When asked: "How do you subtly mess with people?" this is what people had to say.
1. Holding the door open for a stranger while they are an awkwardly far distance away.
2. When you're talking to someone, instead of looking at their face, look at their ear.
3. When someone you don't like is being sexist/racist/gossiping, just pretend not to understand what they mean, and keep asking questions and making them explain what they're saying, until they get so uncomfortable they have to stop. Wide eyes and an innocent look help here.
4. I asked a guy at work if he'd ever got "that creepy deja vu feeling". A week later, I did it again.
5. My wife used to play a couple of computer puzzle games (win95 vintage), and was quite proud of beating my high scores. What she didn't realize was the high score table was a plain text file in the directory... so every time she beat my score, I edited the file to put myself on top again. She would play for days trying to top me.
6. When meeting people for the first time I say, "Nice seeing you again!"
Sometimes they'll go along with it so they don't appear rude for not remembering me. Other times they respond, "Yeah nice seei- wait, what?"
7. I can tell when someone needs to merge into my lane. I'll intentionally not let them over until they turn on their blinker.
8. When I'm having a cigarette at the pub and someone asked if they can have one I tell them I don't smoke.
9. At parties, I like to introduce myself as my boyfriend's sister and then kiss him in front of whoever I introduced myself to. It has to be a peck on the lips, but drawn out just enough to gross them out. It's become a really awful inside joke. He's a good sport about it, though. Once he wrapped his arms around me as I was talking to one of his ex-coworkers and whispered, "Did you text mom?"
10. Calmness! I work with the public. Dramatic and entitled adults HATE a soothing voice and a slow condescending head nod. I'm not a jerk but when people are unreasonable I absolutely refuse to argue. This approach will get under peoples skin 10 times out of 10.
11. When someone is talking to you, stop them mid sentence and say "Have you been crying?"
12. I look over people's shoulders when they're unlocking their phone so I can see their four-digit code. Then I pretend I'm making a phone call and VERY LOUDLY use their number in my fake conversation.
"Yeah, the address is 8319 Main Street."
It's so much fun to see their neck snap back with this what-the-hell look, and then watch them mentally process the depth of such a remarkable coincidence. It's even more fun to do it with people you know and don't really like.
13. Rotate my friends tv a little to the left each time I visit.
14. When someone is a close talker, I like to take small steps backwards to see how far across the room I can get them to walk.
15. I've been slowly increasing the mouse sensitivity on both of my roommates computers. In 2 weeks I'm going to put them back to the default and pretend like mine is slow too. I'm interested to see the conclusion that they will come to.
16. I place random things on the table when my friend is over knowing that he's gonna pick them up and play with them. Then I think to myself "Yes, dance monkey, dance."
17. I work at starbucks and get stuck in the drive through answering a lot. I like to see how many times I can fit "yummy" into a conversation. My most is 6.
18. At my school you have to login to use the computers. Sometimes on the computers next to me I put a space where the username goes and then press the left key so it looks like there is nothing there. When anyone tries to login it doesn't work because there is a space after their username. They never notice and assume the computer is broken.
19. Say "no pun intended" occasionally after saying something normal in conversation.
Most people don't want to look stupid and will laugh awkwardly while trying to figure out what the pun was.
20. When I hate someone, I make sure to have it seem obvious to them that I couldn't care less what's going on or what they have to say... then make sure in other company to really sing their praises... really go on about how much I admire this person... so when she is bitching about me to someone else, they think she's a terrible person. I'm slowly breaking a coworker this way. She can't figure out why she doesn't like me, people think she's such a bitch for hating on me, especially since I just think the world of her.
These are genius. Share if you agree!
