An Epic Day of Pranking

One thing I really love about my job is the team that I work with. We can all be pretty focused and work hard but at the same time, we love to goof around and enjoy each other's company. We started playing board games at lunch which is a riot. We all have Wookie sound clips on our laptops that we play when we are frustrated (nothing releases the tension like hearing Chewbacca roaring) or Ewok sounds that get played when it is time to gather for a meeting. Classic!
There are loads of other things. We get together in a meeting and it can get pretty crazy. Our assistant manager, Steve, that we report to, is pretty good about the craziness of the team. In fact he gets into it too. He is famous for sending out resignation letter emails from people's computers if they leave them unlocked. He's as obsessed about the TV show How I Met Your Mother and will quote lines along with the rest of us. He tries to keep the focus in meetings but when we all get together, it can be pretty funny.
Even the serious can be made into something funny. As a part of our team goals for the year, we have to read some books. There were a couple that were "required" or suggested but we mostly get to pick the books that we want to read. They are supposed to be inspirational or ones that are related to professional development. The first book is a kid's book called Frindle. All about a kid that decides to make up a word and the power to bring about change. Good book. Would actually recommend it.
But with our team, it turned into something hilarious. We are supposed to discuss the books or give a little report in our weekly team meeting. I end up making a power point presentation with pens dancing all over the place. So funny! Went over great with our gang of goofballs.
We love to play jokes or pranks on people. We've taken all the extra chairs from around the office and put them all around someone's desk (in one case, we took fishing line and wrapped it around them too). . We've enclosed someone's desk with plastic wrap and balloons.
So April Fools Day seemed like a great opportunity for our gang of pranksters. We decided to make Steve the target of our fun. We started with a wakeup call of sorts. We have all figured out how to set up emails that have a delivery delay on them. All of us Assembly Project Task Lead Supervisors (which is a combination of all the titles that our position has had) sent an email saying we were all sick and wouldn't be able to be at work. The first was set to arrive at 2:28 AM, the next at 3:12 AM and so on. The best part of it was that Steve gets his emails forwarded to his phone. So every 45 minutes or so, his phone would wake him up. Hilarious!
In order to avoid Steve and his obvious feelings of doubt about the fact that we were sick, we booked a conference room in the other building and all worked from there. We had sentries and lookouts placed throughout the team that kept us posted on what Steve was up to. They also hammed it up about quarantining the team and more good stuff along those lines.
When Steve came looking for us, we avoided him by ducking into some random guy's office, ducked down some back stairs, ran across the back lawn and were sitting at our desks when he got back. He had, of course, switched our monitors with little tiny ones while we were gone. So fun.
I had a good time sending out an email to the team describing the symptoms that I had been experiencing the past while (which I had found on the very helpful americanpregnancy.org website)
To continue to keep Steve on his toes, we arranged to have the company receptionist send out an email saying his car was being towed. Me and another supervisor snuck outside and along the building to find Steve's car and get his license plate # to help make it official.
We decided to keep the fun going all day and are excited to hear about the string of emails that Steve will be receiving starting about 11:55PM letting him know that we are all feeling great and will be in to work tomorrow.
It was truly a crazy day full of fun and pranks. My sides ache because of all the laughing. Having a place where you enjoy going to work makes handling stressful situations or just getting through the daily grind a whole lot easier. We have alot of fun and it makes it easier to help each other out.
Good times.