The annual celebration of pranks occurs on April 1 each year, presenting the perfect opportunity to add a little bit of fun and mischief into everyday life. As the day draws nearer, Maverick students and teachers reminisce their greatest pranks and make plans for the big day.
Just as the best memories in life are never forgotten, neither are the best pranks. While getting pranked may not always be the most fun in the moment, it’s often a good laugh when looking back on the event years later.
“I was on this trip to Wichita Falls for an academic competition, and … our team was three guys, three gals,” AP Physics teacher Robert Landauer said. “While the boys were downstairs, … the girls went to the breakfast area, got every sugar packet and dumped them in our bed.”
In the end, the boys eventually got all the sugar out of their beds by shaking out the sheets, while the girls laughed at the struggle through a window the entire time.
“They got us pretty good,” Landauer said. “It was a nice, harmless kind of prank.”
Due to the endless possibilities of pranks, April Fools’ Day is often a unique day of the year for those playing pranks, as well as those who become the subject of a planned prank.
“On April Fools’ Day, I don’t believe a thing I hear,” Ibrahim Khurram, 11, said.
Ibrahim himself is a prank player among his friends and family. His clever schemes range anywhere from made-up stories to startling those around him with a fake bug. On April 1, he rarely misses the chance to have a little fun.
“I went outside, found a bunch of fire ants and put them in a [plastic] egg,” Khurram said. “I pretended that the egg was stuck and asked [my friends] to open it.”
Ants crawled out of the egg, much to his friends’ surprise, but no one got bitten. While not everyone enjoys or looks forward to April Fools’ Day, pranks in general can be a great way for people to use their creativity and form a good story to tell years after the event.
“A senior class at one high school … printed just thousands of business cards [with their graduation year] … and hid them everywhere they possibly could in the building,” Landauer said. “Decades later, people were still finding them.”
Unfortunately, as students grow older, less of them find joy in planning out a joke for the big day. The small April Fools’ jokes that were frequent throughout the day in elementary school seem to have disappeared.
“I’ve never had a student get me on April Fool’s Day, and it’s almost disappointing,” Landauer said.
Pranks may not be for everyone, but when done right, this long-standing tradition in many countries throughout the world is an opportunity for a laugh and a memory to last a lifetime.
“The best pranks don’t really hurt anyone, they’re just annoying or funny,” Landauer said.