You Can’t Fool Me…Unless You Try!

August 25, 2011

You Can’t Fool Me…Unless You Try!

I love my job and my coworkers…even though they play jokes on me ALL THE TIME.  They got me again today!!!

It goes WAY back…to gift wrapping Lee’s desk a long time ago.  Fast forward to April 2011 – just before Easter – she retaliated against me.  I arrived at my desk to find a bag of candy and a lottery scratch off ticket.  I scratched it off and FREAKED out (in a calm manner) when I saw I’d won $10,000 (who couldn’t use an extra 10k right?) only to discover the ticket was FAKE.  I can’t even begin to describe how sad I was the ticket was a phony.  The ticket now hangs on my office bulletin board. 

I attempted to get Lee back in May before she left LLT only to have my plan completely backfire.  This was hysterical throughout the entire sequence of events.  Let’s just say I respect the breed of mouse and will never purchase one again.   Enjoy the adventure.  

From: Sara Kleinpeter
Sent: Wednesday, May 11, 2011 4:35 PM
Subject: Lee's Departure

Ladies and gentlemen: While we are all sad Lee has found greener pastures and is leaving us Friday, it is only fitting that we send her off in the way she loves best: with a practical joke or two.  Please do not tell her, but here’s the plan:  since we all know she loves varmints so much, we will be gifting her a sweet LIVE mouse/rat/hamster in her desk following her morning smoke break.  Pictures and/or videos will follow.  Suggestions are welcome for additional pranks.  :) 

Also, do you guys want to go to lunch Friday with her?

From: Sara Kleinpeter
Sent: Thursday, May 12, 2011 12:23 PM
Subject: RE: Lee's Departure - GAME OVER

Well…looks like the joke was on me the whole time.  I was so excited – left work and went to the pet store and got the cutest mice I could.  (photos included are stock photos, not actual pics of our friends)  I was also required to purchase for our little friends a cage, food and bedding.  The mice came in a cardboard box that had all sorts of writing on it that I did not read.  I returned home around 6:30 pm and took care of my little one.  Once he was down for the night around 9:00 pm, I returned to my car to assemble the cage, feed the pets, etc only to discover they had eaten their way out of the box. After hours of trying to catch them in my car IN THE DARK, I gave up, placing traps on the floorboard with peanut butter.  Woke up this morning and the traps were untouched.  I am hoping they found their way out of my car on their own, but  have a feeling they are not based on the activity trail left when I dropped Graham off at school this morning.  Now, the car is outfitted with two live mice traps looking like the one pictured below as well as lots of double stick tape.  Let’s hope we catch them soon!  I’m happy to humor you all with my predicament and blame it all on Lee.   The joke’s on me (again) instead of her.  I’ll never win against her, thus quit trying.  Game over for me.  We will miss you Brenda Lee! 

brought the box inside to find this...

left these overnight in the car...found them the same way in the morning

see the holes on the bottom right of the box? 

traps in my car

what the mice looked like

From: Cathleen Carney
Sent: Thu May 12 11:26:22 2011
Subject: RE: Lee's Departure - GAME OVER

Anyone besides me laughing their A** off?????

Cathleen Carney

From: Michael Taylor
Sent: Thursday, May 12, 2011 11:32 AM
Subject: Re: Lee's Departure - GAME OVER

Me. That is so Sara!
Mike Taylor

From: Sara Kleinpeter
Sent: Thursday, May 12, 2011 12:55 PM
Subject: RE: Lee's Departure - GAME OVER

I’m happy to humor you all and to report that with the help of Eddie Legnon, Spots mouse is in custody.  See picture attached.  She’s getting to know her new home.  I’ll let you know when/if we find Brownie!   

we caught Spots...she's resting in her new home

NOTE:  We never found the brown mouse.  Spots went to live with one of the teachers at Graham’s daycare.  I am still subject to jokes about the incident. 

TODAY was different though.  My coworker Rachel called me before 7:30 am (WAY to early if you know me well enough) to tell me she’d seen something on the fax machine at work that I need to know.  Our office was recently, routinely drug tested and the results were in.  Rachel told me that my test came back as positive for cocaine.  I was in shock.  I’ve NEVER done an illegal substance in my LIFE.  I knew for certain that the test was dead wrong.  I immediately called Ben to see what I should do.  After a couple minutes we both thought it was best I call my boss Mike. I decided to wait until I was on the way to work before calling him – during the time leading up to calling him, I was furious.  I knew the results were wrong; no doubt about that; but I was furious that this company had so carelessly returned confidential test results to an unmanned fax machine over night.  I was also mad that the results were wrong…what kind of company was this anyway?   I wanted to march over there and tell them to retest me immediately and to it the right way ASAP. 

So I finally worked up the nerve to call Mike.  I went over all the “business” I need to talk to him about then started in on my plea about a retest.  I told him I knew Rachel shouldn’t have looked at the results but she just did and that was beside the point...that the results were wrong and I needed a to make sure the correct results were reported because I know I’ve never ever done drugs...(he could barely get a word in).

Then just like that, he simply told me that I needed to go along with it but he was pretty sure they were pulling my leg.  THEY GOT ME AGAIN.  This time without Lee’s mastermind – and the whole BR office was in on it. 

You know of any good practical jokes that I can do to them?  I’m obviously not great at executing them…so keep it simple. 

Hope you enjoyed a few light moments in my workday!

Until next time…