Too soon?

The New York Times buries a story on April Fools' Day in Baghdad. Now, I admire dedication to a good joke as much as anything in this world. Telling jokes like these takes some serious belief in the power of humor:

BAGHDAD — Doah Mohammed played a trick on her mother-in law on Tuesday. She called her and told her that her son, Ms. Mohammed’s husband, had been arrested by American and Iraqi soldiers. When she got the news, Ms. Mohammed’s mother in-law gasped and said she was about to faint. So Ms. Mohammed quickly told her that it was only a prank, and the two women laughed — it was, after all, April Fools’ Day.

Of course, the war in Iraq being what it is, sometimes the humor is a little too topical:

Hadi Abdul Lateef, 26, a clerk in a cosmetics store, said that though he liked to play tricks on people for April Fools’ Day, he no longer dared to do so. Two years ago, he said, a friend called the family of another friend, a man named Ali, and told them Ali had been kidnapped and would be killed unless the family paid a ransom. The kidnapping was a hoax. But the next day, Mr. Lateef said, Ali was on his way to work when a bomb exploded, killing him.

“It was a very black joke,” Mr. Lateef said.

Wow. Too soon.