Senior prank day......

[Anonymous Poster]

Well Cindy, allow me to use your definition of prank to point out a thing or two;
Main Entry: [1]prank
Pronunciation: 'pra[ng]k
Function: noun
Etymology: obsolete: prank: to play tricks
Date: circa 1529
TRICK: : a mildly mischievous act : a ludicrous act

What I don't see in that definition is "at the cost of others".
What I don't see either in your proposed prank is cleanup of the mess. Aparently, you and the group of "adults in training" propose to have your fun, and leave behind the mess to be cleaned up by others, like the people who will have to capture the chickens, sweep up the feathers, and mop up the chickenshut.
Now, I suppose that's just a logical extension of what purports to be public education in the US today, a more appropriate definition might be Publicly funded entertainment of my kid so I can do what I please all day, and if that's what you want to teach your kid, that's your privilidge.
As far as chickens go, I assure you I hate, loathe, despise, detest and abhore chickens with a passion shared by few men, and given my experience with those miserable creatures, doubt you have ever been confined in a room with 100 chickens. Let me assure you, each and every chicken comes equipped with spurs & talons, as well as a beak, and when panicked, those chickens aren't just going to sit on the bleachers and wait to be picked up and reconfined by the janitor.

Suppose you were to reverse your concept into a chicken roundup in the gym, release the same number of chickens, and send the "adults in training" into the room to round them up, and clean up afterwards. Have you or your daughter ever rounded chickens up? I assure you it will be interesting.
Of course, you, and the rest of the "parents" who think this is a fantastic idea, will assume all liability for injury to the herders, as well as any costs associated with torn designer clothing, sutures and casts, as well as possible eye surgery.
Since I'm fairly certain the "teachers" are union members, you'll probably also have to pay them to chaperone the event, or provide parental supervision of sufficient number for the roundup.
Then, once you get all the chickens rounded up, you could even barbeque the cadavers in the school parking lot for all I care, and the class could have a final feast. You could even charge for the cooked chicken and cover cleanup costs. That would be responsible adult behavior.
I'm glad your daughter considers you her equal and trusts you as a co-conspiritor, mother-daughter relationships like that are certainly to be coveted. Did it ever cross your mind she just might have been hopeing you'd say NO? A lot of kids I know ask their parents for permission hopeing for a NO so they don't have to bow to pier pressure. It's a lot easier to say my mom won't let me than it is to say I don't want to be part of that when you're a kid.

 

[Anonymous Poster]

Franz you make several suppositions in your posts. I'd like to inform you that I have upwards of a hundred and twenty chickens in my hen barn as I speak, and I have caught chickens left and right, reaching under them and snatching them by the legs until I thought I would faint.

I have been beaten about the head, neck and shoulders with dirty dusty wings, I have been puked on, as everyone knows if you hold a chicken upside down for longer than thrity seconds they will puke on you. At least everyone out here knows that.

I assure you, I am familiar with chickens. Those one hundred and twenty chickens produce enough eggs to nicely supplement the protein needs of the twenty head of hogs out back, and if we get hungry enough, the chickens themselves supplement OUR diet.

I don't think there is a designer suit in the surrounding three counties that is less than five years old and was probably purchased with an entire paycheck as the rebellious act of some dairy wife sick of dusters and jeans.

As to who will clean up the mess. I assume it will be left in the hands of the principal as it has been for years. I'm sure he's got a few kids on a special list in his big wooden desk that owe him a few detentions or some community service, or he may ask for volunteers like he did with the hogs. But that would be the old fashioned way of doing things. I'm sure we will all agree that he should be calling the police instead, the new and better way of handling teenagers nowadays.

I made the dismal mistake of assuming this was a rural living forum, with rural people who understand other rural people and some of the small town lifestyles that everyone seems so determined to aspire to, and then proceeds to condemn.

There is no way you will have me beleive that participation in a simple prank is a one way ticket to hell. You will never convince me that the hundreds if not thousands of kids who participated in these simple pranks over the years now reside in the state penetentiary.

I can undertand your aversion to chickens. You must have dealt with some monsters. I have yet to have one rip my clothes off or put me in a cast, but I guess anything is possible.

I bet there isn't a kid in the whole county who hasn't handled chickens at some point. Who the heck do you think will be trudgin' the isles at the egg farm, catching, carrying and crating and then unloading these two hundred chickens? The.....seniors. I myself have spent more time than I like to think about in that very same egg farm.

Chickens as far as the eye can see.....layers and layers of them, cages on top of cages. They are nasty little beasts, no doubt about it. Coming from someone who has raised them, killed them, plucked them, cleaned them, cooked them and eaten them, I do have a clue.

I still think chickens in the gym is a bad idea because of potential damage to the floors. Had I kept a few in the house I might have been aware of the fact that this was an issue, but mine have always stayed out back.

 

[RobS]

I cannot fathom that a responsible adult would condone/participate in this action, but...

<font color="blue"> I tried to stress upon you (collectively) that the school permits these activities. I beleive the faculty gets as big a kick out of it as the kids do, providing no serious damage is done and no one gets physically hurt, and no single individual is focused on.
</font>

If this is truly the case, perhaps the kids could recruit a faculty member to assist rather than a parent. That just may prove how much the faculty really does enjoy the prank /forums/images/graemlins/smile.gif

 

[DocHeb]

</font><font color="blue" class="small">( I have come to this forum off and on over the past few months and have come to know some of you who post here failry well. )</font>

I've been here a while, and I know that if you get in Franz's crosshairs, you're a target! /forums/images/graemlins/smile.gif.

This forum is generally flame-free, but sometimes differences of opinion expressed in written word get a bit strident, and don't come across in a very collegial fashion. Attempts to convey some emotions (especially sarcasm) in writing end up with unintended results.

Some people think chickens are funny - some don't. Where those chickens are found may be funny - or maybe not. I guess there are several sides to this.

I guess we may have to add chickens to the list of:

1.) Hydrostatic vs. geared tractors
2.) Gun control (pro or con)
3.) Marvel Mystery Oil

that shouldn't be posted unless you have a Teflon jacket. /forums/images/graemlins/grin.gif

 

[JDGREEN4ME]

Ahhh shucks...just fill the "cement pond" with rubber ducks... /forums/images/graemlins/grin.gif

 

[DougM]

Lightin up get a life ghssss.

Just have the kids stay in there rooms untill there 25 yrs old

Then they can look back on the the good old days and say ??


Doug

 

[MarkV]

Come on ya'll, senior pranks were the norm where I was raised. Still are as far as I know. One year those of us on the football team placed a VW bug up the stairs and in front of the doors of the school. No one could get in the school. We thought it funny. Another year one of the guys borrowed a crane and a sling from the vet and we tethered a cow on the roof of the school. Made for a funny picture.

Cindi ask us to help think through the prank and some good points were made about damage that she and the kids had not thought of. She has already said that given the potential damage a new plan is called for. Personally I consider that responsible, and to me it proves that the kids made a good decision by involving someone who can point out the problem before any damage was done. Kids are going to do something. Doesn't it make more sense to allow the kids to trust someone who can offer some guidance before something gets out of hand?

Cindi, What about a clandestine meeting with the student consular to see what they think? I know the school unofficially condoned our pranks. The goal is to let the kids have their moment without anyone getting hurt or causing the school any real damage. Wish I was there to help and relive part of my past.

MarkV

 

[Gary_in_Indiana]

<font color="blue"> I saw something in the newspaper recently about that same "prank" (euphemism for vandalism) being done here recently. I can vaguely understand the kids doing something like that, but how an adult could be involved is beyond my comprehension. </font>

When my daughter finished eighth grade at her parochial elementary school there was a similar tradition. All of the boys had a sleep over at one parents' home while my daughter hosted all the girls in her class. The big 'tradition' was to TP the convent there. Another part of the tradition was to meet there the next morning and not only clean up everything they did but also clean up the entire property in general.

I was one of the adults (?) involved as I drove a "getaway" car for the girls so they wouldn't be out on foot at midnight. I guess I still don't feel too bad about my involvement even though there was an unforeseen problem.

Unfortunately, there was a new principal that year who was unfamiliar with the 'tradition' and called the police. No real problem there as the officer on duty had gone to school there himself and knew the whole deal. It could have been worse. It wasn't. And everything was cleaned up before noon the next day.

I guess I see both side of it. Technically, it probably is vandalism, though a good rain eliminates all of the "damage" it does. It also represented a wasted police call and could have taken the officer away from something else. On the other hand, these are good kids not doing any real harm with the full intention and plan of cleaning things up hours later. I guess I don't see any real harm.

BTW, that wayward daughter of ours is now a year away from her law degree. /forums/images/graemlins/smile.gif

 

[Bird]

</font><font color="blue" class="small">( The big 'tradition' was to TP the convent there )</font>

Brings back some (not so fond) memories. Many years ago, I've answered a number of calls from irate folks who had their homes (trees and yards) toilet papered. They usually had a teenaged daughter, even happened to us once when our daughters were teenagers. /forums/images/graemlins/laugh.gif It was of no concern to me at all, but lots of folks got really irate about it. I'll never forget one late night when two young couples (married and one of the young ladies pregnant) called to say they had been stopped on a dark residential street by a maniac who drove straight at them with his lights on high beam, then drove up beside them waving a pistol, asking where they went to school and whether they had been out toilet papering houses. When they told him they weren't in school anymore, he told them to go home and get off the street or get shot and drove off. They got his license number and I found the house a few blocks away, heavily toilet papered, and a screaming woman in the front yard in her nightgown with her hair up in rollers (school teacher at the nearest high school). And while I was talking to her, up drove the husband. I had no choice but to arrest him. Turned out he was pretty nice about it once he calmed down, but then the wife came to the station still almost hysterical, and she really went ballistic (as the kids say) when she recognized me in the station. We had graduated from high school together. /forums/images/graemlins/shocked.gif

 

[Gary_in_Indiana]

Bird,

That story sure qualifies as 'the exception that proves the rule' on TP'ing. In our case I didn't think an irate husband would become involved (the convent thing, you know...). I didn't think any of the nuns would be 'packing,' either. It's just not common here. Maybe it's a regional thing. /forums/images/graemlins/smile.gif

I am reminded of a line from the movie 'Miss Congeniality' when Sandra Bullock was justifying grabbing a man in a crowd because he had a gun on him. Candace Bergen's reply was perfect. "So what if he had a gun? This is Texas. Even my florist has a gun." /forums/images/graemlins/wink.gif /forums/images/graemlins/smile.gif /forums/images/graemlins/grin.gif /forums/images/graemlins/laugh.gif /forums/images/graemlins/laugh.gif /forums/images/graemlins/laugh.gif