Though it’s not common knowledge, Warren Buffettis something of a practical joker. As he’s busy with the Obama transition right now, he doesn’t much time to indulge his hobby. But he doesn’t want to give it up. As he knows the world’s smartest, hippest people (plus a few dipshits) all are found on the Straight Dope Message Board, he’d like to outsource his trickery.
Persuade him to hire you as his new Prank Monkey. Tell us what practical joke you could do with a budget of $1,000,000.
(No, you may not steal the money. That is too obvious.)
Why do they only give us a million dollars for a budget every time they want an ultimate prank? We can’t keep topping the previous ultimate pranks without a larger budget.
great topic.
I’d hire the Boston Symphony Orchestra, and a theater full of extras. I bring the mark out for a night at Symphony Hall. Midway through the program, the orchestra breaks into all the crowd pleasing stadium tunes - YMCA, Sweet Caroline, etc. The audience starts chiming in, doing the wave, making the letters Y-M-C-A. Once the mark is participating, on cue the orchestra & audience abruptly go back to the well mannered program, leaving the mark standing alone shouting, with his/her hands in a big “Y”. That’s when the tabloid photographer takes the mark’s picture and publishes it in the morning paper in a front page article about the buffoon who got thrown out of Symphony Hall last night.
I’d hire out a cheap transport ship and buy several thousand dollars’ worth of fish, which I’d put on ice.
Then we’d steam to Antarctica and I and the crew would round up several thousand Emperor penguins, as many as the ship could hold. Then we’d steam up to the Arctic islands and find a remote one with an ice shelf suitable for Emperor penguins to feel at home, and just leave them there.
It might take a year or two for the North Pole penguin colony to be found. But when it was, biologists would absolutely shit their pants.
For this I’d need a semi-isolated mark, perhaps in a smallish town.
The mark wakes up and puts on the news. Aliens invading! The invasion is somewhere on the far side of the world from where the mark is, so it can’t be checked by going to the window. Every broadcast channel, internet site, radio station, and newspaper within range of the mark has been substituted with a fake one with the appropriate headlines, text, sound, and video. People on the street would all be talking about it, coached beforehand (if they’re known to the mark), or replaced by actual actors.
Then, at a prearranged time, everyone starts the act normally, the radio and TV goes back to normal, and the newspapers all get swapped with normal ones. And then when the mark goes on about the invasion, everyone else can say, “What on earth are you talking about?”
This would require trickery at the ISP level, to filter websites and media as appropriate. We would either have to replace the mark’s radio and TV with ones that provide the fake content while seeming to operate normally, or we would have to substitute content.
Hack into the soundboard for the inauguration. As soon as Obama opens his mouth to utter the first syllable of his address cue “Where 'da white wimmin at?” from Blazing Saddles . Have Cheney killed with any remaining funds.
I don’t think holographic tech is quite to the level CNN would like you to believe, dear. Plus, that’s late-cycle Loki stuff there: past mischief into actively evil.
I’d convince the mark that he was dead. Pay off all the people in his daily routine to act as if they couldn’t see or hear him. At some point, work in a cop/detective that’s working on the mark’s murder case. Dunno how long it’d last. Perhaps depends on the skill of the actor.
So? I’m surprised you’re not offering Annie-Xmas a position in your empire for that one.
This would actually cost considerably less than a million:
Set up a sample table at Coscto. Instead of little slices of cofee cake and prosciutto, you’re handing out three squares of Charmin. Behind you would be a Port-a-Potty.
I must revert to my Evil Altar-Ego to respond to that one.
[Fabulous Creature mode]
Look. I may be a psychopathic mass-murdering super-villain bent on world domination, the sexual subjagation of the entire cast of Private Practice, and the abolition of the world’s cheese supplies, but I’m not about to spend a million bucks creating a holographic reminder of the single most traumatic day of America’s last decade. That’s just tacky.
Now, if you’ll excuse me, I’m got to get back to work. The polar ice caps aren’t going to melt by THEMSELVES, and Ursus maritimus isn’t quite doomed to extinction yet.
Limit your cheesicidal activities to “mild” cheddar, and I will be your loyal follower. Otherwise, I hereby dedicate the remainder of my existence to thwarting you and all your plans.
Well, by “abolitionment of the world’s cheese supplies,” I mean “confining all cheese to the inner circle and allowing the oppressed masses to partake only once a year so they don’t forget what they’re missing, and also having a minion occasionally eat some cheese in front of the townsfolk so that their suffering is increased. Likewise for chocolate.”
So you could do that.
Returning to the thread topic: why not give out Ex-Lax laden brownies at these sample tables you’re planning?
Wouldn’t it be easier to join the inner circle? You’d have all the chocolate you wanted, and might even get the eat-half-a-bag-of-Oreos-in-front-of-the-assembled-people-of-southaven-mississippi-and-feed-the-other-half-to-a-group-of-stray-cats gig.
Oh alright, you convinced me. Alternate-me of course; that twisted antisocial dude known as The Technologist, who built an animatronic life-size Snuggle Bear with a switchable clown face to surprise people in public places, who stakes toy poodles out for the army ants, and who promotes Celine Dion to corporate mall-music managers. Bwa-ha-ha!
