But Cranky, this is more fun. Try it some time. Walk up to a perfect stranger, stare them in the eye, and declare:
“Beware the Jabberwock, my son!
The teeth that bite, the claws that catch!
Beware teh Jubjub bird and shun
The frumious Bandersnatch!”
In a crowd sudenly so a spastic little “hey! Theres a bee!” dance. Sometimes you can get other folks to join in or flinch.
Stage a Highlander-esque duel with umbrellas. Make very sure that you’ve got plenty of space, and hopefully confederates to help keep people out of the way (and to explain to campus cops that it’s “performance art” if you happen to do it in a university quad).
I have known this kind of stuff as “guerrilla theater” and I consider it a valid art form. I have heard guerrilla theater discribed as “theater where the audience doesn’t know they are your audience.” At the Vermont Governor’s Institute on the Arts, where GT was a course offered, the final project usually involves going to the local Walmart and protesting child labor by doing things like loudly proclaiming “Gee, those Tawianese children’s small little fingers sure do make nice tight stiches!” and the like. Rearrange the furniture section so it looks like a livingroom, and hang out. That sort of thing. It’s grassroots social activism, and I think it’s grand. Anything that makes people think, ponder and stretch is, in my opinion, doing something.
Ah… the ‘freak out the old people’ game… Say the most shocking thing when passing the elderly, but make it sound like the middle of a conversation.
I had the all-time winning line with:
I mean I can understand she aborted it, but to bronze the fetus afterwards!?!
Ah yes. This is one of my favourite passtimes.
My friend and I [back in our deathly goth days] used to sit on a crowded train and have a deadpan, completely believable conversation about eating babies and having satanic masses. It would go a little something like this:
Her: Ahhhh…nice day we’re having
Me: Yeah, sure is. Say, did you pick up the goat’s head we ordered?
Her: Oh shit. I forgot. I’ll do it when we get home
Me: [getting slightly panicky] But you can’t! The shops are closed! And the ritual is tonight! Oh man, now Satan is going to be SO pissed off! [I start fake crying, she consoles me, people move from our end of the train to the other, we burst into giggles].
Good times.
Some years ago (early '90’s), I used to read (and occasionally post to) a Usenet group called alt.shenanigans. Dunno if it’s still around, but the stuff described in this thread was exactly the kind of stuff around back then.
a long long time ago (i was maybe 11)…I went to the store with my brother (who was six or seven) and my friend (a year older, but much shorter)…I was about five foot five inches tall already and had a sizeable chest…so me and my friend thought it would be funny if she and my brother referred to me as “mom.” I also scolded them when they were out of line.
I don’t know if it was just in my head, but it really seemed to disturb people.
This one is great, it’s so subtle but you can mess with hundreds of people in just an afternoon.
Do this when you’re walking in a mall, or on a sidewalk, or in a public hallway, and when someone walking the opposite direction approaches you, look past them on the other side from the one you intend to pass them on. Many people will become confused as to which side to pass you on.
This works especially well in malls and crosswalks.
(P.S. alt.shen is still around but I don’t know if it still lives up to your fond memories. A lot of Usenet has deteriorated with the onset of spam and invasions of trolls.)
My best girl friend and I know about 100 linedances, some very complex with fancy footwork. We dance to anything with an appropriate beat, anywhere with an appropriate floor. Most large grocery stores, malls and WalMarts have music and great floors. We start dancing at the beginning of a musical phrase and stop at the end of it. So far, no one’s thrown money.
[hijack]
from Space Jam (the cartoon/reality or whateveryoucallit movie), “Hey, i resemble that remark!”
[/hijack]
I know jellydonut, we both like to, while sitting next to people in a restaurant, move something on their side of the table. Take their fork and turn it sideways. Put their knife so that it’s handle is farther away from them and the blade is closer. Move their cup slightly to their right. It’s funny.
There is a toy, do not know the name of it, but it is a padded bat, with a nerf ball. What you do is take the bat, and make like you are a sword fighter.
You can also do this with those swim noodle toys, i reccomend it.
So what, OldLady, that was like, oh, 60 or 70 years ago?
My friend and I started doing it in High School and it just stuck with us. That was 17 years ago and we still do it.
Something else we do once in awhile:
We are at a restaurant and we order something, but we make sure to order it WITHOUT something that would never be put on it anyways:
Example:
Me: I’d like a cheeseburger with lettuce, tomato, and ketchup… but please make sure NOT to put any whipped cream on it.
Server: Sir, we don’t put whipped cream on our cheeseburgers.
Me: Good, because I don’t want any.