Prank/Joke Gone Bad

We put a rainbow sticker on the back of a co-worker's Cadillac, right after he moved into a more "festive" neighbourhood.

He was pretty homophobic too, it freaked him out to have a barber cut his hair.

It took him about a week to notice the sticker and he wasn't happy about being the "fresh meat" in the area.

I heard a good one from Sebring last year. Green Hornet Racing, competiting in GTC, came back to the hotel from dinner. My buddy Adrian thought it would be a funny idea to take all the lug nuts off the rental HHR and throw them in a nearby lake. So they did. Next day, guy gets in to head to the track, all 4 wheels fall off as soon as he turns onto the roadway to head to the track. Had to get AAA to buy a set and help him put them on. Team Boss was PISSED, to the point of firing whoever did it. Adrian didnt say a word....

DukeOfUndersteer wrote: I heard a good one from Sebring last year. Green Hornet Racing, competiting in GTC, came back to the hotel from dinner. My buddy Adrian thought it would be a funny idea to take all the lug nuts off the rental HHR and throw them in a nearby lake. So they did. Next day, guy gets in to head to the track, all 4 wheels fall off as soon as he turns onto the roadway to head to the track. Had to get AAA to buy a set and help him put them on. Team Boss was PISSED, to the point of firing whoever did it. Adrian didnt say a word....

Sorry, that isn't a good one. That is a dumb and destructive one, and your buddy should have gotten fired.

In reply to mtn:

Good one as a good example of a prank gone bad. Trust me, I'm not the type of person taking lug nuts off cars and laughing about it. I have my fair share of rental car stories, but none of them resulted in something that extreme

We used to break in the new people with jokes. Taught them we weren't serious business. I once worked for an unnamed chain bakery that was accustomed to getting large orders. We had lead times so it was no big deal- but we never told the rookies that. So myself and whoever else was working with the new person would leave, saying we had to go on break or something. We'd then go out, make a phone call to the store, and proceed to place an order for something that would be impossible to do (say 500 cinnamon rolls. In an hour). We'd then sit back and watch as said rookie panicked and started making all of this product. We'd usually roll back in and get to hear the story about how we have to make this massive amount of product. It was nice, because we'd always order something we needed prepped anyhow, so it wasn't product going to waste. We'd sit and let them panic for a few min after we got back, get what we needed done done, and then tell them. It amused many.

friedgreencorrado wrote: I hate "practical jokes" with the power of one billion exploding supernovas. Personally, I consider stuff like the "Jerky Boys" or "Jackass" or "Cheaters" folks do worthy of capital punishment. When the berkeley did people forget how to mind their own business? My last contact with local law enforcement officers was actually due to something SWMBO did to me on April 1st, about 10yrs. ago (about 5yrs. before we "hooked up".). She had attached a sticker I found offensive to my car. I didn't see her do it, she said, "..hey, come look at *this*!" as a "joke". I took the aluminum baseball bat I had stashed in the car, and proceeded to wander down the street looking for a neighbor's car with the same sticker. Lucky for me, I lived in a poor neighborhood at the time..and the car I actually attacked was an abandoned one. I'm still wondering if she & I got together later than sooner because she was afraid of me, or sooner than later because she dug that "bad boy" busting the E36 M3 out of that POS in our crappy neighborhood. Long story short: "pranks" suck the ass of dead popes, even when committed in private. IMO, trying to attempt something as magnificently reckless in public (the workplace) is a recipe for disaster.

This is too funny, I couldn't help but laugh at this.

spitfirebill wrote: I once put a pair of women's stockings (real stockings not pantyhose) under the seat of a co-worker's wife's car. He was driving her car while she was out of town on business. I had found these stockings in an abandoned house I was doing an asbestos inspection on. After thinking about it, I went out and removed them. He was 6' 6" tall (looked a lot like Lurch) and she was about 5' but had a temper you wouldn't believe. I was scared she might kill him.

See, you aren't pulling a practical joke on the dude, you are pulling the practical joke on the wife who'd we assume isn't your friend.

It's actually really not cool, my mom is crazy enough as it is, and one of my father's co-workers did this to him once. That was a really E36 M3ty month.

spitfirebill wrote: I have a great sense of humor, but practical jokes on people you don't know or on the new guy are rarely funny.

My opinion as well. There are plenty of ways to joke around with your friends or co-workers that don't involve hurting their feelings or causing property damage.

failboat wrote:

mad_machine wrote:

4cylndrfury wrote: go up to an unlocked computer and press ctrl+alt+down arrow...screen flips upside down. Hilarity ensues

odd... does nothing on my computer

Mine either. I was really hoping it worked because I was going to go around doing it to everyones computer when they stepped away from their desk.

I think it only works for XP...

Doesn't work on my XP...

This one didn't "go wrong," but it was hilarious when dude got REALLY upset.

I built furniture for a while. The day before I started, one of the dudes was chatting it up, and while he was telling a story or whatever, leaned his hand back and set it on the table....the table with the table saw...which was running all day.

Anyway, he lost a couple fingers. So this place, I quickly find out, is prank-central. You'd think that would've changed after dude lost his fingers, and you'd be dead wrong. Guys would bring in waterballoons and launch all out assaults, blocking all the exits and just waylaying your ass. I was building an entertainment center on day 2 and got hit in the back of the head with a frisbee. When my brother worked there, he brought in a coffee can full of black-cats, waited for the finish guy to go in the spray booth, lit the fireworks, closed the lid, and tossed it in. Dude ran out, spray gun shooting red stain everywhere, including all over himself. He said he thought the fan had come loose.

So after a month or so, dude who lost the fingers comes back to work. For a big dude, he's a little bit of a drama queen. He's wearing this "Special glove" to keep dust off of his little fingerlet-nubs or whatever, and everyone's giving him a hard time about it. So at lunch on day 3 or so of him being back at work, bossman says "Hey, he left the glove. We've got to do something to it."

Yours truly came up with the "Michael Jackson" theme. So finish guy sprays it white with metallic flake and airbrushes "WHO'S BAD?" on it.

There was that hilarious anticipation, as we ALL (dozen or so of us - plus the dudes and chicks from the sanding room) came back from lunch 10 minutes early, peeking over our shoulders every 2 seconds. Finally dude sees it and loses his berkeleying mind. Starts speaking in tongues, screaming about how it's some kind of "special prescription glove and somebody's gonna pay for it," etc. Finally he asks "WHO THE berkeley EVEN COMES UP WITH SOME MESSED UP E36 M3 LIKE THAT?"

He and I didn't get along so well after that.

Isn't it time for TJ to come back and tell us what he did???

I have only ever pulled one prank at work. My boss had to leave early one afternoon. She was waiting for an email with information to include in a report needed that day. So she left her computer logged-on and asked me to get everything compiled and sent as soon the email arrived. I got everything done. But before shutting her computer down, I set the default homepage on her browser to the "The Hamster Dance."

The next day she got to work before I did. When I rolled in, she called me into her office. With a huge grin on her face she looked at me and said, "That was funny. I thought maybe my machine had been attacked by a virus. I called the IT help desk. When we figured out what you did, I think we laughed for about 2 minutes." I knew her well enough to be sure she would appreciate the joke before I did it.

I think the best one I've pulled was sending flowers from a male co-worker to his new boss, also male. The card basically said: "Thank you for hiring me. I look forward to working under you"

When the guy met with his new boss and was thanked, in a very awkward way, for the flowers it was hilarious.

Cotton wrote: Isn't it time for TJ to come back and tell us what he did???

Yes it is.

The new guy at any airport based business usually gets sent next door for a bucket of propwash or a couple of yards of flight line. It gets funny when the new guy and the new guy next door start looking in closets and under the sink.

Cotton wrote: I think the best one I've pulled was sending flowers from a male co-worker to his new boss, also male. The card basically said: "Thank you for hiring me. I look forward to working under you" When the guy met with his new boss and was thanked, in a very awkward way, for the flowers it was hilarious.

Ok, the others were pretty good.... THIS one is BRILLIANT!!! I snorted hard!

mad_machine wrote:

4cylndrfury wrote: go up to an unlocked computer and press ctrl+alt+down arrow...screen flips upside down. Hilarity ensues

odd... does nothing on my computer

has to be enabled in the settings... also not all brands have the option... think it's real common on intel GUI chipsets (ie cheap computers with intigrated crap graphics that companies lease)

Ok T.J. It really is time to fess up.

The upside down screen thing works on my Windows 7 machine, so not just XP.

pilotbraden wrote: The new guy at any airport based business usually gets sent next door for a bucket of propwash or a couple of yards of flight line. It gets funny when the new guy and the new guy next door start looking in closets and under the sink.

Tell him to stand behind a radial when it fires up. I see and laugh at this at Oshkosh every year.

How do I enable the computers to do this? It is an absolute MUST at my work. Please, PLEASE tell me!!!

Doesn't work on mine at this time.

failboat wrote:

mad_machine wrote:

4cylndrfury wrote: go up to an unlocked computer and press ctrl+alt+down arrow...screen flips upside down. Hilarity ensues

odd... does nothing on my computer

Mine either. I was really hoping it worked because I was going to go around doing it to everyones computer when they stepped away from their desk.

All hope is not lost. It works on all computers except two in my department.

Rt arrow is funny as well. Having it on it's side is as annoying as having it upside down, but on it's side people will attempt to use it to "get through" a task, causing much frustration...

Instead of removing the desktop icons to the recycle bin, just right click on the desktop and click View>Show Desktop Icons. This will make them invisible but not delete them, and it's easy to reverse.

I have been arrested at a fimily dinner once as a prank. Didnt go over well with me.

My first job was Outback Steakhouse and we messed with people big time. Lard in an ice-cream bowl with whipped cream and choc sauce looks like the real thing and the servers just dig into it. Make the new people empty the coffee maker that has a never ending stream of water. It just gets sad after around 45 mins.

While in the plumbing business, we had a spanish guy that couldnt speak any english join a crew. He asked how to introduce himself to our uber Christian boss. He was told to say "hello motherberkeleyer, I am Juan." It was funny until he almost got fired.

I surreptitiously wrote "NAMBLA" in one of the empty spaces of a cop buddy's speed-dial list. As it turns out, when his girlfriend noticed it she was quite curious about what this new entry was. He was rather unamused at the time, though we can all laugh about it now that he decided not to shoot me.