Didn't so much read as page through, much like one would a website! Man, am I clever that way, as this started as bits from David Thorne's site, www.27bslash6.com. Thorne is one of those guys who you never want to get on his bad side, or work with, or possibly even know. His pranks are awful and hilarious, except when they are boring and pointless. Awful and hilarious: the one where he photoshopped Justin Bieber's face onto all of a co-worker's stock photos, just because he could. (This was not in the book; more on that later) He did not back those photos up, of course. Pointless and boring: stories about going camping with his kid. I don't care who you are, anecdotes about what you did on summer vacation are not worth printing. Regaling Grandma and people who love you enough to smile and nod, that is the audience for that. (Unless you get your arm trapped under a rock and have to saw it off. Then that's good television.)Some of the exchanges listed in this book are as funny or funnier than the Bieber trick, but sometimes it's stuff about Australian minor celebrities and/or politicians of whom I have never heard. So Australians, this may be more for you. I did have an attack when he listed email exchanges where he answered co-workers only with a Magic 8 ball, because it reminded me of this fucking Chemistry teacher I had in high school who had all of these annoying verbal tics. Stuff like the thing where teachers think it is funny to answer "Can I go to the bathroom?" with "You can, but you may not." Oh, burn! Much like my bladder! Only the teacher took it to this infuriating extreme, where if you asked that jackass an either/or question, he would answer "Yes." There were others too, but I can't remember them. I still want to punch that guy in the throat. So the Magic 8 ball trick was too similar, and I freaked out.
...which is probably the thing. All of these transcripts and pranks are purported to be true, which is why they work at all. Otherwise it's just some guy cold dissing really stupid Internet trolls he imagined. You root for Thorne taking down a semi-official chaplain to the public school about the separation of church and state, or people at the video store, or whatever. Those people are irritating. But when Thorne goes after co-workers and the like, I start getting skeeved out, because it's all to easy to imagine getting punked at work just because I was convenient. Comedy happens to other people, thank the tremendous heavens.
Anyway, unlike the website where this originated, this book is rendered in glorious black and white. Seems a shame, because then you can't see the full glory of this:
