Pranks?

[PollyannaMom]

Spinoff of another thread ---

Do you like pranks, April Fools' Day, etc.?

 

[DisneyCrazyMomma]

Harmless fun ones with my DS, I am okay with. Nothing that could hurt anyone or even be considered mean. For example, last year I made him an April Fool's breakfast.... eggs and toast.... only it was toasted pound cake, with vanilla yogurt and half an apricot. It was fun, and he loved it. Outside of that day, or anything more "serious" than that, no.

 

[okeydokey]

I don't consider any action with the express purpose of making another person feel embarrassed and stupid is fun.

 

[mrswh]

I love practical jokes . . . if you don't have a sense of humor life must really suck.

That said, I would not prey on someone's achilles heel. Hurting someone's feelings isn't too funny.

 

[WebmasterMaryJo]

I love practical jokes . . . That said, I would not prey on someone's achilles heel. Hurting someone's feelings isn't too funny.

I enjoy pranks, too, whether I do them, or someone else does them to me. I don't like pranks, though, that are hurtful - very uncool - and I wouldn't do them to people who don't appreciate them. That would not be nice.

 

[sam_gordon]

I voted 'other'. It depends on the prank.

The prank I pulled that my parents still remind me about... our English teacher (Senior 'Advanced' English, this was before AP classes) announced she was going to show us a video of some movie. A friend and I brought in remote controls (also before universal remotes) for various models. She turned the VCR on, we turned it off. She turned it on, we turned it off. She hit 'Play', we hit 'FF'. She hit 'Play', we'd press 'Rewind'. She had no idea what was going on. The rest of the class was ROLLING, and some were crying they were laughing so hard.

This went on for about 10 minutes before the teacher went to ask for help from the AV teacher. He came in and said "Who has the remotes?" No one owned up of course and he threatened us with something if he had to come back in. The rest of the class time went fine.

 

[elaine amj]

I'm not hugely into it - but whatever. Makes for some entertaining stories though!!

My DH's best friends are big pranksters, particularly when they were younger. I remember when I first started dating DH, his friend called me up pretending to be some random guy. The funny part was, he used a name of a guy I had just met at a party so I thought it was that guy! (and of course, buddy had no idea and thought I was just chatting up some random stranger!) Anyway, he asked me out for a date and I accepted. I had just started seeing DH and did not consider us exclusive.

Then, DH and his friends cooked up a fun outing for the SAME DAY as the fake "date". I really wanted to hang out with DH and his friends and told them I would love to go, but couldn't cancel on that date because I was silly enough not to take the guy's number down. After toying with me for a bit, they finally spilled the beans about the prank. Complete silliness that I didn't hugely appreciate - but DH was happy that I wanted to go out with him instead of the of fake dude!

Another friend of his pulled off elaborate pranks in his younger days. His wife eventually straightened him out and now he tries really hard to be careful that his pranks don't cross the line.

Even after all these years, you can't always be safe with this crew. Unattended drinks usually gets salt added. If you get calls from weird people about weird things, it's usually one of them trying to disguise their voice.

Not really my thing, but I take it in good spirit.

 

[superme80]

I hate pranks. Most are not in good fun and are just mean.

 

[Fortuosity]

Depends on the prank(s), the prankster(s) and the intended "victim(s)."

But if you're going to dish it out, you'd better be able to take it.

 

[DisneyLvr55]

I put seran wrap on the toilet seat when I was in middle school. Just about wet myself when my mom sat down. Priceless.

 

[Erin1700]

I voted 'other'. It depends on the prank.

The prank I pulled that my parents still remind me about... our English teacher (Senior 'Advanced' English, this was before AP classes) announced she was going to show us a video of some movie. A friend and I brought in remote controls (also before universal remotes) for various models. She turned the VCR on, we turned it off. She turned it on, we turned it off. She hit 'Play', we hit 'FF'. She hit 'Play', we'd press 'Rewind'. She had no idea what was going on. The rest of the class was ROLLING, and some were crying they were laughing so hard.

This went on for about 10 minutes before the teacher went to ask for help from the AV teacher. He came in and said "Who has the remotes?" No one owned up of course and he threatened us with something if he had to come back in. The rest of the class time went fine.

12 years of Catholic school and that was our entertainment. We did that to every teacher. We did a lot of very very bad stuff too but I will keep that to myself.

 

[NHdisneylover]

Harmless and creative things, like the MIT Hacks, I LOVE

http://hacks.mit.edu/

but anything that is meant to harm or humiliate someone, I really dislike.

 

[GaSleepingBeautyFan]

I've never been a fan of pranks. Usually someone ends up getting hurt or their feelings hurt or extra work for someone when they were disciplined for it.

So they've not been funny to me once I got in trouble for one.

We lived on a farm. We raised chickens for eggs and meat. I did pull a prank once on my Mother. I was the person who killed and gutted the chickens.
We put the chickens in a bucket after they were plucked, guts removed and cleaned up.

After getting the bucket, Mother would just reach in without looking and give them a final cleaning before they went into the freezer.
Once I put the guts in the bucket instead of the actual chicken. We heard Mother's screams halfway across the yard that day when she reached into the bucket.

It turned out not to be a great prank for me, I had to clean the chicken coop by myself for a month.
That involved taking out the old hay, washing the coop, cleaning the chicken boxes and putting down new hay. We did that once a week normally and all 4 kids did it. Not fun doing it by yourself. Blech.

 

[wiigirl]

I am a HUGE fan of pranks....it just has to be funny to all involved.

 

[Shagley]

I voted other, because I think some practical jokes are cute and funny, but others are just mean. I really don't think the fake "winning lottery tickets" are funny at all. Making someone think they just won the lottery as a joke is just mean.

I agree that if you are going to be a practical joker, you have to be able to take it as well as you give it!! I had a roomate in college who was a big practical joker. It was funny at first, but got annoying really fast. About the fifth day in a row of her practical jokes, she hid in the vanity cabinet in the bathroom and was going to jump out to scare me when I went in there. I could see through the crack in the vanity door that she was under there, so I avoided going in to the bathroom and waited to see how long she would stay in there. TWO HOURS LATER she came walking out of the bathroom. I started lauging and told her I knew she was in there the entire time and she became absolutely furious . Apparently she thought her practical jokes were incredibly funny when she was playing them on me, but when they backfired on her, she didn't think they were so funny after all!

 

[DeaverTex]

I voted "I guess there's a time and place, etc." And I'm not really not into pranks because they are so likely to get out of hand, or to hurt feelings, or to cause real damage or extra work.

I can get a laugh out of a well-planned prank that's funny, unexpected, and that everybody thinks is funny, but I'm just not going to appreciate a prank that depends on convincing the victim that something bad (or very good, like a trip to Disney or acceptance into Harvard) has occurred. In those cases, even when the victim laughs once the prank ends, I still don't like the idea of screwing with someone's emotions that way.

Call me a grump, but I tend to respond to "pranks" with unexpected and probably -- no, definitely -- disproportionate vigor. Nothing violent, but that's pretty much the only thing that's off limits retaliation-wise.

 

[Handbag Lady]

I love good natured, well-planned pranks. I do not like harmful, either physical or emotional, pranks.


Good: coming into work and getting a notice on your phone that says you have 26 voicemails. You listen to all of them and they are all different colleagues calling to see if you got Shelly's message. The last one (ergo the first message left) is from Shelly calling to say, "Hi, I'm just leaving this message for you."

Bad: Telling an overweight, unpopular person that the cutest boy in school likes her just to get her hopes up when in fact, he does not like her at all in that way.

 

[LongLiveDisney]

I normally love pranks, but one that I witnessed didn't give me a good feeling. Cousin tricked other cousin by typing up a fake Harvard acceptance letter (that was her life dream) and she was so happy it made everyone teary. Then the jerk told her it was a joke. She was absolutely crushed. Those kinds of pranks, I hate.

 

[Peanut Giggleface]

I enjoy joking and teasing and even the occasional prank as long as it doesn't humiliate, degrade, or hurt anyone. The best way to do this (I've found) is to make yourself the "butt" of the joke or prank. Just make yourself look silly in a way that you know what your family and friends will find funny. No one gets hurt, and everyone gets a laugh. You just can't take yourself too seriously, though.

 

[2disneyboys]

I enjoy joking and teasing and even the occasional prank as long as it doesn't humiliate, degrade, or hurt anyone. The best way to do this (I've found) is to make yourself the "butt" of the joke or prank. Just make yourself look silly in a way that you know what your family and friends will find funny. No one gets hurt, and everyone gets a laugh. You just can't take yourself too seriously, though.

I agree with this. I have a sense of humor but that does not mean I want to be the butt of anyone's joke