2002 Prank of the Month Archives

Due to popular demand, we started a Prank of the Month feature as part of Stuff of the Month in October, 2001. Here are the collected monthly pranks for 2002.
Disclaimer: Some of these practical jokes could get you into a considerable amount of trouble if you get caught, so don't get caught. If you do, don't say that we told you to do it. Dontmindme.com accepts no responsibility for anything you do. We're just giving you the directions.

September 2002: This may lack some of the elegance of some pranks that I've posted in the past, but it makes up for it in the simplicity of execution. Paint the victim's lawn. That's all there is to it. I'd recommend a water-based paint, or you are likely going to kill the entire lawn, and this prank isn't about being destructive. Plus, you'll be able to clean yourself up much easier with water paint. Some tips: use a bright colour for maximum shock value. Don't use brushes to distribute the paint, that's far too much work. Perhaps use a spray bottle or a watering can for quick lawn coverage, or for a thorough job on short and well manicured grass, a roller. Cover as much of the lawn as possible, and remember, don't paint yourself into a corner against the house, or a fence or hedge.

August 2002: This one is inspired by a Saturday Night Live sketch. When you're at someone's place (or even if you aren't if you know their voicemail password/answering machine code) change the voicemail/answering machine greeting. Don't change it very much, in fact say the exact same words that they do, but use as an effeminate/swishy a voice as possible. If it's a female voice on the machine, use a gruff masculine voice. Don't change the content of the message, just the voice. This prank is easy enough to pull off, since most voicemail systems don't require a password to access the admin functions, and you just need the host/victim out of the room for two or three minutes. Try it out.

July 2002: Here's a nice easy office prank. Print out a page with SERVICE COPIER SOON in a large block font in the center of the page. Make a few copies and insert into the photocopier paper tray. Sooner or later someone will get a copy with a large type message informing them the copier needs service. This works equally well on plain paper fax machines, of course. It would work best in a large office, especially if you can pull it on a copier belonging to another department.

June 2002: Some pranks have immediate payoff. Others play out over a period of time. A good one from the latter category is to pose as the victim and contact military recruiting agencies. Ask for information on joining. Be sure to use phrases like "career change." If you are in the US, this will work even better, as you can contact all of the branches of the military, and say you are seriously considering signing up, but aren't sure which one you'd prefer to join. The victim should be getting calls and recruiting info in the mail for months.

May 2002: This is a fun one that requires a camcorder. If you don't have one, borrow one for an afternoon, or even for an hour, and shoot about five minutes of tape from the a corner of your bathroom ceiling. Dub the tape unto a standard VHS tape and you won't need the camera any more. Wait until you have a good crowd in watching TV, and wait for you victim to go to the bathroom. Pop in the tape and once you hear the toilet flush, start playing the tape and get everyone to start laughing (you'll have to clue them in on the joke before the vic gets back). When the victim returns, make a big deal out of turning off the TV, but make sure they actually see what was on the screen so they'll assume you have a hidden camera in the washroom. This can get some interesting responses.

April 2002: Spring is at hand, and that means lawns are soon going to be growing again. If you have a victim who takes pride in his lawn, this is a particularly nasty prank. Get some white powered fertilizer and use it to deface the vic's lawn. Myself, I'd go for the logo or name of a sports team he hates (the logo of the Montreal Canadiens comes to mind, the big C with an H in the middle is nice and easy to make). Make the letters nice and big and well spaced. Cover a lot of lawn area with this. Don't lay on the fertilizer too thick, you don't need to make big heavy lines of it. Ideally it should look like it was done with chalk, much like sidelines on a soccer field. When the victims sees this, how is he going to get rid of it? With the hose, of course. Water will wash away the chalk in no time. Only it's fertilizer, not chalk. It will soak into the lawn and in a few weeks your message will be back in the form of lush green grass spelling it out. Even mowing won't get rid of it.

March 2002: This is the last winter prank for this year, since winter is running out. It's a dorm prank, but I suppose if you got keys to someone's house it would work. You need to know when the victim will be out for an hour or two, and you need to have snowball-making snow. Get a few people together, and make a snowball that's just big enough to fit through the victim's door. Roll it through the door and put it somewhere nice and central. Open the windows and turn down the heat so it doesn't melt too soon. If you're feeling ambitious make three big snowballs and construct an indoor snowman.

February 2002: Here's one for the university students out there, in particular grad students, or people old enough to pass for grad students (you probably aren't going to be able to pull this one off if you're only 18 or 19). If you know a prof that's often late for class, or if you can come up with way to delay a prof for 10 minutes just before a class, make up a fake pop quiz for the class. This works best if its a big class of first year students and the test is unbelievably hard. Simply show up, preferably dressed well and announce that the prof is going to be very late, and you're in his graduate seminar and he sent you to proctor this test. Tell them to drop the test on his desk at the end of class. Distribute the test and leave just before the prof arrives. End result is nervous class of frosh and a rather confused instructor. A tip: don't try this on a prof if you're actually in one of his classes.

January 2002: This is a classic winter prank. It can only be done if you live where the temperature drops below freezing and stays there for a while to be effective. That said, if you're feeling mean and/or vengeful and the climate permits, this one is a beaut. Start with some buckets. Two gallon ones with handles would be ideal, but use whatever you have. If you have a truck use lots of large buckets — if you've got 'em. Fill the buckets maybe 3/4 full of water, or a bit more if the buckets are large. (You want these buckets to be reasonably portable). Leave them out overnight, maybe for two days if the weather isn't all that cold and the buckets are large, and let them freeze solid. You know have portable blocks of ice. Load them, buckets and all, into your trunk, or if you have a truck, so much the better. Now boil a kettle of water, or two if you have more than four or five buckets. Also bring another bucket of cold water, might want to put a cover on it for the drive over. Drive over to the victim's house, preferably late at night when they are sound asleep. Now block in their car. Turn the buckets upside down, line em up, and splash some of the hot water from the kettle on 'em — the heat will make the buckets expand enough to drop the ice blocks out in a few seconds. Pour on enough of the cold water to freeze the ice to the driveway. On a cold night pack a little snow around the ice and wet it down to ensure a nice, solid, nearly impenetrable wall of ice that's going to be a big pain to get rid of in the morning.