TechCrunch to Sue Facebook?! Yeah, right.

Happy April Fool’s Day! Well, almost.

Michael Arrington really had me going. Initially his story about suing Facebook seemed completely plausible, especially since I’ve seen several negative Facebook stories in the last week. But It wasn’t until I came to the last section of the post where Arrington described his explosive interaction with Facebook Chief Privacy Officer Chris Kelly saying, “He then threw his hot triple soy latte espresso at me, which caused extensive second degree burns over the top half of my body” that I was fairly sure. And then, the icing on the cake (and the perfect end to the ruse), “Later on, he also unfriended me.”

What a hoot! And a day early at that.

This was just what I needed today -- a good laugh when I least expected it. I started thinking about the last time anyone played an April Fool’s joke on me…and would you believe it has probably been at least 10 years. What do you think that means? I like a good laugh as well as the next person. I don’t think of myself as a particularly serious person. Is it possible I am reaching the age where people aren’t sure if I can take a joke? That is almost too scary to even contemplate. I don’t EVER want to be that old. Or at least, I don’t ever want to be thought of as not having a sense of humor regardless of my age. I want to always retain the ability to laugh – both at myself and at others. Yes! I said “at others.” What’s wrong with having a harmless laugh at someone else’s expense? Isn’t that the point of April Fool’s Day anyway?

In the spirit of April Fool’s, here is a link to the Top 10 Harmless Geek Pranks: http://lifehacker.com/373817/top-10-harmless-geek-pranks

10) Install the Blue Screen of Death Screensaver
9) Fake a Desktop with Screenshot Wallpaper
8) Schedule a phone call with a Text-to-Speech Message from Wakerupper.com
7) Fill an office with Packing Peanuts (Or Make it Look That Way)
6) Remote Control Your CoWorkers Computer with VNC
5) Message Co Workers With Net Send
4) ”Break” Your Victim’s LCD Screen With Wallpaper
3) Hijack Firefox with the Total Confusion Pack Extended (Enabled April 1st only)
2) Customize the Office HP Printer’s Console Message
1) Turn Web Pages Upside Down

I am so inspired by this and enjoyed my TechCrunch laugh so much that I am planning to try prank #2 tomorrow at work. It seems funny and relatively harmless. I would have preferred the packing peanuts prank – which would work perfectly in the Dean’s Suite, but I just don’t have the time to get it together. Guess that will have to wait for next year!