44 WAYS TO CONFUSE PEOPLE IN A COMPUTER LAB

  1. Log on, wait a second, then get a frightened look on your face and scream,
    "Oh my God! They've found me!" and bolt.
  2. Laugh uncontrollably for about three minutes and 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 darned thing to work. After he/she has turned it on, wait
    five minutes, turn it off again, and repeat the process for a good half
    hour.
  4. Type frantically, often stopping to look at the person next to you evilly.
  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 and over again.
  7. Work normally for awhile. 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. Make a small ritual sacrifice to the computer before you turn it on.
  10. Bring a chainsaw, but don't use it. If anyone asks why you have it, say,
    "Just in case..." mysteriously.
  11. Type on VAX for awhile. Suddenly start cursing for three minutes about
    everything bad about your life. Then stop and continue typing.
  12. Light candles in a pentagram around your terminal before starting.
  13. Every time you press return and there is processing time required, pray,
    "Ohpleaseohpleaseohpleaseohplease," and scream, "YES!" when it finishes.
  14. "DISK FIGHT!"
  15. Put a straw in your mouth and put your hands in your pockets. Type by
    hitting the keys with the straw.

  16. If you're sitting in a swivel chair, spin around singing "The Lion Sleeps
    Tonight" whenever there is processing time required.
  17. Try to stick a Nintendo cartridge into the 3.5 disk drive. When it
    doesn't work, get the supervisor.
  18. When you are on an IBM and when you turn it on, ask loudly where the
    smiling Apple face is when you turn on one of those.
  19. Print out the complete works of Shakespeare, then when it's all done (two
    days later) say that all you wanted was one line.
  20. Stare at the screen, grind your teeth, stop, look at the person next to
    you. 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.
  21. 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.
  22. Put a large, gold-framed portrait of the British royal family on your desk
    and loudly proclaim that it inspires you.
  23. Come to the lab wearing several layers of socks. Remove shoes and place
    them on 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.
  24. 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.
  25. Laugh hysterically. Shout, "You will all perish in flames!!" and continue
    working.
  26. Bring some dry ice and make it look like the computer is smoking.
  27. Assign a musical note to every key (ex. the delete key is A flat).
    Whenever you hit a key, hum its note loudly. Write an entire paper this
    way.
  28. Attempt to eat your computer's mouse.
  29. Borrow someone else's keyboard by reaching over, saying, "Excuse me, mind
    if I borrow this for a sec?", unplugging the keyboard, and taking it.
  30. Bring in a bunch of magnets and have fun.
  31. When doing calculations, pull out an abacus and say that sometimes the old
    ways are best.
  32. Play Pong for hours on the most powerful computer in the lab.
  33. 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.
  34. 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.).
  35. 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.
  36. 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, "COVEEEEEERRRRR!" 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.
  37. Keep looking at invisible bugs and trying to swat them.
  38. See who's online. Send a total stranger a talk request. Talk to them
    like you've known them all your life. Hang up before they get a chance to
    figure out you're a total stranger.
  39. Bring a small tape player with a tape of really absurd sound effects.
    Pretend it's the computer and look really lost.
  40. Pull out a pencil. Start writing on the screen. Complain that the lead
    doesn't work.
  41. Come into the computer lab wearing several endangered species of flowers in your hat.
  42. 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.
  43. Run into the computer lab, shouting "Armageddon is here!!!!", then calmly
    sit down and begin to type.
  44. 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."
 
     
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