Last year I had a job teaching an officeful of secretaries to use their IBM XT. Well, for April Fools Day, I inserted a Pascal program at the beginning of the AUTOEXEC.BAT file (runs on startup). The program essentially said "Hello, Department of Defense Missile Network..." and gave instructions which led to "Missiles Launched", and "congratulations, you have just launched World War III. Say goodbye to everything you love." I slowed down the printing to match 300 baud, so it looked quite threatening. After the "say good-bye message", I had it tell the user to hit RETURN, after which the program said APRIL FOOL and went on to the normal programs.

The results were interesting. The people who were comfortable with the computer loved it. The real computerphobe registered only that this wasn't her database program, and (as usual) demanded key-by-key instruction, ignoring the prefectly good instructions on the screen. No-one really was startled, they didn't have the background.

Get a thin sheet of lead, cut out the outline of a reclining nude (trace from a magazine if you wish), tape it onto an inside wall of your suitcase. If you're really artsy, glue or sew on a cover sheet, such that the deception is non-obvious when the people check it. Other shapes, or messages (taped onto cardboard) work too. Don't do something that suggests a hijack attempt.

A few months ago I was flying down to L.A. from San Francisco with a friend. He had stayed up too late the night before and promptly fell fast asleep as soon as we were airborne. The airline magazines soon paled, so I looked around for some way to entertain myself until we reached L.A. I went up the steward and asked if I could borrow one of the oxygen masks that they use in their little speech just before take-off. He looked puzzled and said that they didn't work and were just for demonstration. I said I didn't care, and much to my surprise, he gave it to me. I took it back to my seat, put it on, and strung the hose to the up just above my head. Then I reached down and shook my friend furiously. As he groggily woke up, I yelled, "Quick, put on your mask, we're falling fast!"

The look on his face was pretty classic! Interestingly enough, he didn't fall back asleep on the plane.

This is a simple, harmless, and hilarious practical joke, that has claimed me as a victim. The setting is a pool hall, bar, or anyplace else with a pool (billiards) table. Place any ball at one end of the table and give your victim the cue ball. Challenge the victim to focus on the cue ball while walking around the pool table three times. At the end of the third time, the victim is to place the cue ball on the table, take a cue stick and hit the cue ball so that it stikes the ball at the other end of the table. This is very difficult to do; not because of a loss of coordination from walking and staring at the ball, but because while the victim is concentrating on the ball, you lick your finger and wipe chalk off the end of the cue stick. The victim will miscue almost every time. It gets funnier, because if the victim is like me, he/she will be determined and try it again.