Extravaganzafestavillathon II--The Sweet Taste of Sucess

Our many failures in the plot to prank Apartment 5 didn’t discourage us. Instead, they made us all the more determined to pull a good prank on our friends. We knew security would be tight on their apartment and they were probably just waiting for us to strike again. Attempts were made to steal a key so that we could enter their apartment at our convenience. We also thought about leaving the window open just a crack so that we actually could get in that way without the use of a butter knife or being eaten by bushes.

Besides thinking of ways to get in, we also thought of what pranks we could pull on them that wouldn’t backfire on us. Jon had a number of items that would be delightful to steal. One such item was a pen from his mission that he was very attached to. If anyone asked him to borrow a pen, he had a hard time giving that one out and he would hover over whoever borrowed it until they gave it back. We thought it would be pretty funny if we could some how steal his pen. We knew he always carried it with him, so it would be no easy feat. The opportunity presented itself one Friday night when Amy, Lisa, Michelle, and I had gone Latin dancing. We saw Jon there with a date and before they headed over to the ballroom side, he took off his suit jacket and hung it up. Amy had watched where he hung his jacket up and as soon as the coast was clear, we all but ran to it, knowing the pen would be ours. Failure was not an option this time around.

We had great plans for this pen. No ransom note or scavenger hunt would be made. In fact, we would be returning the pen ourselves—in Jell-o. Knowing how much Jon cared about his pen and wanting him to still be friends with us after getting it back, we secured the precious item in a Ziploc bag before we added it to the Jell-o. Since this was our first time at such a trick, we thought the pen was supposed to go in at the beginning and so it floated to the top rather than staying in the middle like we thought it should. A rock was used to weigh it down to the desired level. At last the tasty treat was done and success was ours. The next golden opportunity was actually handed to us by Apartment 5 themselves. We were visiting them just before they were leaving to go somewhere and when it was time for them to go, they practically walked off and left us sitting in their apartment. We were unsure of how long the other roommates would be gone for and didn’t want to get caught in the act so speed and simplicity were vital. Furniture was overturned, marbles were placed in shoes, and remote controls along with silverware were hidden. My personal favorite was sticking silverware in Elliot’s coat pocket and having him find it on his way to school.

And so it was that the very guys who bragged about being pranksters themselves were pranked. For a while we feared retaliation, but they never struck back. Perhaps they thought they were being gentlemen in not doing anything back to us, or maybe they were just too chicken.

The last semester we would all be together at Greenbrier soon came. Amy, Lisa, and I thought it would be funny to pull one last prank on Apartment 5. So while they were gone to the priesthood session of general conference, we thought it would be funny to write a note saying we stole something and slip it through the front door. This time, we wouldn’t even attempt to take anything. We wrote our little note and headed over there. For some reason, Amy decided to see if the door was unlocked and it was. Not sure what to do, we stood there, dumbfounded. Finally, we walked in and set the note on the counter next to some cookies. It turned out that Apartment 5 really hadn’t left their door unlocked. One of the girl RA’s who was also the relief society president had gotten the keys, unlocked all of the guys apartments, cleaned them, and left cookies, a far cry from the shenanigans we had pulled. Our possibilities were endless! However, we decided to just leave the note on the counter, knowing it would bug them more that we somehow managed to get in after all our failures than any prank we could pull. At last, we were successful.