April Fool's Day 2023

 April Fool's Day

In San Francisco, April 1 is the date of the annual St. Stupid's Day Parade, conducted by the First Church of the Last Laugh.  The event celebrates everything stupid.  People wear stupid costumes and carry stupid signs.  The parade follows a path connecting six "stations of stupid."  The first station is at the Federal Reserve Bank of San Francisco, where the bishop who leads the parade blesses the Fed with a bunch of losing lottery tickets.

Being San Francisco, there are always a few naked guys in the crowd.  Above, the crowd leaving the Federal Reserve Bank in 2014.

Another naked parade participant, this one with a birthday cake hat in 2010.

The third station in the parade is the Statue of the Bare Butt Mechanics.  Its real name is the Mechanics Monument, and it was sculpted by Douglas Tilden in 1899.

Above, the parade crowd at the Statue of the Bare Butt Mechanics in 2010.  The statue is graced by the bare butt (and front) of the guy with the birthday cake hat.  The crowd is chanting "No more chanting!"  I told you it was a celebration of everything stupid.

After a stop at the old Pacific Stock Exchange to do a Sock Exchange (the parade participants throw socks up in the air), the last station is the black sculpture in front of the Bank of America building, above.  The parade organizers call it the Banker's Black Heart, and parade participants throw pennies at it.

Here's a video clip of the parade in 2017.  There are several naked participants, but unfortunately their fronts are blurred.

This is the parade float at the end of the previous video, featuring three Doggie Diner heads.  Each head was originally outside a Doggie Diner, a chain of fast food restaurants in San Francisco that went out of business in 1986.  The heads were featured in the comic strip Zippy and have passed into San Francisco popular culture, including their annual appearance in the St. Stupid's Day parade.