Being stuck in the corporate machine means you get to experience some of the most absurd behavior imaginable, but that doesn't mean you can't have fun with it. In "Working for the Man: Inspiring and Subversive Projects for Residents of Cubicle-Land," Jeff Yamaguchi offers tips for quiet little pranks you can pull around the office that will make a statement without ruffling too many feathers (and hopefully without anyone catching on that you're the perpetrator).
We asked Jeff to take pictures of some of his favorite projects. If you decide to pull some of these (or others) around the office, don't forget to let us know how they went.
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Sunday 27 January
By jeff
I once had someone drink from my bottle of Mountain Dew during the dayand I was workeing second shift. Even after I put notes on my bottle, they still continued to do it. I got tired of it. One night I left aobut an inch worth in of it, then pee'd in the bottle and put it back in the fridge......never had that problem again!
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Sunday 27 January
By jack koole
Aboard ship in the Navy you didn't leave your coffee cup unattended for obuvois reasons-so we would drop the insert from teletype paper rolls in and it would sink to the bottom and when the user drained his coffee there was that insert. it was to large to swallow so no harm done. I also have a janitorial service and one of my clients would unplug our vac's then duck out of sight. He was born on 4-1 . we didn't mind as we felt he really liked us and felt comfortable playing pranks on us..
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Monday 28 January
By morgan
I worked a graveyard shift for a few years and to pass the time I
made it a point to get to know the security gaurds quite well. Most
of them were there on the way to something better and had something
on the ball and could do a little creative thinking. I recall one
who told me he delighted in taking out the small milk cartons out of the
refridgerator and placing them in the cupboard out of the way
somewhere and leaving them for a week or two then substituting them
back into the regular rotation. He laughed with glee whenever there
was a report of someone who had downed a carton of sour milk.
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Monday 28 January
By morgan
I worked a graveyard shift for a few years and to pass the time I made it a point to get to know the security gaurds quite well. Most of them were there on the way to something better and had something on the ball and could do a little creative thinking. I recall one who said that while in the army he delighted in taking out the small milk cartons out of the
refridgerator and placing them in the cupboard out of the way
somewhere and leaving them for a week or two then substituting them back into the regular rotation. He tried to make it a point to see who got the carton and had a hard time containing himself as they hastily rose and spewed sour milk back onto their trays.
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Tuesday 29 January
By ava
WOW, THATS CRAZY HOW SOME IDIOTS THINK EXLAX IS SOMETHING FUNNY TO ADD TO FOOD OR BEVERAGES. SOME PEOPLE WITH ULCERS CAN ACTUALLY DIE FROM EXLAX. WHAT A IDIOT !!!!!!!!
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Tuesday 29 January
By justsayin
Lame
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Tuesday 29 January
By John
If your office mate has a Dell computer with Intel Extreme Graphics 2 video card, then do this when he/she is away from his computer. Hit Ctrl - Alt - down arrow all at once. His screen image will invert 180 degrees. One poor fellow this was done to did not know how to fix, so he turned his flat screen upside down!
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Tuesday 29 January
By DAN
a good one is the classic hot foot but when i used to work it always was good to drop a little liquid exlax in the coffee pot when you went for a cup of coffee and make sure you go along with the prank
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Tuesday 29 January
By Alex
I would read the newspaper in the break room and one of the guys asked me to read the winning lotto numbers published in the paper. I had a clear view of his ticket so I read those numbers instead. He wrote down the numbers as I read them then he compared them to his ticket, I could not be mean so I only gave him 5 out of 6 of the "winning" numbers. His reaction was priceless as he thought he won a big jackpot, but he probably would have had a heart attack if he thought he won the Lotto. I also gave someone one of those fake winning scratch off tickets after receiving one myself, very funny.
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Tuesday 29 January
By R Hall
We pulled hundreds of pranks but these 3 stand out as my favorite:
1) One of our shift mates saw our 'fridge raider' take 2 leftover steaks we were saving for the on coming team. We 'arranged' for
him to be busy outside and we carefully switched the steaks out of his lunchbag with wet napkins in foil. The next week at work nothing was said. However, at lunch we had a cold cut lunch given to us and as usual our man was at the front of the line and got 5 times more meat than normal on his sandwich. As the end of the line approached he laughingly yelled 'looks like yall are going vegetarian! With out a pause one guy grabbed some napkins, put um on his bread and said ' na were having steak sandwwichs!
2)We had a supervisor that would come down from his office and sneak around our chemical plant unit on his bike (no vehicles allowed) to spy on workers. We kept a jar in our bathroom and would keep urine in it. When he would arrive at our unit, we would get to his bike before he noticed and inject the urine in the seat! Top engineer graduate from MIT, never caught on!
3) Had a newby coworker firewatching (could'nt leave his post)and asked for a toilet break. We told him we'ed send a relieif man and went to work. Only had one 3 stall bathroom. We went in and placed workboots and pants in front of each toilet, locked the doors and climbed over the sides. We got the kid a break, let him come in and sat back and watched. After 15 minutes of going in and out the bathroom he was literally sweating. We were telling him those guys in the jonh are hiding and napping and he needed to run them out. Also the releif man was dogging him out on the radio! This kid was such a nice guy, but after about 30 minutes we couldn't hold it any more and didn't think he could either!
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Tuesday 29 January
By mysunshinearies
A few years ago I was a bookkeeper in an office, we had shifts and there we a few times we messed with each other...There was a few times we did "flip it" I would flip everything in the office upside down..We had clipboards with reports and everything went upside down. Id change labels on things also. We clued a penny to the floor , LOL That was funny for the first few times till everyone finally new it was stuck.
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Tuesday 29 January
By Jim Kline
We had about 35 guy's working at the place i was at. They told
me to look out. Because there was someone getting into their lunch bag's. One day,yes. Some of my food was gone. That weekend, I got some Ex-lax, My wife made chocolate cookie's.
You got it !!! The Ex-lax went into the cookie's. Went to work
monday. When tuesday came around. One guy didn't show up.
When he came to work thursday, We asked him where he was,
He said, I had the run's real bad, Well, Our lunch was never
touched again. And we knew who it was. I never told anyone.
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Tuesday 29 January
By Pat
Years ago when I was an altar boy there was one particular Priest that was extremely mean and nasty to any of us altar boys.
We were to each hold a beaker one of wine and one of water. When you poured a little of each in the chalice during Mass if the Priest wanted more water or more wine they would just tap your beaker. This particular Priest alway wanted more wine. One day before High Mass we put vinegar in the wine beaker. After giving the blessing and taking a large drink out of the chalice the reaction was pricless. Eyes bugged out and spitting all over the alter
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Sunday 03 February
By Jim Kline
I'm new at this. What is URL & Password Mean
Please help me. Thank you.
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Tuesday 29 January
By Carolyn
You need to be 2 percent smarter than what you are working with....toothpaste is toxic...
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Tuesday 29 January
By Carolyn
You need to be 2 percent smarter than what you are working with...toothpaste is toxic when ingested...That is why it says KEEP OUT OF REACH OF CHILDREN...they are not 2 percent smarter yet.
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Tuesday 29 January
By Carolyn
Ava...also...if you give exlax to someone who is low on potassium their heart will stop...and that makes them dead too...there are some scary people out there.
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Tuesday 29 January
By slm1974
We had this one lady that always went to the restroom right after her lunch (since she took lunch early, it always happened during our lunch). Our office was right across the restroom. She would spray A LOT of air freshener before and after her business. Then leave the door wide open as she left. So one day, a co-worker of mine had a rich fudge brownie. He took it to the bathroom and smeared a small streak down the back of the toilet and then thumped the small piece in the toilet. She came in on time and she had a stroke. Uh, disgusting. She sprayed and you heard the paper towels popping out of the holding. I bet she grabbed about twenty. LOL. Then you hear flush and spray. HA. She quit using our restroom. HA. PS. her office was in the back where there were two or three restrooms. :}
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Tuesday 29 January
By LOTUS73
When my father was still working(he's retired now)he and some
guys once laid out a plate of canned dog food with crackers,
and some guy came along and ate it,thinking it was dip or something.Then,incredibly,he actually came back for more!The
next day,he found his cubicle filled with newspapes and fake dog doo with the words "Woof woof"written everywhere!Never did let him live that one down!There was also this one guy who would take his shoes off a lot,so when he left his desk to use
the restroom,they hid them in the breakroom freezer.He had to walk around all day in his socks until it was time to go home when they finally told him where his shoes were.
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Tuesday 29 January
By Sue
put a rubber band around the sprayer and get somebody to get you a glass of water, they'll get soaked when they turn the water on
We used exacto knives at my job, my first day my co-workers took the blade out and replaced it with paper colored with pencil to appear gray. I didn't notice until I tried to cut something & everybody was watching & laughing at me.
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