You know when pranks are the most fun? When you’re a stupid kid at sleepaway camp and someone short sheets your bed, or sticks your fingers in a bowl of water, or puts toothpaste on your face, and when you find out, you’re allowed to give the requisite three punches to the arm. Yes, this is when pranks are basically just goofy little things most kids go through in the process of bonding and finding camaraderie with their fellow kid maniac friends. Continue reading
I was awoken at 3:45am this morning by a prank call. It would usually be work calling and I should have answered it except that I’m not on call. Since I didn’t recognize the number calling it was probably some off shore developer that really thought his issue was urgent. I didn’t answer it thinking that if it was important they would call back. They did not.
I awoke this morning to the guilt of knowing I had let some poor Argentinian, Brazilian or Manilan person down. I checked my Google Voice for the transcription. I wasn’t expecting much since they probably left the message in poorly pronounced English. (that is still far superior to my Hindi) Indeed the transcript was useless. Continue reading
One of the most important days of the year is coming up soon, but enough about Amanda Bynes’ birthday. In a couple of days it will be April Fools Day, and many of you will either be looking for ideas for the next great prank or for protection from the next great prank. If you’re not, why not? Even such a cool guy as Johnny Depp is said by his co-stars to be fond of a remote-controlled fart machine on April 1. Either way, here’s some inspiration.
The benchmark April Fools prank. Highly respected British news program Panorama, in 1957, runs a full-length feature on the Swiss spaghetti harvest including “footage” of workers picking spaghetti off trees. The BBC was inundated by callers asking where they could get their own spaghetti tree. Scary thing is, if you ran the same program today, #spaghettitree would be a trending topic on Twitter within the hour. You know it’s true.
So said New Zealand radio announcer Phil Shone, solemnly telling morning commuters a huge swarm of wasps was descending and they needed to take precautions to avoid being stung. Anecdotal evidence is that hundreds if not thousands of people arrived at work with stockings dutifully pulled over their faces.
Because New Zealand is populated mostly by sheep, I have this amusing mental picture of a sheep driving a car wearing a stocking over its face, looking for all the world like an armed baaaaandit. Sorry.
In 1998, Burger King (perhaps inspired by a certain Simpsons episode… which I see aired in 1991, making me feel really old) announced the first burger designed for left-handers, with all the ingredients rotated by 180 degrees to make it easier to grasp in the left hand. Once again, people bought a whopper. Or tried to.
What makes it more interesting is the people who came in demanding to buy a RIGHT-HANDED whopper and none of this lefty crap. Yes, really.
I don’t know about you, but when I think of wacky pranks, I think of German luxury car-makers. Things like making a satnav that constantly wants to direct you over the border into Poland! Wait, no, that was Jeremy Clarkson.
Anyway, it’s true. BMW take their April Fools pranks very seriously, and run April Fools ads every year all around the world.
A couple of years ago they stuck a Mini Cooper to the wall of a skyscraper in Sydney to back up their April Fools prank of anti-gravity parking. Like I said, they take it seriously.
One of my all-time favorites was in 2006 for a hands-free car, with no wheel, driveable on either side of the road. The UK version of the ad can be found here.
Notice that BMW faithfully keep up the tradition of the joke name in their joke articles: Herr Huhr-Huhr and Uwe Vollervitt indeed.
Ingredients needed:
1 co-worker or subordinate in need of pranking
1 home phone number
Prank:
Simple. Call co-worker at home maybe 45 minutes before they’re meant to get to work, and tell them they’re late for work, where the hell are they? All the better if they have an important meeting or presentation to do first thing.
If they have an iPhone, you can mention that an iPhone alarm bug was reported on the radio this morning and express sympathy that they’ve been screwed by it. This is particularly believable because it has really happened. Twice.
Important! Call back a few minutes later, after they’ve put their underwear on backwards out of panic, to tell them it’s a prank and they can relax. Because you’ll feel horrible if they sped to work and crashed and died, won’t you?
And finally: my love for April Fools Day began at High School, where we had something of a tradition of pranking the school. One of my favorites was the time we got a well known breakfast radio DJ to call the principal, live on air, to ask about a “breaking sex scandal” involving three of her students. The “three” was the genius touch- when dealing with a person on their guard, it’s that extra bit of hysteria which gets you over the line.
What are your favorite April Fools pranks, whether played by you or played on you?