1. Early Bird
I set all the clocks in my house ahead from the actual time of 3AM to 9AM, when my roommate got up for class. His alarm goes off, and the other 4 guys I lived with (all in on the prank) pretend that they are getting ready for school like any other day.
One had the shower running, another was walking the hall in his boxers, I was laying in bed, and another was eating cereal on the couch while watching cartoons.
He woke up after only an hour of sleep and didn't figure it out until he walked outside and it was still dark (we lived in a basement during a harsh winter, snow covered our windows for days at a time).
We all watched the poor kid take a shower, make breakfast, and get dressed to go out the door. We were laughing maniacally when he came back downstairs.
Elnico
2. Blank Cards
Back in Uni, a bunch of us used to play cards. A lot of cards. Mostly 500, but also cribbage, hearts, euchre, kings and peasants, etc...
Then I found a deck of blank cards in a toy shop one day. Normal card backs, blank faces - so you could make up your own cards. I teamed up with a good friend, and we worked out a "game" - as in, we came up with some simple rules that we could improvise. Then, we sat down in the cafe and started to play...
Within about five minutes, someone noticed. "Hey, is that card blank? Wait, they all look blank! What are you playing?"
We told them the name of the game - Emperor (subtle, huh?). Shortly, we had about a dozen people gathered around, trying to work it out. I pointed out that my purple sunglasses helped, and my friend mentioned that he was color-blind.
People were squinting, holding cards up to the light - one person said "Yeah, I think I can see something!" and everyone else looked even harder... and we just kept on playing, casual like.
After a couple more minutes, we both said we had to go to lectures, agreed that my friend had won, packed up the cards, and wandered off, leaving a very confused group. We managed to keep from laughing until we were out of sight, then we both lost it. "I think I can see something!"
Best prank I've ever pulled.
thornae
3. The Man in the Picture
I was hanging out one night at the house of a close friend and noticed that despite having over 20 photographs of him and his wife with friends hanging on the walls, none of them included me. This was a bit odd, since we'd been friends for years and I was the best man at his wedding.
When he wasn't looking, I managed to pull a couple of pictures off the wall and take them home with me. I scanned them and photoshopped myself into the images, printed them, and put them into the original frames. The next time I was visiting, I put the pictures up on his wall in their original location.
His wife noticed the next day and called me. She promised not to tell him. It took him nearly three months to notice. They both thought it was hilarious and the photoshopped pictures are still on his wall.
wester_sunday
4. Sweet Revenge
I did a prank in return for a friend pranking me. I added a phone to my cell account that was exclusively used to mess with my buddy. Over the course of a year I made countless harassing phone calls to him and sent him obnoxious text messages at all hours of the night and day.
He was so mad at this guy who kept calling him and wanted to beat him up. Finally a year later, a large group of us were out to dinner and I carefully guided the conversation to steer it to get him to start talking about this "guy". It worked and for the hundredth time, he started going off on this dude who had been harassing him over the past year.
Since I knew he had the number, I convinced him to call the guy right then and put it on speaker phone so we all could hear. So he did. Of course I had my extra cell phone in my pocket and on vibrate. So when he called and it was ringing, I casually pulled the phone from my pocked and answered.
The look on his face as he heard my voice over the speaker phone and turned to me to see me with a cell phone to my ear was priceless. I just smiled at him and said that I told you I would get you back. The entire group just completely lost it as everyone knew about his stalker but not one of them was in on the fact that it had been me the entire time.
epicrdr
5. The Senior’s Prank
I had a problem with my highschool superintendent. We'll get to that.
I pulled one "senior-prank" just because I was a senior.
The Cause: parking spots were issued by seniority, even allowing seniors to take-away someone's paid-for sophomore parking pass if they decided they wanted a spot.
The Prank: So I went out in the dark of night (prank-o-clock) with three friends and twelve rolls of black and twelve rolls of yellow duct tape. We hid the current parking lines with black tape and remarked the lot with yellow tape, only slightly closer together.
The Result: When people arrived they ended up so tightly packed in their spots that they had the choice of either not being able to open their doors or parking every-other-spot. Oddly people chose about 50-50, resulting in an overcrowded lot with empty parking spaces. The administration responded with an angry announcement, but a week later they curiously opened up parking on the street to assist underclassmen parking.
Davisourus
6. Paper Wall
Long story short, to get back at someone (someone else suggested this to me) - get a bunch of newspapers, tape them together, and tape them over the person's door. (Dorm room doors opened inwards).
I followed the suggestion and did it up right - used masking and duct tape to tape together the newspapers and made a pattern on them to resist ripping. Used about 10 layers of newspapers. Taped it up to the edges of the door frame with tape and spare bumper stickers. Finished it all at 3 or 4 in the morning and went to sleep.
I heard the story the next day and it was priceless. The vic had to get up very early in the morning (5-6 am), opened his door to go out to the showers and ran into a solid wall. He shook his head and stepped back, put his hand on it and realized it wasn't solid. He tried to tear it but failed, started punching it over and over.
The punching of the paper diaphragm covering the resonant chamber of the dorm room acted as a gigantic drum which boomed over and over and woke up the entire hall. The vic finally managed to tear the paper off by ripping it from the bottom, and came out to see all the other sleepy dormies who came out, wondering WTF was going on.
kwh
7. Sea Monkey Project
I worked in a cubicle. I tried to grow Sea Monkeys. They died. (They always do, eventually.) I set the aquarium aside for a few weeks, and forgot about it.
When I found it again, I noticed that the Sea Monkey food (algae) had started to grow. I figured that a pond scum garden would probably be the easiest project in the world (since I generally suck at growing plants).
So I went all-out.
I mean – what does algae need to grow? Light, and CO2, right? So I got a grow lamp, and as for the CO2… well… I happened to have a ready supply of that myself. All I needed was a straw, and a few moments to aerate the water (by blowing bubbles in it, when nobody was looking).
And it worked. Man, it worked. After a month, the entire inner surface was coated in green. Long, ropy fronds of pond scum drifted in the microcurrents. The surface of the water was solid, furry, and wrinkled-looking. My god, it was beautiful.
Now – my cubicle was out of the way, next to a wall. I was always careful to face away from the other cubicles when blowing bubbles, so that somebody standing up wouldn’t see what was going on. But one day, some VIP lady was visiting our building, and walked down the wrong isle – at exactly the wrong time – and caught me looking all guilty with a straw in that green gunk, right as I was about to blow some bubbles.
Our eyes met, and time stopped. Her eyes widened in astonishment, and – not knowing what else to do – I gulped. Loudly. As if I had been drinking the sludge.
She stumbled away, looking like somebody had punched her in the stomach. The next day, there was a building-wide announcement declaring that all aquariums were now forbidden in the workplace.
Begun, the cubicle wars had.
sealclubber
8. Astral Bums and Vagabond Ghosts
In 1992, a friend from college (Mike) had a paper route. Mike is a very creative guy with a strong imagination and a good sense of horror. Anyway he would drive to various Gas stations and convenience stores between 1 am and 5 am on Sunday Mornings dropping off stacks of papers.
First Sunday, me and 2 buddies dressed up as bums, picked 4 of his stops, beat Mike to each stop and sprawled out on the sidewalks or by the gas pumps. As he went to each of the stops, Mike would see the same 3 bums.
On Monday, he was freaking out telling us the story of the bums with wild speculation about how that was possible. We played it off, like he was full of crap not paying much attention. Then we recruited another mutual friend who was in on the joke and had a video camera. He offered to go with Mike on his route the following Sunday.
We donned our bum clothes, showed up at 4 or 5 stops and our friend with the camera rode in Mikes car filming us at each stop as well as Mikes reaction. The second to the last stop, the dude with the camera got out of the car to film us more closely. Our friend with the paper route was freaking the fudge out screaming at him to get in the car as we began to shamble towards the guy with the camera and the car with pipes and chains in our hands.
Final stop, lighted grocery store. We approached with pipes and chains as Mike was walking from the store to the car. A few seconds of pure terror was followed by a look of recognition. We laughed and went back to someone's house and watched the video. Was a while ago but some memorable scenes were him dumbfounded as to what was happening. He called us astral bums and vagabond ghosts.
leemoore
9. No Snooze Button
When I was in high school my dad woke up real early to get ready for work, like 5AM. I would hear his alarm go off and then he would hit snooze a billion times. One day I took apart his alarm clock. I disconnected the snooze button, I hard wired the alarm to always to be on.
So the next morning I woke up real early before his alarm. It started going off after about 30 secs or so he hits the snooze button. The alarm responds beep beep beep. More forcefully he hits the snooze button again and still the same beep beep beep. At this point I'm dying trying not to give it away that I'm watching him. He finally get's up cussing the thing out. He looks for the off button and flips the switch. Beep beep beep. Now he's mad.
Before I get to the next part I want to explain that there is a battery backup on his alarm clock. He never had a battery in there but I decided to put it in.
Mad and out of frustration he yanks the plug out of the wall. What was priceless was his expression that thing was still going beep beep beep with the power off. I couldn't take it any longer, it looked like he was about to throw the clock against the wall. I thought he was going to kill me afterward but all in all he took it in good stride after he woke up.
guchdog
10. Is There Still Room Left for Me
My buddy and I used to get to work earlier than other folks, so we had plenty of time in the morning to get in some great pranks.
We had this new kid in the office who was barely out of college. Every morning my buddy and I would move the wall of his cubicle just a little; no more than a 1/4 of an inch or so. The person next to him was in on it, because she started noticing she had more and more space as the kid's cube got smaller and smaller.
After a couple of months it was ridiculous because you could barely get in and out of the cubicle. The wall had been moved so much that you had to turn sideways to get in. One morning we just said "fudge it" and closed it all the way up.
Kid comes in and sees his cubicle closed up and shouts "I knew you guys were up to something!" To this day I can't believe he put up with that crap for months and never said anything until the very end.
You still out there, Mikey?
g1nko
11. Don't Sleep
I was driving with a friend back up to college. He had fallen asleep in the passenger seat of my truck and his head was tipped back against the glass and his mouth was open.
I hadn't noticed he had fallen asleep as I was talking to him and he didn't respond. So I drove on for a while and he remained in that position. I had my sunglasses on. When he woke up, I struck the exact same position as him and pretended to be asleep too.
I closed my right eye while keeping left eye open and on the road, but my head was tipped back far and mouth was open just like his. He woke up screaming and grabbed for the steering wheel. The look on his face was hilarious because he really thought he had woken me up.
CuilHandLuke
12. The Mustache
I grew a mustache last year for the first time. After having it for about 6 months and having all my friends get used to it, I started to get tired of it and shaved it one night.
A day or two later, one of my friends was having a big birthday party at his house and nobody there had seen me shaved yet so I went out to the costume shop and bought some spirit gum and a fake mustache, then proceeded to trim the fake mustache into the exact size and shape my mustache had been.
Well I showed up to the party with it on and for the first hour or two nobody noticed a thing, it looked really realistic. After everyone was nice and drunk, I started into a heated conversation with a friend in the middle of a large group of people. At the climax of the argument I pretended to get really angry at her and yelled "You know what? Screw you!", ripped off my mustache, threw it to the floor, and stormed out.
She screamed, everyone looked around confused, and about 10 seconds later they all started cracking up. I came back into the room to their accolades. Later I reapplied the mustache and managed to pull it off 3 times throughout the night to various reactions, but that one was by far the best.
[deleted]
13. The Spare Key
Basically a colleague of my dad had gotten a new company car and was really excited about it. Usually when you get a lease car you get two sets of keys in case you lose one or something like that.
Well this guy got two sets of keys and had just left them on his desk so a colleague took a pair and he hasn't noticed that one key is missing. Every day, or every now and then while at work the guy (who stole a key) goes down and opens the rear passenger window.
After a while this really started to freak the owner out so he eventually contacted his company and explained to them the situation. After failed attempts to fixing the problem the company eventually called the car manufacturers and they sent a team down to the parking lot of the building because they suspected the wireless network is interfering with the cars system and is the cause for the window opening.
This however didn't fix the problem as the window kept miraculously opening ever day. So the car manufacturer was called back and they replaced the entire door. But the same thing started happening, the window would open. Except this time it is front passenger window.
That is as far as I have heard, but nobody has noticed as far as I know and is still an ongoing prank. I’ll find out from my dad and let you guys know!
tonstergfx
14. Gone Too Far
On the last day of high school (in the UK, so aged 16), I hooked up a Walkman and amplifier to the school tannoy system (just crocodile-clipped on to one of the speakers). I started a tape I had prepared with 20 minutes of silence at the beginning, then went to class. The tape started with noise of a radio being tuned in, then some heavily processed, surreal screaming, after which a voice came on announcing, "We are in control. We have planted a bomb in every room, and will detonate them one by one. Now everybody lie down on the floor. EVERYBODY LIE DOWN ON THE FLOOR! explosion You will learn to comply. Listen to the words of a victim." "Do what he wants. Do whatever he wants."
And so it went on. Ahh, thank you, BBC sound effects vinyl.
The best bit was probably the interviews with the teachers, for which I'd borrowed a tape of them being interview about something else, and changed the questions. My favourite was the one with the headmaster:
Me: "Is it true that you often roam the streets naked?"
Him: "Yes I do."
Me: "Why is that?"
Him: "I think it brings a lot of pleasure to a lot of people."
Me: "What kind of women do you like?"
Him: "I think the local ones, that don't cost anything."
It became the stuff of legend.
Isvara
15. The Friendship
I used to work in a small business that was run by two best friends in their late 50s. It was a very chill business, and they had a fantastic sense of humour. It was like having two squabbling brothers who were both very talented in their respective fields. The two of them had a yearly ritual where they'd play pranks on eachother on their Birthdays.
COO's birthday the CEO gave him fake documents that made it look like he'd sold the company to a random dude in India. CEO pretended to be incredibly enthusiastic and naive, saying how "giving all our customer data to India will help our business!" COO responded by casually moving CEO's wheelchair to the other side of the room until he apologised for stressing him out.
CEO's birthday the COO changed the workplace safety policy to require that the CEO had to wear water wings, a bicycle helmet, and several balloons "For visibility". The CEO who had a wheelchair already, was a super good sport about it and kept annoying the COO by pretending to be significantly more disabled than he actually was. This went on for the entire day, until the COO got so annoyed that he reverted the safety policy.
Sekoshiba
16. A Fun Prank
In college, I lived in a dorm. We got along but didn't know each other too well as it was only a couple weeks into the year. However, this was my second year in the dorm and knew a few of them. One of these people, who we will call Fred (not his real name), really loved apple juice. Like...most of his mini fridge was nothing but single serving bottles of apple juice. The only thing that wasn't apple juice was his roommates occasional soda or food.
One day, he was out at a late club meeting and I went over to talk to his roommate about something I don't remember. While we were talking, his roommate opened the fridge to get a soda or something but all I remember is seeing apple juice and thinking "hey, I should put his apple juice in my fridge". So I did.
Everyone else on our dorm floor found out I put it in my fridge and they wanted some too so next thing we knew, everyone had 1 or 2 bottles of apple juice. But this wasn't enough fun for us. Within an hour, everyone had come up with some sort of quest he would have to complete in order to get his apple juice back. Eventually, someone (who will remain nameless but is by far my favorite human I've ever met) suggested we theme the thing around The Legend of Zelda because Fred loved the Zelda series...which we did. We planned out the majority of the main questline from The Legend of Zelda Ocarina of Time then all went to our rooms and waited.
Fred came back from his meeting totally exhausted and his roommate said "wow you look tired, I bet some apple juice will help you feel better". I have never heard someone scream so loud for apple juice. His roommate then handed him one bottle saying "it's dangerous to go alone, take this" while playing the intro theme song to the game and sent him on his way to the first quest in my room. He had to collect 3 spiritual stones (a beginning of the game for those not familiar) and he seemed done with the whole thing. It was obvious he thought I had all of his apple juice which made this all the more fun to watch. When he finally finished he demanded his apple juice and he was so confused as when I opened my fridge for him to only see 2 little bottles sitting in it.
I then handed him the "master nerf gun" and was met with a blank stare. After what felt like an eternity, it clicked in his head that this was just the beginning. He took it and thrust it above his head towards the sky, immediately going into character. The rest of the night was him running around our floor completing quests to get his apple juice back but he was no longer in it for the apple juice, he was doing it for fun. He got more into it as time went as did everyone else involved. The person playing the part of the final boss even wrote an entire monologue complete with a strobe light (well...it was his roommate flicking the light switch rapidly but it still worked). By the end of the night Fred had completely forgotten he was doing it for the apple juice.
What started out as a small prank turned into an all night event that turned everyone into close friends. I still talk to these people nine years later. To give even a happier ending, two of the people that were involved in giving quests recently got married and all of the main participants of that night were there.
That's the best prank I've ever pulled and I would do it again in a heartbeat.
tgra957
17. Mr. Peanut
One of my friends got a small thing shipped to him in a giant box. The box was probably 2 feet x 2 feet x 3 feet, about three quarters of it was packing peanuts. We put them in this guy's jacket, laptop case, backpack, in his pillow case. The best part was they were all hidden. The entire room looked like nobody touched it, except for the single packing peanut on his keyboard. He walked in and thought nothing of it. Opened a drawer, full of peanuts.
"Haha, that's a pretty dumb prank," he said.
Then he went to grab his jacket, peanuts flowed out of his closet.
"Okay, really?"
After a bit of frustration, he rushes off to class, unaware that his backpack and water bottle were full of peanuts. Then the realization starts to hit. He got rid of most them within a day or two because he searched thoroughly through his stuff. It still takes him almost two months before he stops finding more. So we decide to restock this stuff with the rest of peanuts we had left over. He acted angry, but I knew he thought it was funny as heck.
MoonMoon_2015
18. School Prank
So I went to a catholic high school. I had a work study “volunteer” job in the office to help with tuition. Part of this job involved printing letters and stuffing envelopes to parents and alumni. Fast forward to spring break time senior year. I get my hands on some of the stationary and envelopes and type up a letter to parents informing them that after careful consideration, the school has decided to place the health of its students above the arcane regulations against the use of condoms. Thus the school was going to be providing protection at the junior and senior proms. I type this up at home and hit a kinkos but only had enough for about half the senior class to get a letter. So I just mail merged every other student, stuffed the letters, and dropped them in the outgoing mail basket my next shift.
Skip forward three days and crap hits the fan. Lots of kids are talking about this. The school is inundated with half super angry conservative catholic parents and half back-patters saying its about time. The school sends out a letter to all parents telling them to disregard the previous communication and that the letter was not an official communication.
Skip forward another three days and even more parents start calling and writing asking what the school is talking about. They never got a letter.
So... in a final letter, the school gets a copy of the original letter and includes it in a mailing to the entire student body with a second letter explaining that this wasn’t official and that they will not be providing condoms at the dance.
Y’all are the first people I’ve ever told.
[deleted]
19. Adorable Prank
I printed out a few copies of a particularly silly picture of my girlfriend's dog. He's a tiny one, and the picture is him leaning on a pillow in such a way that it looks like he's hiding and just poking his head out.
I hid one in her work bag, one in her yoga mat, one behind a bathroom towel taped to the wall, one in the box of a card game we play sometimes, and one taped to the pipes under the kitchen sink. She's found most of them, and gets a kick out of it. My final act was bringing one to a bar she was performing at this past weekend. I explained to the bartender "hey, she's gonna have a drink after her show, here's this picture of her dog" and he put in underneath the bill when we got our check.
I told her that's the last one that I had. What she doesn't know is that I texted her parents, and they are gonna print the picture and mail it to her from halfway across the country. Can't wait for her to check the mail later this week!
[deleted]
20. Good or Bad One
It was the week before valentines day and I was a senior in high school and my sister was a freshman at the same school. The school was doing a fundraiser where for just $2, you could get these 3 guys from the choir to come to anyone during class and give them a singing telegram. I thought it would be funny to mess with my sister so I bought her a telegram as a joke.
The only aspects of delivery I had control of was to who it’s delivered to, and who it was from which I just put my name for that part, remember that. On the day telegrams were delivered, the singers arrived in one of her AP (advanced placement) classes and they had a test that day. They sung their song and she was so embarrassed. Here's where it gets good. She pulls out her computer (everyone had a loan computer from the school), opens hangouts, and messages one of her friends about what just happened. Part of her message was something among the lines of "I'm so embarrassed, I just want to die" And for the record, she wasn't serious about that, it's just how she put it.
Welp, that message got digitally flagged by the schools computers and she was sent to the assistant principals office for a welfare check just because of that. Our mom got called during this and she explained the whole situation because she knew what I was up to and my sister returned to class. And yet she still blames that last part on me. I will never forget when I passed her in the hall immediately after and she just yelled "I HATE YOU SO MUCH". It was too funny. And thats the story of the best $2 I have ever spent.
Big_Thicc123
21. Cannot Avoid Emails
I set up a fake email address for the "Narwhal Appreciation Society" and sent a co-worker an email from the address saying "We at the Narwhal Appreciation Society have been informed that you, too, have an affinity for this majestic creature and we wanted to see if you would like to join our society."
He responded with "Thanks for the email - not sure who referred me but I don't have any interest at joining your society. Good luck!" A couple of weeks later, I emailed him again and listed off the membership dues for the society and upcoming events. He responded with "Once again, please note that I am not interested. Please take me off your distribution list."
A few weeks later, I emailed him a note that his membership dues were in arrears, commenting that the faithful Narwhal would most assuredly pay its bills, if it used currency. I emailed him roughly 2-3x per year for 3-4 years. For the first year, when we still worked together, I'd see him open the email, shake his head and say aloud "Not these freaking guys again!" But he never attempted to block the email address. He responded to some (becoming increasingly agitated) and ignored others. In one response, he attached pictures of dead narwhals that had been killed by Inuit hunters and said "This is what I think of your stupid Narwhal. I hate them. I wish them all dead!"
I eventually stopped and never mentioned to him that it was me but years later, a few ex-coworkers were out for pints and one guy said to me "Whatever happened with that Narwhal you were doing?" and my pranked coworker's eyes bugged out of his head "THAT WAS YOU?!"
MesWantooth
22. Indoor Snow
One summer when my cousin was staying with us, he and I had a small “prank war” going on against one another. We decided to put our talents together and try to prank everyone else. We put small piles of flour on each blade of the ceiling fan in the living room. Just enough to not be seen from the ground. A few weeks went by and nothing happened and we had forgotten about it.
And then, the day finally came. My mom had company over. I was in the kitchen and I heard all kinds of shouting/screaming coming from the living room. My cousin ran up to me grinning and said “it’s happening.”
The living room looked like it had just snowed inside. Everything was coated in a dusting of flour. My mother was screaming, her guests were staring in confusion and the dogs were running around in circles. It was so amazing - until we had to clean it all up.
sats1995
23. Might Be Hallucinating
When I was in 3rd grade of middle school, we had a physics teacher that we didn't like. So one day when we had a class with her, we all went to an empty class room with all our belongings. And someone hides somewhere in the hallway to check on her. She went to the class, saw it empty and went to the principal on the 2nd floor.
We all went back to class. She came with the principal explaining that the class is empty, opened the door to show her and saw us all in the class. They asked where were we and we all said we were in the class the entire time and that she came to class a few muintes ago, looked around and went out.
After that she would always ask us if it was a prank and we had left the class that day. But we all insisted that everyone was in the class, and we saw her coming and going out. By the end of year she was convinced that the room wasn't empty and for some strange reasons she had not seen us then.
keihaan
24. That’s What You Get
This prank took place while I was in the Army at the National Training Center in Ft Irwin California.
One of my fellow buck sgts, we'll call him Sgt Duke decided to liven things up a bit by pranking everyone around him. This went on until he messed with my coffee one morning. Don't mess with my coffee. I looked him dead in the eye and said, "payback's a b-word." I didn't know what I was gonna do so I let it stew for a bit.
Later that day, a couple of us went down to the PX to get supplies for the box. (Read: cigarettes and pogey bait.) While there, I saw the most glorious thing. Tapatio flavored Doritos. I'd never seen them before, nor have I seen them since, but I'm here to tell you, they were awesome! I grabbed two bags of them and then I had an idea. I grabbed a bottle of the hottest hot sauce I could find. Ghost pepper or some such. Then we headed back to the bay and I put my plan into action.
First, I made some minor preparations with the hot sauce while Sgt Duke was out doing something else. I grabbed the half empty Gatorade bottle next to his cot and lined the rim with that ungodly substance. Then I went and filled the mouthpiece of his Camelback (water bladder) with the same ~1,000,000 scoville solution.
The snare was set. Now for the bait. When he got back, I offered him some of those chips. Mind you, these things weren't blazingly hot, but they weren't exactly mild. After a few pawfuls he was soon looking for some sort of liquid to quell the burning. As I suspected, he grabbed his half empty Gatorade and took the cap off. He immediately smelled the Ghost Pepper and set it down, laughing at his own perceptiveness and my paltry attempt at revenge. I could barely contain myself as he scoffed at me and reached for his Camelback. Wait for it... Wait for it. Sgt Duke took a massive pull on the mouthpiece. His eyes bugged out, his face turned red and I think his tongue tried to climb down his throat. Just as I had planned, he had gotten (and swallowed) a full mouthful of this hot sauce that had a warning not to put more that two or three DROPS on your food. I let him suffer for a minute, then threw him a water bottle and warned him once more to NEVER mess with my coffee.
fullinversion82
25. Face of Embarrassment
I was about 9 years old. Dana had made my life hell for years, but finally her parents did the right thing and were shipping her off to an Israeli boarding school. Yippee. But she had ruined my birthday party, would constantly tease me, pointed and laughed at me while I got changed for gym, borrowed money and gave it all back in one penny pieces. I took it for years. She was just the worst.
So we are sitting there in the end of term assembly, which was also her last day. And the headmaster is calling out various names and the student would go up and receive their prize. And for some reason, without even thinking, I caught myself whispering to her “Dana, he called your name… you have to go up” and she kinda looked at me confused and said “did he?”.
I was like “yeah sure he did, go up” and thankfully a comrade who was sitting near by caught wind of this exchange and said “yeah he did, go up!” And so she stood up proudly, marched herself up there head held high, stuck out her hand for a big old shake and the headmaster just looked at her and said “Dana, I didn’t call your name, go sit back down.” So she had to walk all the way back, head hanging down, dragging her feet. The whole school laughed at her. Man was she ticked off.
I peaked too soon.
Get_Rich_Or_Try_Lyin
26. His Mom Knew It
One of my friends in HS was a jerk to another friend of mine — they weren't dating, per se, but they were "hanging out." anyways, the rude friend was deeply unapologetic about the whole thing and basically said, "what are you going to do about it" (big mistake)
We all went to the same church, so I knew his mom very well. I reached out to her, explained the situation: her son was being a jerk and being deeply unrepentant about it. would she mind if I and a couple of friends came to pull several harmless pranks in his room while he was away at work?
Myself and two associates went to his house on some random Wednesday afternoon. We filled every crevice in that room with that shredded mylar confetti that sticks to everything, left post-it notes all over the wall and sticky-side up on the floor. He had a ceiling fan, so I hauled in a ladder and left thick lines of the confetti on the blades; we did a test run of this, just to see how it would spread, and it was like it was snowing multicolored sparkles. We then set up about ten rows of plastic cups of water, slowly building back to the door, which we then closed.
His mom later told us that the clean up took him two hours, after which he promptly turned on the ceiling fan. You can imagine the outcome.
applesngiraffes
27. From The Future
During college, my friends and I had a classmate who was gullible beyond belief. We'll call her Fiona O'Rourke. She would believe anything you said with a straight face.
Anyway, at one point she borrowed my roommate's laptop to do some work, and forgot to log out of her email before she returned it. Mistake. My roommate began using her email account, to send her foreboding messages. From herself. From the future.
And she bought it. Well, mostly. She was suspicious, at least. Emails from the future weren't a thing, right? Right? My roommate and I assured her that it could be done. We'd read a website about it recently, it was really cool, we'd have to show her, come to the library in an hour and we'll show you.
During the next hour I got on wikipedia and cobbled together a completely bullcrap article on Reverse Temporal Messaging, complete with elaborate equations stolen from the Black Hole wiki page. To top it off, one of the article's final references was to the woman who had discovered Reverse Temporal Messaging, 60 years from now. Dr. Fiona O'Rourke.
Fiona had never heard of wikipedia, and the color drained from her face as she read the article. Her world collapsed as she read her own name at the end. "Fiona O'Rourke? So I'll never get married?"
We lost it.
ludifex
28. Scented Candle With A Twist
Buddy of mine makes candles and blends scents for them and I had him help me for one. I was living with a roommate and his girlfriend at the time and she loved candles so I went to my buddy and we made a nice big vanilla scented one. Right in the middle we injected a couple puddles of this liquid mix that he made. Soon after it was made I moved out and left the candle as a "gift".
About 2 weeks later I called the ex roommate about something unrelated. He mentioned he was waiting for the plumbers to come by cause the whole house just reeked of poop. I had sorta forgotten about the candle by this point and confessed so he wouldn't have to pay the plumbers for no reason. Even went over the next day to help air the place out and it was awful.
I've bought them a big candle every year for xmas though. 8 years and they haven't lit one yet.
Markahm494
29. Instant Panic
My coworkers in the Chicago office asked me to bring back a phone book and the hotel stationary from my business trip to Kansas City. They were preparing for another coworker's bachelor party for the night before the wedding.
The groom was known for drinking to an extent that was considered legendary. After a night of drinking, he woke up on the morning of his wedding in a hotel room. He checked the nightstand and found the Kansas City phone book. the desk was stocked with KC stationary. His friends had clued the front desk staff in on what was happening and convinced them to answer his room phone
"Good Morning and welcome to the Kansas City Holiday Inn." ‘
It was 5 hours till the wedding, and he was actually only a couple miles from the venue, but the freakout was epic!
fredzout
30. Nailed it
I worked at a fast food where the boss was too cheap to get AC installed, in the super hot summer days we would all sweat so much that we could wring sweat out of our uniforms.
There was this boy who I had a love hate relationship with, we would always prank each other but mine were always tame, until one day.
He left his drink in the back while he was flipping burgers, I grabbed a vinegar packet, cut open a corner and put a straw directly into it and exchanged it with the straw from his drink, moments later, I was in the front of the store and I heard him spit and scream my name while calling me a witch.
He still high fived me
Thin_One
31. Raining M&Ms
Back in the 80's I worked for a military aircraft plant. I managed to work my way into an office job after a few years and numerous hijinks in the warehouse (my previous prank). Anyway we got a new computer system and being somewhat computer savvy, I discovered that it had a rudimentary messaging system that I figured out pretty quick.
Being a government supplier we all had to sit in on lots of classes about how to log into and out of the system for security. This was all stupid to me and bored me silly. So one fine day I'm sitting there bored and decided to send the lady that sat next to me a message. 'Attention Attention you are in violation of log on procedures. Please log off and log back on using correct protocol'. She pauses, looks at the screen, and proceeds to log off and back on.
I do this to her a few more times and she's getting visibly nervous. Finally I send her one more that says 'Attention Attention you have violated log on protocol for the max allowable times. Please hold your badge to the screen for identification purposes' She looks around really shook up now and does exactly that. At this point I lose it and just bust out laughing then explain to her what I had done. I got a hanfull of M&M's thrown at me but we all had a good laugh.
Omnesquidem
32. Learn From It
Dude was harassing my ex because he used to have her cell phone number. He was being a real freaking creep. Anyways, I created an email address, signed up to kijiji and placed an ad offering an 80" 3D TV for free with some excuse about a bad breakup and not wanting her to get it... I asked people to only text or call.
I then went to bed and forgot all about it until the next day at work I get a text from my ex asking if I had "done something on kijiji" the dude was begging her to take the ad down and apologizing. I checked the email and there were five pages of responses even though I had told them not to email but to call or text... Dude's phone must have been ringing constantly!
I took the ad down and she never heard from him again.
Sarpanitu
33. Be Careful Next Time
In highschool, there was a girl that was acting foolish and laying on top of a table that me and some friends were sitting at. Mind this was one of those plastic, folding tables. And we were in JROTC class in the rifle range having some end of the year free time.
I then took it upon myself to fulfill a lifelong dream and tie her shoelaces together. The results were better than I could've ever imagined...
My JROTC instructor entered the room and told this girl to get off the table and that's when it all came together. She hoisted herself off the table with full confidence that her legs would work as they always do. Her uneven weighting of the table caused her and the table to flip over while me and the guys were just sitting there.
At first I was the only one who knew of the shoelaces and was dying of laughter. My friends noticed and started laughing and the instructor laughed some and then told her to do push-ups for causing a commotion.
After typing this out, I realize it looks bad, but I assure you it was all in good fun. It was not mean spirited, but it was evil.
chosen1gary
34. New Pet
I was in Kuwait on the way to Iraq when our bird got delayed for three weeks. Well, Kuwait has these things called dub-dubs. A dub-dub is a lizard about the size of a small cat. They're utterly harmless but when they get mad, they hiss loud as heck and do this whole threat display thing. Looks scary as heck. Well...
Being the enterprising Marine that I was, I quickly set about catching them and placing them in any of the airforce guys’ stuff I could find unattended. Backpacks, lockers, desks, toolboxes, glove compartments, sleeping bags. You name it. I must've planted atleast 3 or 4 dozen dub-dubs in my boredom.
Some guy would go into his office, you'd hear a drawer open…HIIIISSSSSSS "oh crap, I hate these motherf-kers so much!"
I was suspected as the dub-dub terrorist, but it was immediately dismissed by the Airforce guys cuz "He's a Marine, he's too stupid."
Yes, yes I am, suspect nothing and enjoy the new pet I left waiting for you in your pillowcase.
Vict0r117
35. Full of Bones
I used to work at a science tutoring center when I was in college and my gap year before professional school. One of the things we taught very often was anatomy. So naturally we acquired a few skeletons and various skulls with some variation in how they looked or were marked etc. Well I was closing one night, and I knew my co-worker was opening the next morning early, so before I locked up I assorted ALL of the skeletons and skulls in a...welcome party near the front door.
I had one immediately at the opening of the only door into the room with several back up skeletons and skulls just behind at a table together watching on. The best part was that you have to turn on the lights manually and that switch is immediately to the side of the door opening, so when she reached down to turn on the lights she had to come face to face with some lifeless skeleton skull in the middle of the shady opening.
Needless to say she screamed, and it was loud enough to make our boss come to see if she was ok. Woke up to some colorful texts lmao. Still proud of that one honestly.
debtincarnate
I had one immediately at the opening of the only door into the room with several back up skeletons and skulls just behind at a table together watching on. The best part was that you have to turn on the lights manually and that switch is immediately to the side of the door opening, so when she reached down to turn on the lights she had to come face to face with some lifeless skeleton skull in the middle of the shady opening.
Needless to say she screamed, and it was loud enough to make our boss come to see if she was ok. Woke up to some colorful texts lmao. Still proud of that one honestly.
debtincarnate
36. Raining Bills
My friend, let’s call him Neil, (because that’s his name...) wanted to prank a mutual friend of ours who was traveling abroad at the time. While this mutual friend was in Sweden, Neil texted everyone in his phone book and told them all that this mutual friend (Chris) had West Nile Virus. (It was a well-known, media-scare disease at the time.)
Well, people went INSANE. This mutual friend Chris was waking up to hundreds of missed calls and texts asking him how he was and if he needed anything while he was in the hospital.
Anyhoo, Neil took a quick break from swarming people’s inboxes with West-Nile-News, and I swiftly changed my contact profile in his phone to, “VERIZON WRLSS”. (And deleted all of our texts.)
After about an hour, I started secretly sending texts to Neil stating, “Your data usage for this month is nearing the maximum on the account.” (this was back in the days before unlimited talk and text, so going over the monthly data plan meant a whooping from your parents.)
“Woah I sent so many texts that Verizon said I’m using almost all may data for the month!” Neil said, and he put his phone away... “k I’m done for the night...”
I waited about five more minutes before sending about ten messages in a row.
“Your data usage for the month is now at maximum usage, any additional calls or texts will incur a new cost of $10.00 per message/call.”
Before he could read on to the second message I sent he was already in full meltdown-mode.
I just kept sending “Your monthly bill has now increased to $249.99 for February”
And with every text, his eyes watered and his blood ran cold at the thought of his dad seeing this bill... all for a harmless prank....
By the end of the night I had sent a running bill up to $790.00 before finally telling him it was all a joke. His mixed look of relief, hatred, appreciation, and impressed was something I’ll never forget, and even brought it up at his wedding ten years later.
[deleted]
37. Plan with Dad
My best new years was that of 1999, I was 9 years old at the time and I worked together with my dad to pull off the greatest prank in history. A few minutes before midnight I synced up a wrist watch with the countdown on tv. My dad pointed me in the direction of the breaker which was in our garage and showed me the lever to pull which would cut all power to the house.
Now I don’t know if you remember the hype but the year 2000 was supposed to destroy all of our computers and technology sending us back to the stone ages. So the moment grew closer as I watched the seconds tick by on my wrist watch, it soon became apparent that i wouldnt need it as i could hear all my relatives inside counting down 10, 9 , 8 ... 2, 1 ! I pulled the lever at the perfect timing and everything went black.
The first thing I heard was from my aunt " OH MY GOD, IT HIT. Y2K HIT!!" I was only going to leave the power out for 10 seconds or so but the lever was stuck and I couldn’t get it back up for about 2 mins, during which the whole time I heard my family freaking out, then eventually they looked outside and started to wonder why our neighbors still had power, haha thinking back I really wish we would have recorded this probably could have won 10,000 dollars.
carnabas
38. Dug His Own Grave
When my brother and I were in middle school, my brother liked to skateboard with our next-door neighbor. One day, my brother and the neighbor took the sheet of plywood from under my brother’s upper bunk bed (no one slept in the upper bunk) out of the house and started making a skateboard ramp out of it in the neighbor’s adjacent yard. My parents had explicitly told him that he wasn’t allowed to do that.
Now, in my defense, my brother teased me unmercifully (to the point of tears, on multiple occasions), so keep in mind that he had had it coming for a long time.
Anyway, an evil little plan hatched in my brain. I ran to the upstairs window and yelled down at them, “[brother’s name], guess what?!! Mom knows EVERYTHING and she is SOOO mad.” Then I slammed the window shut and ran to the stairs and waited while watching my mom read the newspaper.
A few moments later, my brother walks in the front door looking worried and says, “mom, I’m so sorry.” My mom (who had no idea what was going on) said, “about what?” While slowly putting the newspaper down. “For making a skateboard ramp out of the wood from the bunk bed.”
“YOU DID WHAT?!!”
At that moment, a wave of shock and realization swept across my brother’s face and our eyes met. I let out the biggest evilest little sister cackle and ran into my room.
We are adults now and still laugh about it from time-to-time.
orchidlighthouse
Now I don’t know if you remember the hype but the year 2000 was supposed to destroy all of our computers and technology sending us back to the stone ages. So the moment grew closer as I watched the seconds tick by on my wrist watch, it soon became apparent that i wouldnt need it as i could hear all my relatives inside counting down 10, 9 , 8 ... 2, 1 ! I pulled the lever at the perfect timing and everything went black.
The first thing I heard was from my aunt " OH MY GOD, IT HIT. Y2K HIT!!" I was only going to leave the power out for 10 seconds or so but the lever was stuck and I couldn’t get it back up for about 2 mins, during which the whole time I heard my family freaking out, then eventually they looked outside and started to wonder why our neighbors still had power, haha thinking back I really wish we would have recorded this probably could have won 10,000 dollars.
carnabas
39. Couple of Pranks
I farted under the covers then pointed at the ceiling above my gf and shouted "SPIDER!" So she'd throw the blankets over her head.
(Later when she told her parents, that turned out to be the thing that earned her dad's respect for me. Made him laugh so hard he needed an inhaler.)
However, she got her revenge. I was sitting on the toilet after a grumbly Stanley steamer. I reach for the toilet paper to find one square peeled into two very thin squares. No big deal, there's always a stash under the sink.
No.. there is not. Every roll has been taken out from under the sink.
Okay there's never not toilet paper under the sink. Coincidence? I'll just send her a text to bring me some paper towels from the kitchen. I refold the two thin squares into one equally useless square and reluctantly used it. Stanley and his grumbly steamer, in all their arrogance, respawns to remind me who really gets final say.
Back at square one with no squares to spare. There it is written on the empty roll... the future toast I make, cutting into our wedding cake. "Hands can be washed!".
Teagalim
40. The Copycat
My sister doesn't keep anything in her kitchen that she doesn't use. Extras go straight in the trash or to charity.
I started buying duplicates of things she'd gotten rid of and hiding them in the backs of cabinets.
I found another of her favorite mug. It had been cracked and then wasn't. One of the kids dropped it and hid the broken pieces in the bottom of the trash. Another one appeared in the cupboard; the kid freaked out. She did a wonderful spit take when she was drinking from her mug and unloaded an identical one from the dishwasher.
She had plates with concentric circles, blue on white. I found one with a slightly lighter shade of blue and she wondered if the dishwasher had faded it somehow. Then there was one with the same blue but different rings. And then one with the right blue rings but a different background shade.
BTW, its easier to get away with this if you load the dishwasher and wait.
I did this weekly for about a year and a half. She was getting very concerned. I finally confessed when she went to switch out her dishes for the seasonal, holiday ones and had more cups than she'd packed... now with saucers she hadn't had the year before.
revdon
41. The Caricatures
My best friend and I were roommates for a few years and sometimes when I was drunk I liked to draw comics of caricatures of the two of us. They were usually on pizza boxes and I would leave them outside of his room so it would be one of the first things he saw the next day.
Eventually he and his girlfriend decided to get their own apartment together closer to their jobs, so our time as roommates had come to an end. I decided to leave him one last parting gift on one of our last nights together. He left his wallet out on the coffee table, so I took his ID and taped on little drawings of him where the pictures typically go.
A few months later I hear from him about it. He and his girlfriend were visiting some friends out of state and they were going to this bar. Apparently he handed his ID over to the bouncer like that and the dude laughed at him because of how ridiculous it was. I was honestly surprised it worked, I totally expected him to notice way before that, but I guess he didnt.
-eDgAR-
42. Good Script
My brother lives on the west coast, I live on the east coast. One night we discovered that there was about a five minute delay for a "live" show. I saw it on broadcast TV about four minutes before he saw it on Dish satellite.
During the Oscars I called him and screamed at him to turn the Oscars show on. He asked why and I screamed at him again to just turn the show on. He said he was already watching it and I told him to keep watching it because SOMEBODY BLEW UP THE OSCARS!
I then started narrating what was on the screen and pretending like I was talking to a family member who was in the room with me. "I've never seen so much blood!" "Whose arm do you think that Harrison Ford is holding?" "Oh! That's Brad Pitt, without his arm. It's gotta be his." "So. Much. Blood!" My brother asked me what happened when it all started and I described the light and sound of a bomb going off.
I could hear my brother excitedly telling his wife what they would be seeing. He asked me when it happened and I told him the last thing that was on the screen was particular part of a song and dance number. On his TV that moment came and went and he sounded surprised and disappointly said that nothing happened.
"Yeah, I made it all up. Love you, Bro."
IamSortaShy
43. Nice Logic
Growing up I had a friend that wasn't exactly that bright. One year when we had to be about 12 years old he decided for April's Fool he was going to play a prank on his family.
His prank was going to be something quite simple: It involved the salt and pepper shakers on the family dining table. He decided that he was going to move the salt from the salt shaker, and relocate it into the pepper shaker; and the pepper would be moved into the salt shaker. Basically just a simple salt and pepper switch-a-roo.
Yeah... so both of those shakers? They were clear see-through glass shakers.
hacklinuxwithbeer
44. Annoying Makes Happiness
My freshman year of high school the big craze at my school was this fifty pack of Crayola markers (idk why exactly but fads are fads). A friend of mine had a pack that she was obsessed with. She had them organized in the pack in like, a perfect color gradient order. So of course any time she left the room I’d mix her markers up so she had to fix them when she came back.
This went on for a month maybe? And one day in study hall she leaves and she before she leaves turns to me and she says “don’t rearrange my freaking markers”
So I didn’t.
I rearranged the caps.
You see, these markers were solid white apart from the caps and a little tiny nib at the other end. She got about halfway through “fixing” them when she noticed she was holding a marker with an orange cap and a turquoise nib. I can’t tell you the joy I experienced when she looked at me and said “you didn’t even move the markers did you?”
I laughed so hard I was asked to leave the study hall. She didn’t talk to me for two weeks. 100% worth it.
Honk_For_Team_Mystic
45. Completely Dumbfounded
I convinced a coworker for 2 months that the guy she had sat next to for 3 years was named Jay, not Dave. They worked in different departments but sat 3 feet away from each other for years. I got the guy in on it. And his manager. Then later his supervisor, group manager, division manager, and entire department.
They bought him new nameplates for his desk, changed stuff in the system, so his name would print as Jay, etc. The only thing they didn't change was his phone number and email. She thought she was going crazy, and when I finally told her she sucker punched me in the stomach and dropped me to my knees (she was a personal trainer in her off hours, so she got me good).
Totally worth it and I laugh about it to this day over a decade later.
Infamous_Lunchbox