Blast from the past.

How many people remember these:

 

 

 

 

Yeah, I was going through some of the things I rediscovered from the garage clean out.  A bunch of slides was in there and I contemplated how many of my students would recognize them.  I think I’ll have to bring some in August to find out.

I also found this picture, which made me laugh.  It’s a little dark, but that’s me in the driver’s seat, and my friend Dave “holding the gun”.

It was the mid-80’s and I was in my mid 20’s.  I’d had to ret a car for a few days and ended up with this blue-grey 4-door K-Car.  It could have been reality or something perpetuated in the movies and TV, but blue-grey 4-door K-Cars were often associated with suit wearing police-type government officials.  Which is what we were discussing at HQ* when we came up with a brainstorm of a practical joke.  It took us a couple hours to plan the whole thing, choreographed it down to the last minute.

We positioned Bill at the pay phone on the corner of 800 So and State Street (1), a busy corner on a weekend night.  Rick, Rae and Dan were positioned on the other side of the streets (2) walking down the sidewalk.  Dave and I were dressed in our best suits, wearing sunglasses and armed with a water gun and a “car phone”.

We pulled into the Sears parking lot and went over to the corner where Bill was.  Screeching to a halt, we jumped out of the car and got out to hassle Bill.  Hung up the phone on him and had a heated discussion for a couple minutes.  Bill pointed across the street towards where the other group was stationed and Dave and I jumped back into the car and took off. squealing the tires as much as I could get the K-Car to.

We crossed through the light and squealed to a halt up on the curb right in front of the other three.  Another heated argument and then we took Rick and shoved him in the back of the K-Car.  He was screaming the whole time, yelling “They’re gonna kill me” and, as we drove off, was pounding on the window so hard I thought he was going to break it.  Or a hand. (He did hurt his hand).  We took the first corner, Rick stopped banging on the window, and we all headed back to HQ.

With the political climate today (NSA, Homeland Security), surveillance cameras on every corner and everyone having a cell phone, there is no way I’d do that now.  Even if I was in my early 20’s.  It probably wasn’t the smartest thing to do even back then, but, hey, I was young and stupid.

*What we called the house a bunch of us were renting together.

Legacy of the Motel West BBS (circa 1987)

I've been writing back and forth with Sir Duke, the sysop of the old Motel West BBS that I belonged to in the late 1980's. We've been swapping stories about our times at Chevron - he worked graveyards for a year or so and I've been working part time at one for 3 years now. He got on the subject of practical jokes, which reminded me of one I pulled at Churchill Jr. that I'm particularly proud of :

I haven’t pulled many practical jokes at the Chevron, but I’ve done some good ones at the schools I’ve been at. One of the best ones I can think of was on April 1st, about 10 years ago. The Spanish teacher and the Vice Principal at the school were (well, still are) major Diet Coke addicts. I made sure I worked late the night before the 1st, they both had left the building and I pulled out $20 in quarters and bought all the Diet Coke out of the faculty vending machine. Then I talked one of the custodians into letting me into the Vice Principal’s office and the Spanish teacher’s room and cleaned out their personal stashes. Pretty much cleaned out all the Diet Cokes in the entire building. Put them in the cooler and brought them home. The next day (April 1st) I show up and hide the cooler in the auditorium, and say absolutely nothing to anyone. Halfway through 2nd period the Spanish teacher shows up at my room, murderous look in her eye and says, sounding remarkably like “The Exorcist”, “GIVE ME A DIET COKE!” Why do you think I brought a cooler full of Diet Cokes to school, I knew my life was on the line. I run off to the auditorium, get her a couple dripping, cold cans and I could see the Devil leave her body. Didn’t hear anything from the Vice Principal, so at lunch I get another ice cold can and bring it down to her. When I get there, she’s drinking a warm 4 month old Diet Coke (it had the Christmas lable on it) that she found in the bottom of her closet. Now, this may not be reality, but it’s the way I remember it – she see’s the can, dripping cold water and her tongue comes out and drools, just like Homer Simpson. I swear. They ended up buying back all the soda, I reclaimed my $20 bucks.

Anyway, if you have any good ones. go ahead and post it here - always like a good, tasteful practical joke