Stork misses North Bay Jan. 1

There will be no New Year's Day baby in North Bay for 2004.

Delivery room nurses told baytoday.ca at midnight today that the woman who will deliver the city's first baby of the year didn't show up at the North Bay General Hospital.

Nor were there any women at the hospital ready to give birth, and no phones calls from those on the verge of doing so.

"This is very unusual not to have a baby born here on New Year's Day," one nurse said.

"We will have the first baby of the year born, but obviously not today."

Baytoday.ca will continue monitoring the situation Friday and will post information about the newest arrival as soon as it's available, or, rather, as soon as he or she is available.

Our scientific calculations going back nine months take us to April 1.

Maybe too many people weren't fooling around on April Fool's
Day, with the possible exception of Roxanne and Russell Meade, of Grand Bank, Nfld.

Roxanne gave birth to an eight-pound, eight-ounce girl at 12:13 a.m. today at the Burin Peninsula Health Care Centre.

Since Newfoundland is located in Canada's easternmost time zone, the Meade baby is believed to be the country's first-born this year.