin Agile, a Studio Series performance through April 29 at the Arkansas Arts Center. Call (501 ) 372-4000. 26 Old times not forgotten: Kickoff party for Arkansas Heritage Month (May ), 8 a. m.-6 p. m. in the River Market, downtown Little Rock. Call (501 ) 376-8722. 27 Southern heritage celebrants blow right past Gen. Ulysses S. Grant's birthday, 1822.

HAIR AND THERE National Hairstylist Appreciation Day, National Hairball Awareness Day. Something about her reminded me of a cat... maybe the way she kept washing her whiskers. 29 The zipper receives its patent, 1913, thanks to a little pull in the patent office.

Eyes on irises: Central Arkansas Iris Society Show and Sale and Iris in Art sale of paintings and sculptures that feature the monocotyledonous cousin of the crocus, 1-4: 30 p. m. at Grace Lutheran Church, Little Rock. Call (501 ) 664-2903.

Barn dance: Junior League of Little Rock's Bargain Barn, 7 a. m.-noon at the Hall of Industry, State Fairgrounds, Little Rock. Call (501 ) 375-5557.

Blues Benefit with Chubby Carrier and Anthony Gomes for Lifeline of Northwest Arkansas, 7 p. m. at the Clarion Inn of Bentonville. Call (479 ) 254-0000. 30 Happy endings: Mount Holly Picnic and Mini-Fair, 4: 30-7 p. m. at Mount Holly Cemetery, Little Rock, features Gayden Matcalf and her book, Being Dead Is No Excuse. Call (501 ) 376-1843.

rwolfe@arkansasonline. com by April 15 to suggest May calendar entries or tax deductions to give the IRS a laugh, such as: Deduct the price of Scotch tape when you can't find where the roll starts... and the expense of time spent peeling stickers off apples... and the cost of all meetings where nobody pays attention. Each event requires a phone number that is answered during business hours or by an answering machine that identifies the event or its sponsor.

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