Pranks, when executed successfully, can make for some really good, wholesome fun. In many cases, pranksters unleash their fury during the holidays or at milestone high school events, and their deeds usually go on to become core memories that the participants (and witnesses) will remember for years to come. Here are some of the most epic pranks people have come up with:
1. Looks Can Be Deceiving
For a long time, my sister was a big fan of Mini Coopers, so for Christmas, we told her she was getting a big surprise. We stacked about 100 boxes in the shape of a Mini, wrapped them, and left it outside after she had gone to bed on Christmas Eve. The next morning, we woke up, headed downstairs, and my dad handed her his car keys, saying her present was outside.
She started screaming and crying. She went outside and, for reasons unknown, attempted to hug the car. It was so sad, and yet, so glorious at the same time. She went straight through the boxes and sat for about five minutes before looking at my parents as if they had ended her bunny. I myself didn't get much that Christmas, but that memory is pure gold.
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2. A Historic Prank
There were three high schools in my hometown. Two of them—both named after famous historical figures—were in a sort of rivalry with each other. It was nothing really serious, but the students would casually trash talk the other school a lot. Like I said though, it wasn't that deep, and it was mostly all done in good fun.
Each school had a display case with a bust of their respective historical namesake somewhere in the building. They were just some decoration—objects that you would pass by every single day and pay little attention to. So, we figured we would test just how little attention people actually paid these things, and we hatched the most brilliant plan.
One night, a few buddies of mine and I got together. Most of us were from my school, but we had a few "inside men'' from the other one as well. We split up into two teams, got access to both buildings simultaneously, picked open the very cheap locks on the display cases, grabbed the busts, and switched them.
Keep in mind, these schools were not that close to one another, and none of us had been old enough to drive at that point, so we had to carry these enormous limestone busts through half the town. After carrying these things to our “rival” school, we snuck them into the display. We then locked the busts into the display cases and left.
Since we had managed to enter the school in a completely non-destructive way, nobody ever realized that something had changed, and no one found out about our prank. It took almost an entire school year for anyone to notice. To this day, no teacher has ever found out who was responsible. But no damage was done, so they didn't try too hard to figure it out.
3. Turkey Turmoil
When I was 10, my mother's family decided to come up from Guatemala so they could experience American Thanksgiving for the first time. We had about 12 people to feed. I helped my mom prepare the turkey, then went out to play with my friends a bit later. When I came back, my mom burst through my door, screaming: "COME! COME TO THE KITCHEN QUICKLY! SOMETHING HAPPENED! SOMETHING BAD!"
I panicked. I knew something happened to the turkey. I yelled at her, "DID IT CATCH ON FIRE?! OH MY GOD!" We stopped right at the entrance to the kitchen and my mom dramatically turned to me, whispering: "I...I don't know what we're going to do. We don't have a backup plan." I pushed through her and opened the oven. The foil covering the turkey was still over the dish, hiding my nightmare.
My mom stepped next to me and lifted it with a pair of tongs to unveil a baked cornish hen. I screamed bloody murder. "WHAT THE HECK, MOM?! IT WAS A 24-POUND TURKEY WHEN WE SHOVED IT IN THERE! WHAT HAPPENED?! OH MY GOD! WE DON'T HAVE ANY OTHER FOOD TO OFFER! THEY FLEW UP JUST FOR THIS! OH MY GOD, THANKSGIVING IS CANCELLED! WE'RE GOING TO HAVE TO ORDER PIZZA OR SOMETHING! WHY DID YOU LET THE TURKEY SHRINK?!"
I started bawling at that point, freaked out beyond belief that my "perfect" family Thanksgiving had just been ruined. I turned away and started heading toward the balcony to tell our family the bad news when suddenly, my mom grabbed my arm and sank to the floor in a fit of laughter. I looked at her puzzled and followed her into the kitchen where she opened a bottom cupboard revealing the 24-pound turkey cooked to perfection.
She continued laughing for another 20 minutes while I just sat on the floor questioning my family's sanity. To this day, I still don't know how she didn't break character and crack up.
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4. A Student’s Revenge
This kid in my class put the school for sale on Craigslist. He provided the school's attendance office number as a point of contact because everyone hated the receptionist there. They were getting calls from interested buyers for days who wanted to buy a huge property with a big swimming pool and a track. Needless to say, the secretary was kept busy.
5. Puppy Problems
One Christmas, when my siblings and I were young, my mom decided to prank us as no one had ever before. I wanted a puppy, being the little girl I was. Christmas Day came and there was a giant box with holes poked in the sides and top. There were even scratch noises inside. I knew it was my puppy, but the box was overly large. I ripped it open and immediately screamed.
It was not the puppy I was hoping for, but my fat uncle sat inside with a collar and a stuffed animal. I never did end up getting the puppy.
6. Losing My Marbles
This kid once brought a backpack full—and I mean completely full—of marbles to school. What he did with it was legendary. Well, he went to the main staircase near the front up the third floor and dumped the whole bag over the stairwell. How those marbles didn't break the glass trophy case at the bottom is beyond me, but the marbles went everywhere.
Here’s the kicker, though. The kid that brought the backpack full of marbles managed to never get caught. I’m not sure what he did. He might have either managed to run to one of the stairwells at the end of the hall and get to the bottom of the stairs before teachers had time to react, or he hid somewhere until the first bell rang.
7. Apocalypse Now
Back in 1993, when I was 13 years old, I was sitting in my parents' 23rd-floor apartment when I came out from my room and saw them both watching a news broadcast. They both looked very serious watching this news story, so I sat down and asked them, " What's going on? " My mom calmly replied, "Asteroids...they found a big asteroid approaching Earth." I became immediately interested.
I sat down and watched as the story unfolded into a live TV news broadcast. At one point, the newscaster confirmed that the asteroid was going to hit earth and that no one was sure if something could be done in time. I should note, every 10 minutes or so, my dad would flip through the channels, saying, "I wonder if anyone else has better coverage."
I was just focused on the story. Eventually, the newscaster said that the asteroid was now visible to the naked eye, so I RAN out to the balcony as fast as I could to look for it...when I didn't see it, I ran back and kept watching. The next update was that the government had decided to shoot the asteroid, break it up, and send the bits to bounce harmlessly off the Earth's atmosphere.
My mom and dad were calmly sitting on the couch, while I on the other hand was freaking the heck out. The plan to destroy the asteroid succeeded and the TV showed bits of it blasting apart in the skies above. I was so happy that I started crying...but then, about two minutes later, another BIG news alert update flashed on the screen and they cut over to some space monitoring center...
Then it happened. About 100 asteroids showed up on the screen, each one larger than the one they just blew up... People were freaking out, and there seemed to be no hope left. I broke down in tears, completely oblivious to the fact that my parents were still sitting calmly sipping their coffee...It was only at that point that my mom decided to tell me the truth.
It was all made up, the entire news broadcast. It was actually just some fictional TV show, and it ruined me. I was absolutely furious! My dad later told me that the reason he flipped through the channels looking for other news broadcasts was so I wouldn't notice when the TV show cut to commercials!
8. Taking Back Control
One of my friends brought in a universal remote and tuned it to the TV in the lunch hall. This TV's original remote had long since been lost, so he had the only one. Instead of playing the news during lunch, he would change it to other channels and watch things like sitcoms. The teachers were pretty clueless and had no idea what was going on.
The teachers kept flicking through dozens of channels, only for him to immediately change back. They even started turning it off, and he'd just turn it back on again. After about a month of this, the teachers gave up. Nobody except our immediate friend group knew it was him doing this, but the entire school whispered about the mystery man that ended the scourge that was the news channel for ages.
9. Of The Same Name
When I was little, I told my parents that all I wanted was the new Kirby's Dream Land game for GameBoy. When it came time to give me presents, there was this huge one wrapped for me, and after pulling the wrapping off, I discovered that it was a Kirby vacuum cleaner box. I started freaking out, as my tiny mind began putting pieces together; meanwhile, they were acting all concerned.
They told me. "I thought you wanted a Kirby?" Of course, after a while of dying inside, they begin to laugh and tell me to open the box. Inside, after enough digging, I found the cartridge waiting at the bottom.
10. False Alarm!
A kid hit the fire alarm when the mayor was visiting our school. For context, we had an assembly the week before during which we were specifically told not to hit the fire alarm during the mayor’s visit unless there was an actual fire, as it was a common occurrence at our school for students to just hit the fire alarm whenever.
11. Chasing The Rainbow
Every year on St. Patrick's day, my mom dyed everything green. Green milk, green pancakes, GREEN! She said that we had to do this because the impish leprechauns would be out and about causing mayhem all day, and the only way to catch their speedy little asses was to bait them with their favorite color. We'd set traps with a dish of food set under a shoebox, propped on a string, and our gullible butts parked around the corner waiting for the telltale "flash of sparkly green."
My parents would sit and watch our shenanigans, no doubt holding back their laughter. But here's the thing—while we were waiting for the leprechauns to take the bait, there would inevitably be a loud clatter somewhere else in the house. When we ran to see what the noise was, there would be a bunch of chocolate-wrapped gold coins all over the floor. It didn't make any sense.
We lived in a very large, old, and noisy house, so we could easily hear this happening from a floor up or down. Keep in mind that every single member of our household was present and accounted for at the leprechaun baiting. The places where the coins fell were too far from us for my mother to have simply tossed them over our heads while we were distracted.
They also often fell in very stark, empty areas of the house where hidden stashes of coins or other complicated methods of coin dispersal were impossible to hide. The go-to spot seemed to be our upstairs hallway, which had all hardwood floors, sparse track lighting, absolutely no furniture, and only one entry point...which my mother would have had to pass us to use.
As we grew older, we grew more suspicious. We started to investigate our mother, all year long. Middle of August? Let's figure out where the heck mom is hiding her method of chocolate coin dispersal. These witch-hunts caused some unfortunate and untimely discoveries...like all of our baby teeth stashed in mom's nightstand (which confirmed that the tooth fairy was not real).
We also solved the riddle of the missing Victoria's Secret catalogs, but we never did figure out how the heck my mom managed to be two places at once, every St. Patrick's day. We're all in our 20s and 30s and she still refuses to tell us how she did it.
12. A Motor Mystery
My best friend owned a red 1975 Corvette Stingray. That thing was like his baby. It was an awesome car, but he never shut up about it and always did burnouts in the parking lot. It was super annoying, so we decided it was time to take action. On senior prank day, my friends and I got our chance to carry out an epic plan.
We went to his house the night before, got his keys, drove his Corvette to the school, and with the help of a coach that liked us, parked his car in the center of the gym. Since he was staying at his dad's house that day, he didn’t notice until he got to school and the school resource officer asked him why his car was in the gym. I’d never seen someone more confused in my entire life. His face was priceless.
13. Clowning Around
One Christmas morning, as my brothers and I gathered around the tree, my mom excitedly pointed out one lumpy present and said, "That's the one I think you'll like most, sweetie. Open that one last." So we opened presents together, each of them amazing and just what I wanted. That made me even more excited about this mystery present waiting for me.
How could it be better than the books I got? Or my new hat? Dang, this must be one excellent gift. Finally, all the presents had been opened, and my mom was beaming with anticipation as she slid the final bundle across the rug to me. I'd never seen her this excited for me to open a present. I tore the paper and saw a glimpse of red, two sinister eyes, and cloying yellow splashed with polka dots.
My mom had given me a freaking clown statue. Not just your run-of-the-mill clown, either—it was this very horrifying clown statue that I had cringed upon viewing at my grandma's house once years ago. The very statue that had made clowns unsettling for me (even before I saw the film It). I threw it across the room and screamed as my mother howled with laughter.
She'd apparently gotten it from my grandma (who was going to throw it away) and saved it for MONTHS to give to me. That was the year I stopped trusting that crazy woman (just kidding, I love my mom and her insane sense of humor).
14. Exam Time Hijinks
The school was preparing to take their “assessment tests,” which played a part in how schools are rated. Many people think these tests are a waste of time, but they are important to school administrators. So, the principal ordered for some classes to be interrupted in order to make sure that all the kids get “refreshers” in some basic math and writing skills.
A few kids in a US History Honors class were angry. They resented the interruption, as the classes were preparing them for an independent "AP Exam" that awarded college credit. Having to take basic “refresher” courses on top of their already full plates was way too much. In response, they decided to take matters into their own hands—they intentionally sabotage the assessment tests.
Our school was in an upper-middle-class area and regularly scored in the low 90s. This put the school in the top 10%. After what they did, we definitely weren’t in the top 10% anymore! The test results came back, and suddenly, the school scored in the mid-low 80s. Turns out that 15 to 20 students out of 300 turning in absolute zeros can impact an average score!
The school administrators went berserk. Stories were circulated. Students were “talked to.” But nothing came of it. The students never confessed the tests were anonymous, and the school rules didn't forbid poor performance. It helped that they were led by kids whose parents were well-trained in protesting during the 1960s.
15. Hound's Ham
It was Christmas time, and my father and my step-mother were preparing a relatively big meal for about seven or eight people. My dad worked fifty-plus hours a week and I went to school, so both of us were pretty tired and looking forward to our holiday break. My stepmother stepped out and told my father that the ham would be done cooking in about an hour. He was to take it out of the oven if she didn't get home in time.
I could see the wheels in my father's head spinning. He let the ham cook and then proceeded to take it and hide it in the dining room, leaving the oven on to pretend it was still cooking. My dad then pretended to be asleep on the couch as my stepmother got home. When she went over to check on the ham, she started losing it, yelling, "Jeff! Where on Earth is the ham?! Did you take it out?!"
After a couple of seconds of silent giggling, he "woke up" and walked her to the dining room to show her the ham...but a fresh new horror awaited them. The dog had been chomping on for about ten minutes. That ham was completely chewed up by our American Fox Hound. We had Chinese food for Christmas dinner instead.
16. A “Fowl” School Day
During my junior year of high school, someone snuck in some chickens. There were dozens of chickens just roaming the halls, and all the teachers were panicking. For some reason, the faculty treated them like rabid dogs. There’s nothing funnier than seeing literal roadblocks set up around a chicken, and four teachers all red-faced, pulling their own hair.
17. Big Y2K Scare
New Years' Eve, 1999. My whole extended family had gathered for a party. At the time, people were kind of wigging out about Y2K. Our family had not really bought into any of it except for one of my aunts who was slightly nervous. When the time came to watch the ball drop, we started the countdown...3...2...1...HAPPY—Oh no!
The TV snapped off, the whole house went black, and my aunt started to lose it. Everyone was silent except for my aunt who was freaking out, and after a few seconds, we heard some laughter coming from the garage. While my family tried to light a candle, I went to look for my father and uncle who had mysteriously gone missing during the chaos.
I later found them crouching right next to the circuit breaker, laughing their behinds off.
18. Totally Clueless
We had an English teacher in training with poor classroom management skills. To prove that point, my friend jumped from a classroom window mid-class, casually walked through the schoolyard, back into the school, and then back into the classroom. He told the teacher that he had gone to the bathroom. She nodded and kept on with her lesson.
19. The Redirect
Every Christmas, my brother and I would visually inspect the gifts under the tree to guess what they could be and see which ones belonged to who. One year, there was a big box all the way in the back that didn't have a name on it, so we asked our mom who it was for. She said, "It's for your dad. It's a multiple-piece gift set for men; you know, with a wallet and flask and stuff."
We thought it was a pretty cool idea and we let it go. Then came Christmas morning—we handed him the box excitedly, waiting to see his reaction to this gift. He started opening it, then said, "Hey, why don't you guys help me?" Sweet, more wrapping paper to shred. The paper came off and...it was a Playstation 2. We lost our minds for a good minute or so before we turned to our mom (who had a video camera in her hands) and started screaming.
"YOU LIED! YOU LIED TO US! YOU'RE A LIAR!" She thought it was hilarious. And it was. We were beyond ecstatic. I love watching that tape years later and hearing our childish, squeaky voices.
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20. A Spooky School Surprise
Halloween costumes were banned at my high school because of some idiots who dressed up and used it as an excuse to hide their faces while they vandalized the school about ten years prior. The seniors in my year decided that enough was enough—more than half of the class decided that we would still dress up and march into the school together in the morning.
We all knew we would be punished right away, but it didn't matter. I stayed up all night making a suit of armor out of metallic duct tape and cardboard, along with a broomstick horse to ride. The next day, we all gathered in the parking lot and waited for everyone to show up. People went all out and there were a lot of amazing costumes.
After about 20 minutes of waiting, we started our march in. The deans had learned of our plan and were waiting for us right as we entered. They started pulling people aside in groups and taking student IDs to hand out detentions. In my group, there was one guy dressed up as an ATM, and let’s just say that he really committed to the bit.
His next move was hilarious—when the dean asked for his ID, he started making ATM noises, and then slipped the ID out through the slot where you would put your debit card in. It was one of the funniest things, and I was so jealous that my costume was not as clever as his. Even though having so many of us participate was pretty awesome, his costume just made that whole event for me.
21. Naughty List
This was my prank, but my mother was in on it. When my brother was about seven, he still believed in Santa, and I was the cool 12 year old helping my mom with keeping the presents hidden until late on Christmas Eve. We would then wrap them and set them up under the tree for the morning. Later, when all the presents were in place, we were watching a movie and I noticed by the fireplace an empty gift box, along with the leftover wrapping paper...
The next morning, my brother woke up and saw a gift in the middle of his room. Not unusual, mom had always left our stockings or something small in the room so we wouldn't wake her up at the crack of dawn. He opened it while I stood at the door poker-faced, and under the layers of tissue paper, he found a lump of coal. He also found a note, written in my best 12-year-old writing, saying something along the lines of, "You were mean to your sister this year, no presents for you."
He sat down on the rug, ashen-faced and sobbing, and refused to leave the room...which was a shame, because his stocking was outside the door. I broke after about two minutes and confessed.
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22. A Happy Ending
During our sixth-period class, not one student showed up to class on time. Not one. I—the teacher—started to panic that all 37 of them had finally figured out they could outnumber me. About five minutes later, they all filled in with a lighted birthday cake for me, singing Happy Birthday. It was so incredibly sweet. They thought it was hilarious.
23. Staged Fright
My mom is a high school teacher. April 1st rolls around, and she decides to prank her students. In order for the prank to be successful, she included one student in her plan. The day before, she told this kid (we'll call him Brad) to take one of her old phones to class with him the next day, pull it out at some point, and "text" in class. Brad agreed to do it, and the next day, when Brad started texting with the mole phone, my mom promptly halted her lecture.
She walked up to Brad, took the phone right out of his hands, and she chucked the thing out of her second-story window. The look on the faces of her students was priceless, as my mom describes it. No one was laughing, no one was smiling; just sheer, raw horror. Always loved that one; never done a prank quite like it.
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24. Taken For A Ride
My friend didn’t finish an English assignment on time. As punishment, the teacher asked him to look up the definition of “diligence,” and write a five-page essay on the need for "diligence." When he opened the dictionary, the second definition of “diligence” was "a public stagecoach." He proceeded to write a tremendous five pager on the need for, or lack thereof, public stagecoaches.
25. A Little Birdy Said...
When I was very little, my dad would talk in a high-pitched voice when I wasn't looking. He pretended to be a little bird and he became my friend. We would talk all the time and I would beg him to come out from where he was hiding. It started on a very long road trip to visit my grandparents and he continued to do it once we got home.
One day, I was looking under all the furniture trying to find the little bird while we talked and I spun around suddenly and caught him in mid-sentence. It was devastating.
26. Time To Attack!
This story didn’t just involve me; in fact, it involved all the students in our senior year. It was customary at our school that, on a hot day, near the end of the year, seniors would start a water balloon fight. It was usually quite small and the teachers were used to it, so they could put a stop to it quickly. Not this time though.
We had been dropping hints here and there about the upcoming event for several days beforehand: talking about it in hallways within earshot of teachers, leaving behind empty balloons, etc. The day before the actual showdown, we brought thousands of balloons to the school, and a good 10 to 20 people started filling them at water fountains and in the toilets.
Then, we kept them in big buckets filled with water so the balloons wouldn't burst and hid them in the bushes around the school. On the day of the attack, we had some mock maneuvers: groups of people would suddenly start running towards the school entrance, the toilets, the principal’s office, etc. Teachers would be running to stop us, only for nothing to happen.
Then came the actual event: everyone suddenly ran into the bushes, grabbed the buckets, and started pelting the other kids. The teachers closed in, trying to destroy our balloons, but there were just so many; they couldn't get rid of them. Everyone was soaking wet after, but we had no regrets. It was totally worth it.
The most legendary thing though wasn't the number of balloons or the planning of it all: it was the fact that each and every senior participated in it. From buying balloons, to bringing buckets, to filling balloons, everyone did something. Despite all the high school drama, we managed to all come together for this epic prank.
27. Oven Surprise
This happened around the year I was born actually, but it's a famous little joke my parents played that has been talked about in my family for years. Anyway, my older brothers really wanted an NES. It was the only thing they wanted for Christmas, but my family was pretty poor and my parents told them over and over that it wasn't likely they'd get it. Still, their little hearts just refused to give up hope.
On Christmas Day, they opened their presents and...nope. No NES. My one brother was upset the most—he'd been the one most vehement about getting the system, but he was trying to be happy with what he got. After a couple of hours, my parents told him to scrub out the oven so they could get the ham going, and my brother was upset. Come on, having to do stuff? On Christmas? Couldn't they just cook it in the oven as it was?
My dad basically told him to shut up and do what he was told. So my brother glumly went over to the oven and opened it up...and there was the Nintendo, with a couple of games. He was ecstatic. He couldn't play with it until after he scrubbed the oven, though.
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28. An Alarming Situation
Our senior class pulled their prank on the day while they were all gone for their last field trip. They all bought different alarm clocks, set them to go off at the same time, stuffed them into different lockers, then zip-tied our lockers shut. It was absolute mayhem while the poor janitor and teachers were hunting down the clocks and cutting lockers open.
29. Extended Wait
Back during the holidays in 2001, I broke my leg and was pretty miserable hobbling around school and all that. I was stuck every single day waiting in the principal's office after school waiting for a parent to pick me up because I couldn't take the bus with a cast on and crutches (and the principal was a family friend). I couldn't hang out with friends much because I was pretty immobile and they just wanted to horse around outside.
Miserable old me begged my parents to get Tony Hawk 3 for the GBA as my Hanukkah gift. They knew that I really wanted a PS2, but it was pretty expensive for just a gift, so that's why I turned to the GBA game. Come Hanukkah, I got my gift on the first day and it was Tony Hawk 3 for the PS2. I, of course, didn't have a PS2. My mom apologized profusely and said we would go out the next day and she'd let me get any other game from the store.
I got into bed that night and there was a big box under the covers when I tried to get in. Inside that box was a PS2 that my parents got me for Hanukkah and to help me be less miserable while my leg healed. I'll never forgive my parents for waiting until 10 pm to give me a new game console—the next day of school felt like the longest of my life!
30. One Slippery Surprise
For senior prank day, a group of kids dressed up in all black with masks. They ran down the main hall of the school with industrial buckets of cheap vegetable oil and poured it everywhere—and I mean everywhere. This happened right before the bell rang for the next period. When the bell rang, kids came out into the hall—and utter chaos ensued.
Kids were slipping and falling all over the place, spreading the oil even further throughout the school. It was so bad that they ended up sending everyone home so they could clean up the mess. The school did an investigation, pulling camera footage from campus and interviewing students. The search for the perps got pretty intense.
Of course, the kids were bragging to friends about their accomplishments, so the suspects were pulled into the office. They didn't even need to interrogate them, they knew they all did it. How? They were all wearing the exact same oily shoes they were wearing when they pulled their prank off. In the end, they were suspended for 5 days.
31. Under The Sink
One Christmas, my mother bought my cousin the Asteroids game for Atari. We had an Atari as well and really wanted the Asteroids game too. We found out our cousin already had the game in his expansive collection and we told my parents of this. At this point in our lives, we didn't believe in Santa anymore, so my parents would wrap gifts as they were bought and torment us by leaving them under the tree, weeks before Christmas.
Leading up to the big day, we were all sitting around near the tree, trying to guess what the presents were. All three of us kids were like, "This is Asteroids" pointing to our new game. My dad was like, "How do you know? "It's not Asteroids." He got all three of us to say, "Yes it is! I'll bet you $20 it is!" Come Christmas, we opened our presents to find picture frames. Taped to them were three $20 bills...which we all had to give to my dad for losing the bet. But there was a twist.
Asteroids were wrapped and hidden under the kitchen sink.
32. Let Them Eat Cake!
Long ago, during my senior year, we had an advanced chemistry class, so only 13 students were in the class. It was a test day, so we had a devious day of fun planned. Our valedictorian asked to go to the bathroom before the test. He left and sprinted to the payphones (this happened a long time ago) next to the cafeteria, and called the office.
When they picked up, the valedictorian put on his best “adult” voice and asked to speak with our teacher immediately. The secretary called him to the office, so he left. Immediately, the rest of us busted out a grocery store birthday cake, put up birthday decorations and balloons, and passed out party hats—the whole nine yards.
Meanwhile, the teacher got to the office and picked up the phone. The valedictorian, on the other end of the line, says, “Prank call!” He quickly hung up and sprinted back to class. The teacher got back and we started singing happy birthday. He was like “It’s not my birthday...” but went along with it. We successfully postponed the test to next week.
33. Foodception
On April Fool's day one year, my mom doctored an entire meal to look like other kinds of foods. She mixed vanilla ice cream and some yellow food coloring to make "mashed potatoes," molded green beans out of taffy, and made some kind of incredibly convincing "lasagna" out of cheesecake bits and red frosting in a casserole dish. We were thrilled...but then she brought out an actual meal.
34. Motor Mayhem
Long ago, someone donated an old VW Bug to our school for an auto class. A group of seniors disassembled the car and reassembled it around a tree in the middle of the night on a weekend, all in a single session. The staff was so impressed that they left it there for the week! It was gone the following Monday and I wasn't able to find anyone who knew exactly what happened to it.
35. Rerouting To Destination
I pranked my husband for his 40th birthday. I kept joking I'd take him on a great trip, so a few days before, I took a road trip over to Carowinds near the North and South Carolina border. I went to this filthy hotel near there called The Plaza and got a brochure and a piece of letterhead from them. I also picked up tons of brochures for cheesy attractions in the region.
I gave him an envelope with a "gift certificate" to stay at The Plaza, along with the pamphlet that showed the ugly pink place in its full glory. (We'd ridden past it many times, so he knew of it). He wasn't quite sure what to make of it. As he was rooting through these, giving me a dirty look, he came upon the final piece of the present.
The last pamphlet was one I created that included the itinerary for our flight to and information on the bed and breakfast where we would be staying, as well as photos of all the cool things we were going to do for his birthday.
36. Barking Up The Wrong Tree
Our school was putting in a brand new turf field and it was taking a long time—but my friend managed to make it take even longer. He decided to dig up our state tree and plant it right in the middle of the field. Apparently, it’s illegal to uproot our state tree, so it stayed there for two weeks and halted the construction. The workers literally moved dirt around it like it was supposed to be there.
I was told you have to get state approval to dig up a state tree, so I guess they had to wait on that. Eventually, they realized that he had just broken off a branch and planted a branch, not an entire tree, so they were able to “uproot” it. At least that’s the excuse I heard as to why it was taken up. Either way, it gave the whole school a few good laughs for a while.
37. Whip It Good
My mom was a pretty big health nut when my brother and I were younger, so any sort of sugary treat was always a huge deal. It was a weekend, so we were allowed dessert after dinner and my mom decided to let us have ice cream. My brother was playing video games, so my mom called me into the kitchen to help her scoop it out. Awesomeness. I spooned out three servings for us and then got ready to put on some Cool Whip.
That's when she suggested we put sour cream on my brothers' ice cream. As a younger brother who was constantly picked on and bullied, it brought me great joy to see him take a huge bite of "Cool Whip."
38. An A-moo-sing Tale
My friend and I brought a dump truck full of hay bales from my family farm and literally blocked off every single entrance and exit to the building with them. We did this really early in the morning, and the school was in the middle of nowhere so nobody knew exactly who did it except me, his partner in crime. We got school canceled for a day and a half.
Why did we do this? The principal was an absolute dirtbag who hated kids. My friend’s sister got in trouble for something she didn't do and he brought her to the principal's office, forcing her to apologize for allegedly trashing the girls’ bathroom to the entire school over the PA. She left the office in tears that day.
When we were done with the escapade, we also filled his car with turkey feed through his open skylight on the first day back while everyone else was at a meeting about the aforementioned hay baling. Everyone had an idea of who did it, but since nobody was around for it and the cameras weren't working, we got away with it.
39. Fast Forward
On Christmas Day sometime in the '90s, We had a rule that I couldn't wake my mom before 7 am to open presents. One year, my uncle put all the clocks forward three hours. I woke up super early, as usual, saw it was 7 am, woke up my uncle first (who had been out clubbing the night before), and we returned with a few whistles. I tried to wake her but she refused to get up, saying it was too early.
Cue 20 minutes of me and my uncle running around the house blowing whistles and shouting wildly. It was glorious.
40. One Sticky Situation
My kid and his best friend started the Bubblegum Cartel in middle school. It was basically a small-time MLM, and they got a good portion of the school involved. The kids on the bottom sold it, and my little guys provided the “goods” and made the money. I’m throwing my kids under the bus here, but I’m not even mad, just amazed!
Apparently, it got so deep that the middle school—on three separate occasions—had to have a town hall to inform the kids that the Bubblegum Cartel had to stop and that they didn't know who the perpetrators were. They told the kids selling gum that they needed to stop since they were doing all the work, while the perpetrators took advantage of them.
But here's the best part—through all of middle school, not a single student turned them in. And the school had no idea that my son and his BFF were the head of the cartel. It’s funny—I was wondering why he kept asking me to buy him gum wherever we went. I thought it was a phase. He then informed me it was free gum to sell. I could not stop laughing after I found everything out.
My partner was incredulous that my son took advantage of me, but I couldn't get mad about it (although I should have been). That night, for the first time in my life, I was floating on clouds and felt what peace must actually feel like. After all, if my kid could pull off a scheme on this grand of a scale, I realized that my kid was going to be OK.
41. To The Track!
I guess I pranked myself! My dad had stayed late at work for months making us this super awesome petrol go-kart for Christmas. On Christmas day, they gave us a large box with a racing helmet and a set of keys inside. Well, my sister and I were pretty confused, but not wanting to seem like ungrateful little brats, we got excited and started playing with the helmet.
They just stood by and smiled while we zoomed around the living room until my dad sent us outside for chores (On Christmas day! Come ON, dad!). Only, we didn't notice the brand new shiny go-kart and proceeded to feed the chickens, complaining loudly. They eventually had to come clean and point it out to us.
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42. Just “Kidding!”
On the way to our school, there was an old hotel with a huge area infested with kudzu, an invasive type of ivy. They had deployed something like twelve goats to slowly eat it all and get rid of it. It was gaining local attention, and so a local news station had stopped to do a story on it. A kid at school was driving home from school alone one day and he decided to make the most of the situation.
Impulsively, he pulled over to tell them he was a “goat expert.” After he told them he was getting his Ph.D., he was featured on the local news that night. It was like three minutes of him rambling on about made-up goat facts. The video caused a big scandal at my private school and it was pulled from the internet. On the last day of my senior year, they showed it to the whole school. He was a character for sure.
43. Sax, Relax
It was just before Christmas when I was in high school. I was the biggest band nerd ever and I had just recently started playing the soprano sax. My mom's boyfriend had one that I usually borrowed. One day, I stayed home sick from school, so I used the time to practice a piece I was working on. They came home that night and started yelling that I had ruined it.
They said I would have to buy my mom's boyfriend a new one and it would never be the same, blah blah blah. All I could see was them looking visibly freaked out with an open case in front of them. My mom's boyfriend shut the case and asked me why I ruined it. I was almost in tears, freaking out about whatever I did when they turned the case towards me, still looking super upset.
I grabbed the case and opened it, then started to freak out even more when I saw a brand new, red soprano sax in the case. They then pulled out a new case that had his sax in it, completely unharmed. They started laughing before telling me, "Merry Christmas, GOTCHA!"
44. Breaking The Ice
I had a history teacher who would always go on and on about his favorite hockey team. One day, about a week before exams, he got called down to the office. After about five minutes, one of the kids went up to the teacher’s desk and started typing. Suddenly, he said, "Wow… His password is actually the name of his favorite hockey team.”
After a bit more searching, his eyes widened. He added, “All our grades are here. What do you guys want?" People were slow to take him up on his offer, but soon, everybody was maniacally shouting out grades, and the kid started typing. He got back to his desk before the teacher came back. Everyone passed, and grades were never changed back. It soon became pretty clear why though.
You see, that teacher was gone for about 20 to 30 minutes, but he probably wasn’t actually down at the office. At that time, there was a rumor going around the school that he and the English teacher were hooking up. The rumors might have had some truth to them since the two teachers did get married around three years later.
45. What Comes Around...
When I was seven and my brother was four, we found some brand new bikes in the shed a week before Christmas. The shed was locked, but we somehow managed to break the bikes out. All this happened while my parents were sleeping at like 7 am on a Saturday morning. My parents woke up to us riding our bikes up and down the street.
They stopped us and claimed the bikes must have been stolen. My parents called a family friend that is a cop and he showed up in his patrol car to take the bikes. When he arrived, he thanked us for finding them. We were pretty sad that the bikes were taken away. But then, on Christmas morning, we woke up to the same bikes and a note from the cop claiming he told Santa to give the bikes back (since we were nice enough to return them).
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46. A Close Call
When I was still in high school, my school had this automated system that would call home in the evening and tell the parents if their kid was absent. I figured out that if the parents called in a legit absence, I could ditch the next time and not get caught since the system wouldn’t call home. So, a couple of weeks into my senior year, I ditched class for a week straight.
After that, things quickly escalated. I basically said "Whatever," and ditched all of my classes for eight weeks. I realized that the scheme would soon come crashing down on my head, so one morning, I got a brilliant idea. Before school, I called the attendance office, and basically impersonated my dad. It was all part of my incredible plan.
When they picked up, I said, in my most adult-sounding voice, "My son just left for school and forgot his note. He's been out for eight weeks with strep throat." The lady replied, "No worries, we'll take care of it when he comes in.” After that, I left for school. When I got to the office, I stood in line, and when I got to the front, I started checking my pockets with my best “Oh no!" face.
The attendance lady noticed and said, "Oh, don't worry, your dad called and explained it all." Unfortunately, my guidance counselor came strolling up to me and started calling me out. He wasn't buying the eight weeks of strep throat lie. Just as I thought I was in real trouble, the bell rang. He looked at me, sighed, and let me go to class.
47. Follow The Clues
My parents were awesome at Christmas time. They always made an effort to make each year as special as possible. This one Christmas, however, has to be my favorite. It was the year the N64 came out. At the time, those were nearly impossible to get your hands on. People were paying three to four times the store price to make sure their kid got one. So about a week or two before Christmas, my mom started to brace me for the fact that the N64 I wanted so badly likely wouldn't be under the tree.
I was visibly upset but told her I understood. I woke up on Christmas morning and walked to the living room in hopes that a minor miracle had occurred and that a new, shiny N64 awaited me under the tree. It did not. I was sad, naturally, but my parents informed me that they'd buy me one once one came available. Not bad, huh? I just had to wait a little while longer.
We continued our day as we traditionally did when my mother came into the living room all excited. "I...I just ran to check the mail and there was a letter addressed to you. It doesn't say who it's from." I opened the letter and saw it was from Santa (I knew the truth by then, but she still liked giving credit to the big man. Plus, she didn't want to spoil it for my little sister). It was a clue.
I followed it and it led to another clue. On and on this went. They had me going from the freezer, then to the back yard, then to the garage, and back inside again. I had spent over an hour deciphering clue after clue until I finally arrived at the dryer. I opened it up and there, hidden under a pile of clothes, was my N64. I screamed like a little girl. BEST. CHRISTMAS. EVER.
I came to find out that my mother was not lying about not being able to find it in an effort to pull off this epic surprise. She really couldn't. It's just that my granddad had somehow managed to get his hands on one. For himself. When he heard about my mom's inability to find one, he insisted that she give me his.
48. A Wet And Wild Day
This happened at Basic Training. We all had to do swim tests and water training. Those of us who were good swimmers passed on the first day and moved on with training. The recruits who didn’t know how to swim had to do extra swim practice over the next few weeks. One of our best swimmers was a guy named Robinson, who was basically the platoon clown.
Robinson always had something funny to say, and he was constantly getting berated by the drill sergeants. Now, one of our drill sergeants was a very attractive woman, and although she was without a doubt tough as nails, she was the closest thing to a loving mother you could get. She was also one of the swim instructors, so she would put on a one-piece bathing suit for those activities.
While we were in formation, she was listing off the names of the recruits who had to swim training that day. When she got to “Robinson,” she went off, demanding to know why he was pretending to not know how to swim. His response was priceless. “I just like looking at your pretty legs, Drill Sergeant Davis!” Everyone in our unit, including the other two drill sergeants, and Drill Sergeant Davis, completely lost it.
She didn’t let us get away with it, of course. We did an unbelievable number of push-ups and sit-ups for that remark, but we all agreed it was worth it.
49. Gone Fishin'
I haven't been pranked on a holiday, but we did get my grandfather one year. When I was 12, I went to my grandparents' house with my family for Thanksgiving festivities. There was a problem with the kitchen sink and my grandfather spent a bunch of time working on it. With some help from my dad, he had it fixed in a little while, which was a big deal for him as he was legally blind from macular degeneration.
At some point in the night, my uncles came to me and my cousin and asked if we wanted to go fishing. We were on Long Island and my uncles wanted to take my grandfather's boat out. We drove to the marina and went fishing for a few hours. I ended up catching a four-foot striped bass. So we went home with the fish in the cooler and decided to play a trick on my grandfather.
He had gone out to the Elks Club or something and he got back around 11. We told him that the sink was acting up again and he needed to take a look at it. He started grumbling and cursing, then he went to his room to change into his work clothes. He later came out into the kitchen with his tools, coveralls, and a bucket.
There in the sink was the striped bass with an apple in its mouth. I'll never forget how much he laughed when he realized he didn't have to fix his sink again.
50. Bending The Rules
One of our teachers in high school had a rule that if you swore, you had to go down to the canteen and buy her a chocolate bar. During some of her classes, we had to take turns reading something for the class. One of my classmates was dyslectic and just didn't like reading in general, so he took her rule to heart.
Every time the teacher chose him to read, he swore loudly so he had to go to the canteen. It also meant that he didn't have to read. I think the teacher did catch wind of his trick, but she was just too amused by it to stop him.
51. The Truth Comes Out
On April Fools Day many years ago, my mom and dad decided to prank my brother and me. We lived across from a church, and we went to a Catholic school that we despised, so my dad thought it would be hilarious to run into the room and scream, "Come quick! The church is on fire!!!" Like the little demons we were, we jumped up and down in glee and ran into the living room to look through the windows at the burning church. Mom said she never saw us both so excited.
52. A Scandalous Graduation
My high school had a tradition at graduation: the seniors snuck in beach balls under their robes, inflated them during the ceremony, and tossed them around with the caps at the end. Good, clean, harmless fun. Of course, my class had the brilliant idea to also bring inflatable blow-up dolls and other less-than-appropriate inflatables.
The class was huge, with hundreds of students, so no one caught on until there were several dolls flying around the gym, forever caught on the videos all the parents were shooting. The dean turned purple with rage, and the authorities scrambled around trying to catch and remove the offending inflatables. It was completely impossible.
You see, we had already accounted for this. We made very sure to keep hitting them as high in the air as possible, and as deep in the crowd as possible. They didn’t allow inflatable anything in later years.
53. Beneath The Boots
On Christmas morning, about five years ago, my sister tore through the wrapping paper of the last present my parents handed her. So far, it was a good year for presents; not a lot better than the previous year, but we still got what we wanted. Beneath the paper, she found a Doc Martin's box. She was ecstatic since she had been asking for a pair for a couple of years now.
She opened up the box, smiling the biggest smile I'd seen on her face since childhood—and then her face fell. Inside, she only found my dad's old combat boots. Seeing her face light up then fall in disappointment, heartbreak, and anger was the best present that year. After some pestering to put them on, she reached in to find the iPod she also asked for. She laughs about it now, kind of.
54. When You’ve Seen It All
One time, my friend was angry at the rest of us guys. He chased us into the school bathroom because he wanted to be a tough guy and thought one of us was hiding in a stall. He yelled, "Peekaboo, I see you!" and kicked the stall door in on a teacher we all knew. I will never forget his reaction. The teacher just said, "I see you too Nathan, now close the door."
55. Anytime Now...
There was a HUGE box under the Christmas tree one year. My sister and I were so anxious to open it. Our parents finally woke up and we were crawling around the tree, sizing up presents like lions chasing after gazelles. My father said, "Wait, don't open anything! I have to go to the bathroom real quick!" We were sitting there patiently, waiting for the sound of him washing his hands so we know game time is upon us...
What was taking so long? We then heard the sound of him brushing his teeth. Man! OK, fine. He'll be done soon, right? We heard the water running again in the sink. NOW he was done! Yes! NO! The water shut off and then we heard the faucet in the tub running. He proceeded to bathe, taking his sweet time...I'd say he delayed our Christmas present opening by about 30 minutes with that morning routine; but when you're younger, it feels like hours.
We were seriously trolled that morning, but the Sega Genesis and Sonic we got made up for it.
56. Confidence Gets You Everywhere
There was this guy who was almost universally liked in my high school. He did everything—took AP classes, theater, football, even track. His grades were good but he wasn't the valedictorian. That didn't stop him from getting up during the graduation ceremony and giving a speech like there was nothing strange about it. And they let him finish, too.
57. False Alarm
One year in elementary school, we had a snow day. April 1st came around and it landed on a Saturday. My parents woke me up super early and told me that I had to get ready for school to make up for the snow day. I bawled my eyes out screaming, "But it's Saturday!" Yet they still got me fully ready for school and out the door, crying the whole time, before they told me, "April Fools!"
I have no idea how they didn't give in to how incredibly devastated I was. Needless to say, April Fools is no longer celebrated to this degree in my house.
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58. Dressed For Success
One day in seventh grade, the class clown was saddened by the fact that our female math teacher didn't wear a dress again, even though he had verbally asked. He promised her that the following day, he would wear a dress as well so that she wouldn't be the only one. Well, the next day came around and everyone was surprised—she still wasn't in a dress.
The class clown came in later not wearing one either and he was shocked when he saw her. She responded with, "Neither did you!" Then, the absolute legend started undressing, to reveal that under his normal clothes, he was wearing his sister's dress. We all collectively lost it, and he actually wore it for the rest of the class.
59. Logging Out
When my little brother was about 10 years old, my mom bought a six-foot-long Christmas stocking at a garage sale. On Christmas Eve, she wrote his name on it and filled it with logs for the fire the next day. Cue the next morning where we could all hear him thundering down the stairs to unwrap the presents in his stocking.
He ran back upstairs completely speechless about his GIANT present. It almost broke our hearts to see him that excited. Almost. He sprinted back downstairs to open it, and about half a minute later, we heard a furious "DAD!" from the living room. Poor guy got blamed for it since he was the one usually playing tricks on us. We all had a good laugh, especially my mom.
60. Seen A Ghost
I had a truancy problem in high school. For some reason, two of my friends told our teachers I was gone and buried. They decorated my locker as a memorial, and the office made an announcement that anyone needing to speak with a social worker should do so. Here’s the thing, though: I was in the school when the announcement happened.
No, seriously. I was literally just sitting at a desk in the library. One of my teachers showed up at my house with flowers for my mom. Apparently, nobody bothered to actually verify their story, and they just took my friends’ word for it. I walked back into my first-period class the next day and someone actually gasped. The level of stupid in some administrations is so bizarre.
61. Cabbage Surprise
At a wedding, there is usually a table where all the guests put their gifts. My cousin and his wife were invited to a wedding. They brought with them a nice gift—it was wrapped beautifully with a card attached. But they also wrapped a cabbage in a nice gift wrap...though it had no card. They walked into the reception each carrying a gift and left the two gifts on the table.
It's now many years later and I don't think they have ever confessed that they were the ones that gave them the cabbage.
62. Baring It All
At my school, the entire senior boys’ football team streaked through the cafeteria the day after the season ended. However, they didn’t have any plans for covering up once they got outside. One of the vice principals just collected their clothing while chuckling to himself as 25 boys ran around the parking lot, with no plans on what to do after they were done.
63. Dream Man
My parents are boring—they don't ever do pranks. But my brother, on the other hand, does a Christmas prank every year. Last year, he pulled one on my husband. My brother bought a trunk, decorated it, and put my husband's name on it. Then my husband went to open this lovely trunk...and out flew a bologna, which slapped his face. But nothing beats his prank from the year before.
He got me really good. He made a DVD with a label that said: "Watch me now." He had created a video of celebrity crushes I had growing up. Then, in the end, it read: "...And finally, the man that she loved so much. Please turn around and open the door behind you." So I did so and it was just a cardboard cutout of my father. I was laughing so hard.
64. A Valentine’s Day Legend
I went to a school with only 150 kids. I had an idea that me and my buddy would pool money and buy a rose and a valentine for every single girl at school and have them delivered with both our names on them. I figured since Valentine's Day can be depressing for single people, we could also include a nice personalized compliment in each delivery.
I drafted the list of recipients, wrote up personalized messages, and gave them to my buddy so he could put the order in. Valentine’s Day came, and I was surprised when I found out what he actually did—my buddy had only put his name on the cards. He was an instant legend and even ended up on the local news. I have no idea why he decided to betray me in such a petty manner,
When I tried to point out that it was MY idea, and that half of it was paid for by me, he acted like he didn't know what I was talking about. Everyone started making fun of me for trying to steal credit, and he's still legendary for it. I decided to get over it a year or so after high school and just let him have it, but at the time it was a pretty big knife in my back from somebody I considered my best friend.
65. Cake Mistake
For my mom's birthday, my brother and I tried to surprise her by making a gigantic cake. We started off with four layers, but we messed up one of the layers and it got all spongy and gross somehow. We saved it anyway—we put the main cake together and hid it in the fridge. When she came home, we put the messed-up layer on the table and we were like, "Happy birthday! We made you a cake!"
She was like "...That looks delicious, thank you so much!" and then we brought out the real cake, and she sighed with relief, saying, "Oh thank God, I really didn't want to have to eat that first cake."
66. A Wholesome Graduation
A girl in our class found out that our principal liked racing and cars in general, so she started a big chain text orchestrating something special. Each member of our senior class at graduation gave our new principal a toy car as we walked across the stage. The principal lost his composure and laughed all the way through the graduation ceremony. Good times.
67. Later Gator
I got a toy alligator once for Christmas when I was eight or nine years old. You know, the kind they sell at gift shops in Florida? It looked completely real and was probably four feet long from head to tail. My dad decided he was going to place it on the floor beside my bed, facing the bed, so it would scare me when I woke up.
It did the trick and I remember letting out a couple of good screams before I realized it was the present I had received from the previous day. My parents still have it at their house and it creeps me out to this day.
68. The Serial Prankster
A friend of mine went to a high school in a three-story building. He and two friends each released a large box of live crickets on each floor. They also slapped a big chunk of Limburger cheese to the basement radiator in the winter. They had to close the school for three days to air it out. They were troublemakers though, so the “fun” didn’t end there.
The last straw was when they walked a cow up to the third floor and let him wander the hall just as class was getting out. To make things worse, people had been complaining that the elevator was broken for a year. Also, cows can't walk downstairs. They had to tranquilize the cow to get him out of the building. My friend had to finish high school in another state.
69. Phone-Fished
I am a blood relative of Frank Zappa, and when I was little, I was very excited to be related to a rock star. I found out all I could about him, and I was always outwardly excited to know that his children Moon-Unit and Dwezil were still alive and that I might one day be able to talk to them. One day, I heard the phone ring, and my mom frantically yelled for me to answer it because it was apparently for me.
She told me it was Dwezil before I picked it up, and naturally, I burst with excitement. Then I heard the voice speak—and all my anticipation disappeared in an instant. It was only grandma. I hung up instantly and started to cry.
70. Airplane Antics
I call what happened the “paper airplane event.” We had this very old teacher who used to shout tirades of funny old-fashioned insults at people who messed about before sending them out, so people were "halfwits," "nincompoops," and so forth. We used to get him mad just to hear what he would say. This led to the “paper airplane event.”
In one lesson, I managed to convince almost the entire class to make paper airplanes, and then got one kid to call the teacher over for "assistance." At that moment, I initiated the epic prank—I signaled silently for launch and about 25 paper airplanes flew through the air towards him. His response, whilst batting them away from his head, was "Good gracious! It's like the bloody blitz in here!" What he did next made the whole thing even funnier.
He picked one of the planes up, looked it over, and then said, "That's not a plane, this is a plane!" He proceeded to show us how to remodel it into a better type of paper airplane. Needless to say, when I learned that said teacher was to host a group assembly in our lecture hall, I wasted no time in informing the entire year via group email that we had to make paper airplanes to his new specifications.
Halfway through that assembly, whilst he was facing the display screen at the front, I gave the covert signal to fire, and about eighty faster, more nimble airplanes flooded the stage. He then turned around, picked one up, looked at it, and said, "Bloody good work lads, that's what I call a plane," and everyone gave him a round of applause. He wasn’t done yet, though!
He then called me by name, and said, "Of course, I'll need you to stay behind after to pick all these up," which utterly shocked me. How did he know it was me? But the entire year group, including me, thought it was hilarious, and yeah, of course, I had no comeback. It was honestly so incredibly funny, I'll never forget it.
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71. The Proof Is In The Diamonds
When I was 10, I realized that Santa didn't exist. I told my mom this. That Christmas, I saw a little bag attached to the tree, and in the bag was this beautiful necklace that I was convinced had real diamonds in it. The card in the bag said: "Always Believe. Santa." I asked my mom, and she was adamant that she didn't get it for me. I believed in Santa for another year because of that.
72. A Porky Prank
The senior class in my high school brought three pigs into the school in the morning. You think this would be bad enough—but wait, there's more. They painted the numbers, "1," "2," and "4" on the sides of each pig. They were all caught fairly quickly; however, the staff spent the next day and a half looking for the nonexistent pig #3.
73. Fire Safety
When I was 15, I opened my presents and got socks and a fire extinguisher (because I accidentally set fire to a tree during the summer), along with other small things. I was a little disappointed, while my brother got better stuff. My parents acted like that was it for about 10 minutes, then pulled a PS2 out of the closet. Then it was all better!
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74. Graffiti Gone Wild
Our computer teacher was always late for class. One day, while waiting for our teacher to show up, my friend drew a giant pecker on the whiteboard, then rolled down the projector screen over it. By pure luck, our computer teacher didn't turn up. Instead of him, the teacher who was the head of the discipline came to take the class. We definitely knew we were in for a world of trouble.
As he was talking, he absentmindedly rolled up the projector screen. We somehow managed to keep straight faces as he continued speaking for five minutes in front of my friend’s masterpiece. After way too long, he finally turned around and couldn't help but laugh. No punishments, surprisingly, just a good laugh all around!
75. A Quick Fix
When I was young, my grandma burnt the turkey beyond reclaim. To rectify it, she ordered another one last minute from a local catering service and it was delivered promptly. The joke was that the catering company was the place where my grandfather had been working for 20 years and we didn't tell him about the true origin of the turkey or her screw-up for an entire year. Is that funny to others or just us?
76. Too Smart For Their Own Good
In my last year of secondary school, two weeks before our SAT exams, the whole class that was full of smart kids decided to just skip school and go to a theme park over 100 miles away. Their teacher walked in to discover that everyone but two guys was gone. Obviously, their teacher was incredibly upset by this turn of events.
When they returned, they were hauled to the principal's office, but they only received a stern talking to. No action was taken because these guys already excelled at their studies. In fact, the school depended on them to make the school look good. The school has never been one to enforce any kind of discipline, and they weren’t about to do it then.
77. My Screen Froze
My favorite prank is still the one when I opened up MS PowerPoint on a friend's computer, put a desktop screenshot on the first slide, then a picture of a plain blue screen on the second. I waited with bated breath for him to click something, and after a few minutes, he started raging, just as I had envisioned he would. Also, putting Goatse on the second slide is equally effective.
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78. Cracking Under Pressure
When I was a junior in high school, we had to attend this ceremony where the seniors would state what college they were going to attend and also what their career goals were. In addition, they would "pass the torch" onto us and pin something on our school uniform. I don’t think the school ever could’ve predicted how this one girl would react, though!
This girl was stressed out by all the unnecessary school politics happening around her and the stress they were putting the students under. So, when it was her turn to get on stage and say what her career goals were and what school she was going to, she just blurted out that she wanted to become an adult worker and sell brownies on the street.
Everyone lost their minds and the girl left the stage in a hurry. I soon realized that there were recruiters in attendance and that made my school look bad. After a few minutes, the girl had to go back on stage and apologize for what she had done, and she ended up saying that she wanted to open up a bakery when she got older.
From what I remember, the girl ended up getting suspended for a few days for doing that. Still, it was the funniest and boldest thing I have ever seen anyone do.
79. Bieber Fever
I did this one a few years back to my brother. I put on Craigslist that I had two tickets to the upcoming Justin Bieber concert. I said that I had gotten them for my girlfriend, but we broke up and I didn't feel like going alone. Being a good-natured fellow, I offered the tickets to anyone who could call or text and tell me why they were the biggest Justin Bieber fan.
I then listed my brother's phone number. For a full day, he had screaming little girls telling him all the Justin Bieber facts that they knew while I just sat back and laughed.
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80. Seeing Double
My vice-principal drove an old VW Beetle. He loved this car. It was lime green and in pretty great shape. During the last day of school, he had to break up a pretty drawn-out disagreement between a pair of students—it was the classic "rich kid" versus "punk kid" drama. This made him especially tired. Naturally, he was tired, so he didn’t think much of what happened next.
When he went out to the parking lot to drive home and couldn't seem to remember where he parked his Beetle, he chalked it up to exhaustion. Eventually, he found it, but his key didn't work. Confused, he looked up and saw another lime green VW Beetle a few cars down. And then a third. And a fourth. And a fifth. He was so confused; what was going on?
You see, one of the kids' dads owned a pull-a-part. For three years, every time they got a Beetle in, they would set it aside for this prank. For three years, they painted them green and fixed them up to look exactly like the VP’s car. They couldn’t be driven, but the dude's dad had a tow truck as a part of his pull-a-part business.
On the last day of school, the dude got his friends to fake an argument to keep the VP's attention while they used the tow truck to bring in the decoys and move the VP's original bug. We all thought it was the best prank in the world, but the VP was too tired to appreciate it at the time. Later on, we heard later on that the VP loved it too.
81. Box In A Box In A...
My grandfather would get dozens of boxes, ranging from big to small, put some cash in a tiny box, wrap it, place it inside a bigger box, wrap it, and so on. He'd do this until he had an appliance-sized box with like 20 smaller boxes inside it, all wrapped neatly. By the time you were done, you were covered in a mountain of wrapping paper and cardboard.
82. Prayer Gone Wrong
I went to a Catholic school, so we had school-wide prayers in the morning and afternoon. Each prayer was broadcasted over the school PA system and was always led by two students that were randomly picked by one of the teachers. As you can probably imagine, this was a surefire recipe for disaster, which our school learned the hard way.
One morning, right before the end of the morning prayer, one of the dudes leading it decided to pass gas for a long, winding three seconds over the PA system, then said "Amen." Every single classroom burst out in laughter, including the teacher who was in our class. The gas boy got expelled, but he'll forever be remembered.
83. Turkey C-Section
On Thanksgiving many years ago, when my cousins and I were much younger, my dad cooked the turkey for dinner. What he didn't tell us was that he had put a cornish hen inside of the turkey. He proceeded to act very surprised while carving the bird and he said that it had "been pregnant." Many of us cried that day.
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84. The Flagpole Prank
A student shimmied up to the top of a flag pole at our school while carrying a bucket with a dumb face on it and put it on the top. The school was furious but was unable to get it down, so it stayed up there a long time. Soon, someone noticed a fire truck using their ladder to remove it, but someone decided that they couldn’t let that be the end of it. When we got back, there was another bucket with even dumber faces on it.
85. Joke's On Me
One year, I was Miss Altruistic and I asked my family to donate money to any charity of their choosing in my name. That Christmas night, they gave my brother an envelope with a big check.
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86. Celebrity Crush
A few years ago, a class pulled a prank on the French teacher. For reference, she has a HUGE celebrity crush on Bradley Cooper, so everyone in the class got print-out masks of his face. Then, they waited for their chance—which came when she got a phone call and had to go out into the hallway. The class quickly put their plan into motion.
While she was outside, everyone put on their masks and turned away from the door. She walked back in… and everyone collectively turned to her. She completely lost it.
87. Full Of Peanuts
I filled the window of my boss's office with styrofoam peanuts. From the outside, it appeared like the whole office was full. But from the inside, you could see that they were just held in place by bags. I set up a camera in the hall to record his horrified reaction as he walked up. The best part? Minimal clean-up.
88. Student Shenanigans
One of the seniors in my class found a way to access the school’s faculty administrative system and tried to change all of his grades to As—until someone pointed out that he’ll obviously get caught when they see that he somehow went from a 1.7 to a 4.0 GPA. Then, he just decided to just give everybody a 4.0. It resulted in absolute mayhem.
The event ended up on the news at one point because they were so sure it was some hacker that attacked the school. They tried to change it back, but most teachers never paid enough attention to keep track of who wasn’t doing so well, so they just left it. I believe the valedictorian told on him, and they tried to charge him, but eventually, the charges were dropped due to a lack of evidence.
A lot of students who were failing ended up getting to go to college and even got full rides thanks to him.
89. Call Me Maybe
I changed the preferences on one of my friend's Pandora channels. I liked Carley Rae Jepsen on all of his channels and he didn't figure it out for MONTHS. He never did clue in on why the indie rock channel kept playing "Call Me Maybe."
90. Testing Your Beliefs
If we asked our teacher something about the lesson that was incorrect, he would respond with, "If you believe that, then it says ‘gullible’ on the ceiling." One day, he stepped out of class for a minute and a bunch of us taped a piece of paper with "gullible" written on it on the ceiling above his desk. Then we waited…
When the time eventually came, he tried so hard to not be amused by it, but he laughed about it for a while and left it up there until the end of the school year.
91. Bubble Wrap Bandit
When I was in college, I'd go home for Winter or Spring Break and bring back as much bubble wrap as I could. I'd then return to school a day early and proceed to place bubble wrap under every doormat in every building. I didn't care if it was April 1st, if it was rainy or snowy...It was happening.
92. Vanished Into Thin Air
Back in tenth grade, our school had to take on far more students than possible thanks to some stupid "reforms." This resulted in every possible room being repurposed as classrooms. We had desks placed in the former school kitchen after they got rid of the stoves, a part of the gym was walled off, and a fair share of storage and utility rooms were packed full with benches and moveable chalkboards.
We were the one lucky class residing in a former storage room, which was basically a slightly bigger broom closet with zero natural light and a hardly-working ventilation system. That room had nothing except for one thing: built-in closets on every wall. Our class soon found some fun ways to use these closets to our advantage.
Now, about halfway through the school year, we discovered that the backs of these closets were just half-inch thick wooden plates and that those plates were the only thing separating our "classroom" from the hallway outside. We also discovered that in one of the closets, the plate was loose on one side. You could push it open from the inside and step out in the hallway.
This worked just from the inside, because once you stepped through, the panel slipped back in its original position, leaving no clue that it was a hidden exit. Naturally, one glorious day, the whole class decided to play the best prank ever. During the last two hours of the day, we would step into the closet one by one, seemingly disappearing into thin air.
We would start slowly, with those sitting nearest to the secret exit. They would wait until the teacher turned their back to the class, writing something on the chalkboard. He didn't even notice the first one vanishing. He scratched his head at the second one. Then we got bolder. The students further away also snuck out once the teacher's back was turned.
At the fourth one missing, he asked us what was going on. We, of course, acted like we knew nothing, and said the missing students called in sick the whole day and had never been in the classroom. We actually convinced him! So, we took the next step and, again, one by one, students would just up and leave every three or so minutes.
After the sixth one went missing, he finally went to the closet, ripped open the door, and of course, he found an empty, innocent closet. We acted as if we wondered about his behavior, asking him if he was looking for something. Of course, he told us that he had seen those students enter the closet.
We told him that he must be mistaken because they were sick the whole day—it was flu season. This went on for an entire hour, with him ripping open the closet door multiple times before he finally decided to go to the director to have us all suspended. By this time, there were only five or six students left in the room.
Of course, as soon as the teacher left the classroom, we contacted the now missing rest of the class, who were waiting nearby to come back immediately. So when the teacher and the director came back, they found a full classroom. It was the most hilarious and at the same time impressive prank I ever took part in. Our poker faces would have put the most seasoned poker player to shame that day.
93. A Little Overcooked
We pulled a prank on my grandfather a few years ago. He had owned a smoker for several years, but he had never bothered to learn how to use it. My uncles finally convinced him to use it on a turkey in it for Thanksgiving. The cornish game hen we switched the turkey which had been burned on a grill to a bird-shaped lump of coal.
When he saw it, he flipped and accused my uncles of ruining Thanksgiving for everyone. They let him go for about 15 mins before they both broke down laughing. We still watch the video every year.
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94. A Science Experiment Gone Wrong
When my dad was in high school in the mid-'60s, a friend of his flushed metal sodium wrapped in foil with tiny pinholes in it. Once it reacted, it blew all the toilets off the walls on all three floors. The FBI was called in and the student body was questioned. Many people knew who did it and yet no one ratted him out. Talk about a close call!
95. Morphin' Time
When I was a kid, we went to a farm for Thanksgiving and they slaughtered our turkey. They cut the feet off, so I took them, put them inside my sweater, and grabbed them as if they were my hands. I was small enough that the ratio was such that it looked like I really did have scaly, reptilian hands. My mom was laying on the couch taking a nap, so I went up to her quietly and touched her cheek with one of my new hands.
When she started to stir, I screamed: "I'M CHANGING! I'M CHANGING! IT HURTS SO BAD!!!" She freaked the heck out and started screaming like crazy. She tried to back up against the back of the couch and ended up going over the edge of it. It took several members of my family to calm her down. Still, nobody took my new hands away.
96. A Spooky Situation
I had a laid-back English professor in college, and she had finished telling us about this story about ghosts—she's a strong believer—or something that happened at her house. She basically felt that she was being followed by this presence. Super spooky, but I found a way to make it a whole lot spookier. I sat far away from her, so I opened up a word document and typed, "We're coming for you" over and over again, and had it sent to the in-room printer.
The printer came to life, and since we had no reason to be using the printer, her face went pale. She looks at the paper and she just said, "Oh no." At that point, I started laughing my head off. She told us off even as everyone, including herself, started laughing as well.
97. Ew, Gross!
When I was a kid, I ran up to my parents' room at 6 am on April 1st, opened the door, and yelled: "MOM, DAD, THE CAR IS BEING TOWED!" This backfired on me, however, because when they sprang out of bed in alarm, they were both naked. Gross.
98. Leaving You Breathless
My school had two lunch periods to accommodate our population. The first time I realized something was up was during the second lunch period. I was walking in the stairwells to class when I started coughing, along with a lot of others. It felt like I’d swallowed sawdust. I was near the science labs, so I thought it might’ve been a chemical reaction gone wrong.
The next day during lunch, the upper forum was weirdly completely deserted. As I was going upstairs, my friends and I started noticing we felt the same; like there was sawdust in our throats. When we opened the door of the stairwell to the forum, the effect increased tenfold and a teacher ushered us back into the stairwell.
We’d barely gotten to class when the entire school was evacuated. When the truth got out, I was floored. I still have no clue who did it, but it turns out that someone had gone around spraying mace, or pepper spray, or SOMETHING into the ventilation shafts during lunch. The culprit was never found, but I do want to thank him for the fifteen-minute evacuation—I got to skip science class!
99. A Total Hero
This happened to my kid. He was the quiet kid that people made fun of or generally ignored. Another kid was getting tormented outside near this really big hill descending to the football field. My kid stepped up and told the tormentor to please leave the other kid alone, but this just set the guy off. He mouthed off at him and took a swing at him, but that was a mistake.
Not a lot of people at school knew my kid had been taking kung fu since fifth grade. He was a brown belt at that point, and his instructor was really big on practical applications and sparring. He dodged the punch and roundhouse kicked the guy in the jaw. The other guy rolled down almost the entire embankment before stopping. The prank was on the bully.
My kid got a two-week alternate school suspension for it. His mother gave him a lecture. I bought him a PS4.
100. Now That's Cruel
Ever since I can remember, my parents have let my sister and I open one present on Christmas Eve. One year, there were two GIANT boxes under the tree. I think I was 11 and my sister was 10, and these things were up to our chests. We could only imagine what was inside! When the time came for my sister and me to open our one present each, my mom threw us a curveball.
She said we could open them, but she got to pick which presents. To our surprise, she picks the two big boxes. Now, you have to understand that Christmas Eve was a big deal in my house. We would have a ton of family members over (my dad was one of nine siblings, so you get the idea). Everyone watched as my sister and I tore through the wrapping paper and ripped open the boxes.
The first thing we saw was crumpled-up newspaper, covering whatever was inside. We threw it everywhere, anxious to see what glorious present resided in such a giant box. More newspapers. It seemed to go on forever. Once we got to the bottom of the box, we stopped. My sister and I looked at each other in silence, confused as to why there was a brick duct-taped to the bottom of the box and nothing else, while my mom slithered away to laugh in the kitchen for 15 minutes.
101. I Can't, It's a Geo!
I was a lifeguard at a summer camp, and the cutest counselor there drove a little Geo Metro. So one night, with some help, we swam in the floating dock and pushed the car onto it. I set the emergency brake so that it wouldn’t roll off of the small platform, and then swam it back out into the lake and attached it to the buoys.
Our dining hall sat on a hill with a beautiful view of the lake and swimming area. The typical morning mist covering the lake made it take a minute for the car to be spotted. As soon as it was, laughter and chaos erupted. I dated that girl the next summer.
102. The Gullible Virgin
I had a high school friend, Sam, who wasn't…the brightest crayon in the box. Last I saw him, he was living with his addict girlfriend, who's pregnant with his child. Or, so that's what I thought. I haven't spoken much to him since he had gotten expelled from school, and our relationship faded into only Facebook updates on each other's lives.
The other day, I was speaking to a friend, who we'll call Sara, that still keeps in contact with Sam. He got brought up in conversation, mostly laughing about the ridiculous things he did in school, and then I asked about what he was up to. Now, back in high school, Sam vowed himself to celibacy. He didn't want to be intimate before marriage. Also, despite how strung out his current girlfriend is, the only drug he ever used was pot.
Sara: “You know the baby's not even his.” Me: “Wait, seriously?” Sara: “Yeah, he's a virgin.” Me: (confused because he posts on Facebook all the time of how happy he is about becoming a father) “Does…does he know?” Sara: (shaking her head) “Nope. He legitimately thinks he got her pregnant.” Sara let me have a moment, just to see the astonishment on my face.
She went on to tell me that when Sam first told her his girlfriend was pregnant, she asked him when did he start being intimate. Sam said he never did, however, they do perform oral. Sam believes that when his girlfriend…swallowed…it impregnated her with his child. Sara and a few others tried to explain to him that's not how it works, but he's either just lovestruck or just plain stupid.
There has been speculation that the true father is a guy who graduated a few years before us. He is Black. Sam is white. His girlfriend is white. She's about four months pregnant.
Sources: Reddit,
