Distasteful April Fools' Day pranks, jokes unsuitable for the office
Distasteful April Fools' Day pranks, jokes unsuitable for the office
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By Paula Burkes
Published: March 30, 2008
Want to play a prank on your co-workers this April Fools' Day?
Stick a "gotcha” note to the underside of their computer mouse. The note will render the mouse useless, which will drive your colleagues bonkers until they lift the mouse and discover it.Advertisement
Totally unacceptable
Yvonne Rainwater, regional vice president for Robert Half in Tulsa, said more jokes fall in the distasteful category.
Unacceptable pranks, Rainwater said, include promiscuous jokes, fake termination, layoff and promotion notices, and anything attacking.
"Even a ‘kick me' sign,” she said. "It was OK back in junior high, but not in the business world.”
Acceptable jokes, Rainwater said, might include swapping labels on a phone, or substituting decaffeinated coffee for the real stuff. Humor can help build rapport among co-workers, she said.
"Just be sure to make it light — and appropriate for the work environment you work in.”
Pat Reeder, former news editor of The Claremore Progress, was the butt of an April Fools' prank years ago. "Everyone was calling in sick and all the phones were ringing at once,” Reeder said. She was about to pull her hair out, she said, until the prankster and the rest of her staff stepped from behind the door.
Mike Seney, senior vice president of The State Chamber, pulled a number on his staff years ago. The chamber's legislative tracking system on the Web didn't work half the time during its early days.
"I copied the (Internet provider's) letterhead and sent out an e-mail to our entire staff that they had determined the problem was a ‘build up of static electricity.'”
To neutralize the static, the company planned to send a negative electric charge at 2 p.m. on April 1, the memo read. To be safe, everyone should gather away from their computer terminals in the conference room.
At the designated time, Seney called the office from the state Capitol and on the conference room's speaker phone, wished his staffers, "Happy April Fools' Day!”
Even on a Sunday
The fact April Fools' fell on a Sunday one year didn't keep Leslie Spears, communications manager for the Oklahoma City Museum of Art, from teasing her co-workers. She sent a few text messages that director Carolyn Hill was going to call an emergency meeting at the museum.
To Spears' dismay, the message was forwarded to Hill by a co-worker who didn't realize it was a joke.
"Thankfully, Carolyn saw the humor and was fine with it,” Spears said. "It was a good, scary laugh.”
At a former job, Sean Simpson worked in a cubicle next to a co-worker, whose desk had been completely stuffed with packing peanuts.
"When she opened her desk drawer, she screamed,” Simpson said. "That was understandable, given she was covered in white Styrofoam. But then she started screaming, ‘Get them off! Get them off!'
"I thought she was overreacting,” Simpson said, "but when she turned to face me, I saw two live crickets on her sweater.”
The bugs weren't part of the joke but just happened to be in the desk, too.
Simpson got blamed for the prank, though he said he had nothing to do with it. To this day, he said, he avoids April Fools' jokes.
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Tara Henson 919-9038
Director Marketing/PR