From time to time, I loved to play pranks on my colleagues to ease the tension of a stressful day.
Jessie was my best accomplice because she was even more giggly than me.
Everyone who worked with Casper for any length of time knew he hated brussels sprouts. His face would contort just at the mention of them, and he would make choking, vomity noises each time he thought about the ‘wretched vegetables’. He eventually declared that they were ‘of the Devil’.
One day, Jessie began talking about food and mentioned that Casper had told her that Christmas dinners are ruined when this detestable piece of produce is placed onto his plate by an unsuspecting host.
“Let’s get some,” I said, “and plant them everywhere he goes and everywhere he puts his hands.”
Jessie danced on the spot.
“Ooh yes! That would be such a laugh. Let’s get loads!”
“Okay. But you mustn’t let on it was us. Not at least until the end of the day. Even better would be for him to go home and moan to Ellie and have her suggest to him who she thinks it might have been. See if she can guess before him.”
“Well, he’s bound to know it was either of us.” said Jessie.
“Yes, but he won’t realise it was both of us. He may even think Louise was involved.”
“Oh yea, and it will be so funny to see her face because when he accuses her, she genuinely won’t know what he’s talking about.”
We laughed at the thought of Louise stating that there was no way she was going to waste her hard-earned money on Marks and Spencer’s overpriced commodities and why would he even think she would do such a daft thing?
At lunchtime, we dashed to the ‘middle class supermarket’ and picked a bag of their finest little green balls.
When we got back to the shop, I split them in half, and we set about stuffing sprouts into everything that belonged to Casper. His jacket pocket, locker, desk drawers, office in-tray, fax machine, coat pocket, mug, briefcase, lunch box, downstairs in-tray and packet of digestive biscuits all got acquainted with this abhorred mini cabbage. We crept back to work biting the sides of our cheeks.
Now, Jessie assured me that she could keep a straight face. She also assured me that she was such a good actress that there was no way that Casper would suspect her of foul play.
When it was time for Casper to go to lunch, he walked out of the door wearing his jacket. I giggled at the thought of him putting his hand inside his pockets.
Jessie had disappeared upstairs by the time he returned, and I kept my head down so not to accidentally give him eye contact.
An hour later, she came back downstairs looking sheepish.
“Sorry Sharon, I gave the game away.”
“What? So soon?”
“Well, he came up to me and asked me if I was responsible for the supply of sprouts.”
I frowned.
“What, and you just owned up?”
“No. I slipped up. I turned around and said, ‘I never put them in your coat pocket.’ And he replied, ‘I never mentioned their location, so how did you know they were in there?’”
Overproduction
If there was one thing that rattled Trudy’s nerves it was the Americanisation of products. What I mean is, when a certain item is popular, Christian publishers seem to bring out as many versions and variations of that product as possible.
The “Power of the Praying…” series by Stormie Omartian, is fantastic and well-needed. But each time a new version came out, Trudy would wonder when it would stop. We had, “The Power of a Praying Wife”, then, “…husband”, “…parent”, “…grandparent”, “…girl”, “…life”, “…teen”, “…woman”, “…church”.
Recently, there was a new edition called, “The Power of a Praying Mom”. How that differs from the ‘parent’ book, I’ve yet to discover, because isn’t that what a mother is?
Then there were study books, audio books, perpetual calendars, bookmarks, notebooks, prayer journals, leader’s notes, gilt-edged editions, hard backs, pocket editions, softbacks, leather bounds, giant prints, boxed sets and more.
When a book by Bruce Wilkinson called, “The Prayer of Jabez” came out, a similar pattern emerged.
There was, “The Prayer of Jabez for Kids”, “The Prayer of Jabez for Teenagers”, “The Prayer of Jabez Bible”, “The Prayer of Jabez Devotional”, “The Prayer of Jabez Bible Study Notes”, “The Prayer of Jabez Journal”, “The Prayer of Jabez Calendar”, notebooks in flexcover, luxleather, wirebound, genuine leather, faux leather, “The Prayer of Jabez CD”, and also, storybooks, mugs, bookmarks, greeting cards and posters.
One morning while I was emptying a delivery box of new titles, Trudy was sat behind me on the computer.
I stared at my invoice and said to myself aloud,
“Oh. The Prayer of Jabez for…dogs.”
She flung herself around on her swivel stool and widened her eyes as if she had been watching a horror movie.
“That is it! What is wrong with them? Dogs? Dogs! They have a book out for…”
She suddenly noticed my smile which turned into a grin, then a laugh.
Her chest sunk in relief.
“Urgh, I can’t believe I fell for that.” she chucked. “It’s something I could imagine them doing, but I’m pleased to know it hasn’t happened just yet.”
Needless to say, when God says we reap what we sow, it is true. My colleagues did not need get their own back on me. Unfortunately, I made enough silly mistakes of my own to give people justification to laugh at my expense; as you will discover in the chapter entitled, “Bloopers”.
