50 WAYS TO CONFUSE, WORRY, OR JUST SCARE PEOPLE IN THE
COMPUTER LAB 

1. Log on, wait a sec, then get a frightened look on
your face and scream "Oh my God! They've found me!"
and bolt. 

2. Laugh uncontrollably for about 3 minutes & then
suddenly stop and look suspiciously at everyone who
looks at you. 

3. When your computer is turned off, complain to the
monitor on duty that you can't get the damn thing to
work. After he/she's turned it on, wait 5 minutes,turn
it off again, & repeat the process for a good half
hour. 

4. Type frantically, often stopping to look at the
person next to you evily. 

5. Before anyone else is in the lab, connect each
computer to a different screen than the one it's set
up with. 

6. Write a program that plays the "Smurfs" theme song
and play it at the highest volume possible over & over
again. 

7. Work normally for a while. Suddenly look amazingly
startled by something on the screen and crawl
underneath the desk. 

8. Ask the person next to you if they know how to tap
into top-secret Pentagon files. 

9. Use Interactive Send to make passes at people you
don't know. 

10. Make a small ritual sacrifice to the computer
before you turn it on. 

11. Bring a chainsaw, but don't use it. If anyone asks
why you have it, say "Just in case..." mysteriously. 

12. Type on VAX for a while. Suddenly start cursing
for 3 minutes at everything bad about your life. Then
stop and continue typing. 

13. Enter the lab, undress, and start staring at other
people as if they're crazy while typing. 

14. Light candles in a pentagram around your terminal
before starting. 

15. Ask around for a spare disk. Offer $2. Keep asking
until someone agrees. Then, pull a disk out of your
fly and say, "Oops, I forgot." 

16. Every time you press Return and there is
processing time required, pray
"Ohpleaseohpleaseohpleaseohplease," and scream "YES!"
when it finishes. 

17. "DISK FIGHT!!!" 

18. Start making out with the person at the terminal
next to you (It helps if you know them, but this is
also a great way to make new friends). 

19. Put a straw in your mouth and put your hands in
your pockets. Type by hitting the keys with the straw.


20. If you're sitting in a swivel chair, spin around
singing "The Lion Sleeps Tonight" whenever there is
processing time required. 

21. Draw a pictue of a woman (or man) on a piece of
paper, tape it to your monitor. Try to seduce it. Act
like it hates you and then complain loudly that women
(men) are worthless. 

22. Try to stick a Ninetndo cartridge into the 3 1/2
disk drive. When it doesn't work, get the supervisor. 

23. When you are on an IBM, and when you turn it on,
ask loudly where the smiling Apple face is. 

24. Print out the complete works of Shakespeare, then
when its all done (two days later) say that all you
wanted was one line. 

25. Sit and stare at the screen, biting your nails
noisily. After doing this for a while, spit them out
at the feet of the person next to you. 

26. Stare at the screen, grind your teeth, stop, look
at the person next to you, grinding. Repeat procedure,
making sure you never provoke the person enough to let
them blow up, as this releases tension, and it is far
more effective to let them linger. 

27. If you have long hair, take a typing break, look
for split ends, cut them and deposit them on your
neighbor's keyboard as you leave. 

28. Put a large, gold-framed portrait of the British
Royal Family on your desk and loudly proclaim that it
inspires you. 

29. Come to the lab wearing several layers of socks.
Remove shoes and place them of top of the monitor.
Remove socks layer by layer and drape them around the
monitor. Exclaim sudden haiku about the aesthetic
beauty of cotton on plastic. 

30. Take the keyboard and sit under the computer. Type
up your paper like this. Then go to the lab supervisor
and complain about the bad working conditions. 

31. Laugh hysterically, shout "You will all perish in
flames!!!" and continue working. 

32. Bring some dry ice & make it look like your
computer is smoking. 

33. Assign a musical note to every key (ie. the Delete
key is A Flat, the B key is F sharp, etc.). Whenever
you hit a key, hum its note loudly. Write an entire
paper this way. 

34. Attempt to eat your computer's mouse. 

35. Borrow someone else's keyboard by reaching over,
saying "Excuse me, mind if I borrow this for a sec?",
unplugging the keyboard & taking it. 

36. Bring in a bunch of magnets and have fun. 

37. When doing calculations, pull out an abacus and
say that sometimes the old ways are best. 

38. Play Pong for hours on the most powerful computer
in the lab. 

39. Make a loud noise of hitting the same key over and
over again until you see that your neighbor is
noticing (You can hit the space bar so your fill isn't
affected). Then look at your neighbor's keyboard. Hit
his/her delete key several times, erasing an entire
word. While you do this, ask: "Does *your* delete key
work?" Shake your head, and resume hitting the space
bar on your keyboard. Keep doing this until you've
deleted about a page of your neighbor's document.
Then, suddenly exclaim: "Well, whaddya know? I've been
hitting the space bar this whole time. No wonder it
wasn't deleting! Ha!" Print out your document and
leave. 

40. Remove your disk from the drive and hide it. Go to
the lab monitor and complain that your computer ate
your disk. (For special effects, put some Elmer's Glue
on or around the disk drive. Claim that the computer
is drooling.) 

41. Stare at the person's next to your's screen, look
really puzzled, burst out laughing, and say "You did
that?" loudly. Keep laughing, grab your stuff and
leave, howling as you go. 

42. Point at the screen. Chant in a made up language
while making elaborate hand gestures for a minute or
two. Press return or the mouse, then leap back and
yell "COVEEEEERRRRRR!" peek up from under the table,
walk back to the computer and say. "Oh, good. It
worked this time," and calmly start to type again. 

43. Keep looking at invisible bugs and trying to swat
them. 

44. See who's online. Send a total stranger a talk
request. Talk to them like you've known them all your
lives. Hangup before they get a chance to figure out
you're a total stranger. 

45. Bring an small tape player with a tape of really
absurd sound effects. Pretend it's the computer and
look really lost. 

46. Pull out a pencil. Start writing on the screen.
Complain that the lead doesn't work. 

47. Come into the computer lab wearing several
endangered species of flowers in your hair. Smile
incessantly. Type a sentence, then laugh happily,
exclaim "You're such a marvel!!", and kiss the screen.
Repeat this after every sentence. As your ecstasy
mounts, also hug the keyboard. Finally, hug your
neighbor, then the computer assistant, and walk out. 

48. Run into the computer lab, shout "Armageddon is
here!!!!!", then calmly sit down and begin to type. 

49. Quietly walk into the computer lab with a Black
and Decker chainsaw, rev that baby up, and then walk
up to the nearest person and say, "Give me that
computer or you'll be feeding my pet crocodile for the
next week". 

50. Two words: Tesla Coil.