Office pranks
So, that office warfare thread got me thinking of pranks, and it occurred to me that I need a new bag of tricks. In the past I have reliably enjoyed using the ThinkGeek annoy-a-tron, though word eventually gets around on that one. My favorite no-hassle prank to play on folks is to take a sliver of black tape and cover the optical sensor on their mouse, which works perfectly on the standard-issue ones that come from Dell or HP. If you apply it very carefully, it's easy to miss. They flip it over, see nothing out of the ordinary, and go back to cursing. This provides endless entertainment if you can surreptitiously remove it after they've phoned Support for someone to trot a new mouse over. The tech shows up and gives them a nice condescending look when they find nothing wrong with the device. As soon as they leave their office, on goes the tape again.
The best one I can recall, though this took a fair amount of work, was back at my old job when we all had two or three CE/PC's in our offices, which are basically just recycled hardware/cases used to boot Windows CE so you can do some development on it without needing a small, expensive device. We had a guy who would relentlessly prank the hell out of everyone, so one day when he ducked out for lunch, we hurried into his office, opened one of his CE/PC's, crammed in an old ethernet card into a slot right below the rear case fan, rested a fish on top of the card, and then closed everything back up and screwed it all back in just before he returned. Within ten minutes he was aware that the fish smell was definitely originating within his office, and spent the better part of an hour ransacking his drawers, stacks of files, and ceiling tiles trying to figure out where we'd hidden it. He finally had to cry uncle, as it hadn't occurred to him that we'd stash a fish inside a working computer. The fan blowing the scent around was icing on the cake.
Inspire me with more ideas!
XBLive: Ruckus
I once took a small black ziptie and tethered a guy's phone handset cord at the ends. It was undetectable until he took that first call. Up came the handset, phone base and all.
Got any toast?
Speaking of the annoy-a-tron, if the people definitely know about it and would look for it if they heard the beeps, you can do this. (We actually did this in our office and it worked wonders) Its not too hard to code up, but write a very simple program that will emit beeps through the computers speakers (preferably the one built into the case, not the desk speakers). Load it up onto their computer and set it to run everytime the computer is started. They will hear the beeps and spend hours, possibly days, looking for the annoy-a-tron.
When we did this at our office, the guys eventually gave up and consoled themselves on the fact that it would run out of batteries in a couple weeks. After that we just couldn't help it, we had to tell them.
Chumpy wrote:
Malor wrote:
I did something similar to this for April Fools one year. I downloaded several prank programs to run at startup on all my coworkers computers that would do various things throughout the day. Of the ones I remember: randomly popped out the cd drive, turned the Office "Mr. Clippy" into a rude insult generator, flipped the monitor image upside down but still usable, popped up msg "Do you want to format your C:\ drive? Yes / No" with the No button grayed out.
It was received well and fun to listen to the results since I couldn't see anyone, just hear the mumbles of confusion as it progressed throughout the day. Amazing how long people will ignore issues before asking for help. The best part is that since I had to load everything about a week ahead to be undetected, it was all setup to run only on 4/1. I was laid off the following year in March, and heard from several of them that it all went off again that year because no one thought to ask me to remove it the year before.
Bears. Beets. Battlestar Galactica.
Quintin_Stone wrote:
Priceless. It really is amazing how lazy people can be.
Chumpy wrote:
Malor wrote:
Well, in terms of dorm pranks, gorilla glue and 5 minute epoxy are your friends.
My favorite is gorilla gluing someones windshield wipers to their windshield. They have to get new blades, but getting into the car when its raining and hearing the motors torque out is priceless.
*Legion* wrote:
Jeebus, that's bordering on vandalism, especially if the motors burn up.
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Ya that's definitely worthy of a beating in response.
Gamer Tag: Rantyr
*Legion* wrote:
Yeah, I'd probably be feeding my old windshield wipers to the guy who glued them to my windshield. Forcefully. And taking the money for the new ones from his wallet while he was choking.
XBLive: Thin J
PSN: Thin_J
I don't imagine master craftsmen leaping away from completed projects and shouting "Done, motherf*ckers! - 1Dgaf
Eh, you are all to lenient. If someone did that to my windshield wipers, or my bathroom door, I'd epoxy them to the wall or something. Or epoxy their car door shut.
One of my favorites is either unscrewing the hinges from the door, or just removing the pins (which works better) to their door. When they open the door, it hits them in the face. Falling on them.
Be careful of who you do this with, and the weight of their door, but it works quite well with the light flimsy office doors.
The annoy-a-trons are a little cliche, but they can be used to amazing effect, with a little help. (One place I was fixing a computer at had the maintenance crew help them put three in an office. One behind an outlet plate, one above the drop cieling, and one in a reasonably obvious place (taped under the desk behind the keyboard tray.) He found one within 2 hours, and spent 6 hours looking for the other two, but couldn't find them.
The next day, when I come back, around noon, the unfortunate target completely flaked. Ranting, raving, throwing furniture, the whole 9 yards. Then supervisor comes down, and the managerial crap hits the fan on epic scale... I mean he had everyone packing the stuff from their desks, and right when everyone was completely convinced they were screwed. (I didn't even work there and I was freaking out.)... they burst into laughter, and start showing the hidden video.
Turns out that after the floor supervisor (The one who had his office infested with annoy-a-trons) couldn't find the other two, he went to the supervisor... and they hatched the plot. And took that excuse to tell everyone they were moving to a nicer building tomorrow anyway.
SAM wrote:
If you're looking for something that doesn't cause any damage, here's one I did a few years back.
The end result is that the victim thinks his office has been completely filled with styrofoam packing peanuts. What you need is a big box, some tape, and packing peanuts. The box has to be big enough to cover the window, and also have at least 12 inches of depth. Cut out the side facing the window and the top of the box. Tape it securely around the window frame on the inside of the door. Fill from the top with peanuts. Close the door. Sprinkle peanuts in front of the door with most of them piled by the non-hinge side. Then stretch two or three long pieces of masking tape across the door frame at different heights with the words "DO NOT OPEN DOOR" on them. Enjoy the befuddlement.
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Bacon is like monkeys - it makes everything better. - Bagga
At a previous place of employment we had in storage a stuffed and mounted turkey. We used to strategically place it on the toilets in the stalls of the men's room and close the stall door. It was quite unsettling for the victims.
Xbox LIVE: oldman GWJ
"I might have gotten away with it if it wasn't for a damningly tenacious clinger." - Crouton on a childhood excrement escapade
Sometimes it really is the little things that work best. Unplugging someone's keyboard, for example. Leave it on the desk, leave the cord close to the back of the PC, just unplug it. See how long it takes to call for help. (Bonus points for every time they reboot the machine.)
Another classic that still makes me smile: take a screenshot of someone's desktop. Set the screenshot to be the background image, then move all the icons off the desktop and minimize any toolbars. Everything still looks fine, but nothing works. The first time you do it to somebody, I guarantee significant cursing and confusion.
If I could only bring three things to a desert island, all three would be you. And I'd make you all kiss. -a softer world
Since I do the tech support in my office, I'm usually the one that is called over to "fix" whatever the issue is when someone gets one pulled on them so I tend to not them do often.
But some our office has seen over the years:
- Take a screenshot of their desktop and then set that as their wallpaper. Then just drag the Taskbar/StartMenu down so it's hidden and then right click the Desktop and do Arrange Icons By -> uncheck Show Desktop Icons. To really mess with them you could always put copies of a few of their previous icons back in place so that some things work and others don't.
- Took a P-Touch and labeled everything on a guy's desk. I mean everything. "John's Keyboard", "John's Mug", "John's Pencil"/"John's Pen (literally every single one we could find), "John's Calculator", "John's Stapler", etc, etc. After the big laugh he spent most of his morning de-labeling all the stuff on his desk. Then he opened one of his drawers and discovered we had labeled everything in there as well ("John's rubberbands", "John's paperclip", "John's paperclip", "John's paperclip", you get the idea). Good times.
- Similar to the above, another time we bubble-wrapped everything at someone's desk.
- A guy was out sick for over a week so we decided to saran wrap his cubicle. I don't mean all the items like above, I mean the cubicle. So when we were done there was a giant 6x6 cube of saran wrap. Then we a taped a note to it saying "Quarantine Zone" and left it up for a few days for when he came back. We got into a little bit of trouble for that one because it apparently freaked out the cleaning crew.
- If you know someone isn't very familiar with the layout of a keyboard (the hunt and peckers) then popping a few keys off their keyboard and rearranging them can be amusing. (I didn't do that one, but I got called over to replace their "malfunctioning" keyboard and noticed the real issue right away)
Mr T broke the speed of light in the A-Team van because he wanted to prove that quantum physics was a bunch of Jibba Jabba.
If you want to do a quick and harmless prank you can tape a post-it underneath your victim's computer mouse. Obviously it has to be an optical mouse. Be sure to tape all four sides of the post-it so it doesn't crinkle when the user is trying furiously to get the mouse to work.
Bonus points for writing something funny/smarmy on the post-it.
Heh thats a good one.
Here's a sophomoric dorm prank: If someone's office door opens inward, get a large cup of foul liquid and set it against the door, tipping it to rest against the door. When jerkface opens the door, the cup of stuff spills onto his office floor.
my vote cancels out yours
A street musician (term used loosely) used to play the saxophone outside my building all summer long. He knew 3 songs: Jingle Bells, Summertime, and Amazing Grace. A co-worker whose office was right above the dude moved offices to the other side of the building to get away from the noise. So my boss hired the street musician for 10 minutes to come up and play outside the co-worker's new office.
"All that time you waste dating and having sex could be better spent scouring the web for new game developer press releases." - Quintin_Stone
A few I've seen around here:
-fart in the superfvisors room and then hold the door so they can't escape
-one of the engineers created a program that was emailing the sales guys every minute. Since their email goes to their blackberries their phones were ringing constantly. Eventually had to call the Engineering Manager to get him to figure it out what was happening
McChuck wrote:
I like this one. We have a guy here who is pretty particular about his stuff. He labeled his toolset. It's understandable because the guy he works for is very messy and leaves things lying around all the time, loses things, etc. Might be fun to label all his stuff for him.
Getting killed, though? In a way that you don't like? Suck it up, Gertrude.
Some of the stuff I've done over the years:
Creating a mock battle with green army men on a ceiling tile
Removing a caster from their chair and hiding it in one of their drawers
Installed Squeaky Toy Deluxe
Installed Mega Man Effect program launcher
But I'm not a terrible person to work with... honest!
Xbox Live: Trachalio
Pipe Threader Manual wrote:
- I added a "For Rent" sign to the outside of my cube when I changed divisions. (My old manager didn't appreciate it, but everyone else did, so mission accomplished.)
- We dismantled our cube walls and reassembled them without an entrance
- Random white board art w/ magnetic people
GWJ Alliance on Blackhand
Lunazul - Rouge & GWJ Paparazzo
Merdee - Hunter
Lunarel - Druid
At work we share a computer between the various shifts, i set my background to show our dispatch screen filled up with calls... My assistant managers look was priceless the first time he came down and logged in as me (another annoying thing I hate, *noone* should know my password but me. he has admin access he can look at anything on my stuff any time he wants. I can't even change the damn password (well not without the risk of losing my job anyway, i don't think they'd like me to hack into their computer system))
Back in High school, I did the classic, rearrange the classroom trick over lunch, I could see why they didn't have the student desks looking out the window in the original layout
"Also, I have four legs and am covered in wool. Baa!" *Legion* reveals his inner furry.
There is someone in my office that is known for complaining about everything. One of the managers referred to him as a "princess" and the name has stuck.
One day, we decided to really screw with him, so we came in on the weekend, closed off the front of his cube with chicken wire, made his cube look like a zoo exhibit, and put up a plaque with a shaded map of North America. The plaque read "North American Princess. Habitat: cube farms, copy rooms, water coolers. Diet: gossip, vitriol, free donuts. Lifespan: 3-8 years."
There is only an up or down--up to a man's age-old dream, the ultimate in individual freedom consistent with law and order--or down to the ant heap totalitarianism,... those who would trade our freedom for security have embarked on this downward course.
That is hilarious. One of the best I've read today.
Getting killed, though? In a way that you don't like? Suck it up, Gertrude.
I've done a large number of these and more, including rearranging the keyboard, screenshot of the desktop, hide stinky stuff (crawfish bait) in the office, rigging fireworks (party poppers) to go off when the door is opened, the cup of upside-down water on the desk, etc.
But these two are my favorites.
Prank One - Can't See the Forest
We hired a service to come in and put some office plants/office trees in the offices to green things up. Now if you've ever had such a service, they come in and LOAD the place up with plants. You tell them which ones you don't want and they take those away. This way they end up with more plants in the office than you would order normally.
Well, they did the initial delivery and I showed up early the next day. I proceeded to get every plant and tree in the office and carried them to one guy's office. I PACKED his office full of greenery - all available floor space was taken by the trees and all desk/shelf space was taken up by the plants. I even hung a few from the drop ceiling. I then squeezed the door shut and left him a note on the outside of the door.
When he got to work that day, he found the note. It simply said:
"sometimes you can't see the forest for the trees".
Secret Santa
We used to do the "Secret Santa" thing. To fill in those who aren't familiar with Secret Santa, you draw a name of a co-worker and you get them an inexpensive gift each day for an entire week. Then they have to guess who got them the gifts...
Well, we had a really annoying salesman that worked for us. He was a little guy - 5'4", 130 lbs or so. But he was from Texas and had a huge ego - anything you could do, he could do better. And, of course, he always was bragging about Texas, which is damned annoying when you live in NC. He was a total pain in the ass to work with - a combination of a brown noser, a tattletale and a braggart. The best word to describe him is "insufferable".
So I got his name for Secret Santa and decided to have a little fun with him. I don't remember all the gifts, but I remember a couple of 'em...
Monday - A can of shrimp
Tuesday - A box of Runts
Each day, he proceeded to get a gift that had to do something with size (or the lack thereof). And each day, he got madder and madder. By Thursday, he was ranting and raving about it. So on Friday, he entered the office totally pissed off. Friday is the day you spurge a bit for the gifts. So he found his gifts wrapped up on his desk. A box of Magnum condoms...and a roll of duct tape to keep them on. He exploded and quit the same day.
Needless to say, this episode is still the only formal repremand I've ever received in my career.
I am so going to quote that out of context.
Xbox LIVE: oldman GWJ
"I might have gotten away with it if it wasn't for a damningly tenacious clinger." - Crouton on a childhood excrement escapade
Holy crap that was hillarious.
Thank you, thank you.
I have a few other good practical joke stories, including ones about midgets, fake auto accidents and porn noises on a laptop. However, I have never topped the Magnums and duct tape.
I am so going to quote that out of context.
On the Secret Santa...
I hate to sound like the spoilsport, but I really think that was a bit over the line. You don't beat on someone because their short, fat, bald, Jewish, black, or something else deeply personal. That's harrassment and can/should get you fired.
I think it would have been a lot cooler if you could have addressed his offensive behavior without resorting to the cheapshot on his height.
There is only an up or down--up to a man's age-old dream, the ultimate in individual freedom consistent with law and order--or down to the ant heap totalitarianism,... those who would trade our freedom for security have embarked on this downward course.
I'm also pretty sure that buying and giving condoms to a co-worker for an office Secret Santa is sexual harassment and grounds for dismissal.
Still funny though.
Fletcher wrote: