April 2nd, 2014
by Countess Tea
Hi, all!
Sad news: our scratch n’ sniff comics feature had to be removed from the site, as we’ve been informed it was severely slowing down page loads and causing allergic reactions.
We hope you survived April Fools’ day intact! This week, I asked cartoonists to share some of their favorite pranks– ones they’ve played, ones people have played on them, and ones featured in their comics.
Earlier this year, the penguins constructed a subway station that got poor Howard very excited….
–Alex Hallatt, Arctic Circle
–Marcus Hamilton, Dennis The Menace
I think as a cartoonist, you’re kind of hoping all your comics are pranks.
–Isabella Bannerman, Six Chix
A long time ago, before desktop publishing, I worked as a graphic artist for a small magazine. We used hot wax to attach art and text to our layouts. On one April Fool’s day I dipped several q-tips into the waxer and then left them on desks of people in the editorial department. The Q-tips were laden with huge disgusting blobs of molten wax. (I thought it was funny, anyway.)
–Kevin Frank, Heaven’s Love Thrift Shop
The best prank played on me was when I was in college, and working nights in a donut shop. One night, while I was setting up for that night’s production, a counter girl who shall remain nameless ( we briefly dated) stuffed my coat with day-old donuts. Thankfully, none were jelly-filled. That ranks right up there with the time I was taking a nap (remember, I was working nights!) in the art studio at the University of Nebraska at Omaha, with my head down on a large table. My good friends, never ones to pass up an opportunity to humiliate one of their own, taped me down to the table. They fell over laughing when I woke up, and couldn’t lift my head off the table.
The best April Fool’s Day trick I ever pulled was when I was 7 I filled the sugar bowl with salt. Turns out my old man didn’t have much of a sense of humor. If you read my comic strip, you’ll see plenty of pranks pulled by 7 year old Spencer. I think his best prank happened twenty-some years ago when he put super glue on Ernie’s toilet seat. Sid charged for tours of Ernie’s bathroom with Ernie, pants down glued to the seat. Not long after that appeared, a copycat in Las Vegas pulled the prank. The poor guy who got glued sued the Casino where it happened.
–Bud Grace, The Piranha Club
–Rick Kirkman and Jerry Scott, Baby Blues