Personal story time, folks!
As a child, my cousins and I would have speed-Waldo tournaments using the "Where's Waldo? series of books.
The winner would get a cold delicious can of Welch's grape soda. There were eight of us and I only ever won once, but let me tell you there was nothing more satisfying than finding that stripe-wearing sneak.
TikTok prankster @BlakeMessik is set to make sure at least one person is denied that satisfaction. We don't know what his beef with Waldo is, but it clearly exists.
Blake went to some serious lengths to pull a prank that's going to give someone, likely a child, a major frustration headache.
Blake's victim, probably.
So what did he do?
Blake bought a copy of The Great Waldo Search, took it home, digitally removed Waldo from every image in the book and then returned it to the shelf of the book store for some unwitting person to purchase.
He posted a short TikTok about the prank...
Lad learns Photoshop to edit a Where's Wally book... 😂 Credit- https://t.co/MSLGCYhJZW To use this video, Please… https://t.co/CS1biIVaah— TheCONTENTbible (@TheCONTENTbible) 1581693061.0
We're not fans of putting the book back on the shelf.
That copy of The Great Waldo Search is likely going to end up in the hands of a child who is going to end up confused and frustrated thinking they're dumb for not finding Waldo anywhere. That child isn't going to know this is part of some internet prank done for likes.
Having said that, we'll admit that on some level this is downright genius. Evil genius.
If we had Blake's level of patience and skill, we would 100% do something like this and give the book to a friend...or enemy...or frenemy.
That video is only about 30 seconds long, which is common for TikToks, but we really want you all to think about just how much time and effort this must have taken. Blake had to purchase the book, take it home and find Waldo in every image.
That could have taken days in and of itself.
Once he found each Waldo, he had to then scan each image into his computer. Then he had to use Photoshop to digitally remove Waldo from each image.
If you've never done digital image manipulation you may not understand how time consuming that step is. You can't just delete Waldo, you have to then create patches for where he was standing.
Was Waldo in the corn? Well you're going to have to create more corn and match it seamlessly.
Once Blake was done removing and re-creating, he printed the pages out and glued them into the book. Again, you may not realize the time this would have taken.
This isn't a simple glue stick job. This required matching edges and texture of the book pages.
Blake is serious about this.
BlakeMessick / TikTok
It seems funny haha in a thirty second clip, but the more you think about it the more you begin to suspect Blake has quite the interesting backstory. You can kind of imagine him hunched in front of his computer screen in the dark cackling as he furiously deletes Waldos, his eyes shimmering in the reflected screenlight while he matches corn.
This is some seriously next-level evil mastermind stuff. This is the sort of thing you do for fun if you happen to live on a volcanic island shaped like a skull. This is like "Ooh, I just thought of the perfect Christmas gift for my henchmen" kind of evil.
Blake...who hurt you, Blake?
Redditor PadWanKenobi was curious to hear what people felt were the tell tale signs they were in the company of a possible genius, leading them to ask:
"What’s a sign of extremely high intelligence?"
Instant adapability
"Ability to intuitively and quickly understand complex systems and how lots of parts relate in a coherent whole."
"Like I work with some people who just keep tons of concepts in their head and easily integrate new information into their understanding of those concepts."
"They immediately know what questions they should be asking to better understand."
"And these are things they're currently working on, not like things they spent time studying in school over years."
"They just have a very strong ability to synthesize new information into their understanding."
"I sit in meetings distracted and confused having forgotten what we talked about in the previous meetings, and these folks just consistently have a solid handle on everything."- Ok-Control-787
Innate Problem Solvers
"They know when not to solve a problem."
"This took me a while to understand but the smartest people I know do this."
"It could be a really simple thing like ignoring emails from people asking for help."
"The supervisor or boss might have a quick and easy solution for the situation but instead of just handing it to the person that asked they let them figure it out on their own."
"They know who they can do this with and when to do it."
"If they did that with all of their underlings it would just create a mess."
"Another example that I can think of is planned chaos."
"Some people can predict exactly where things will go wrong and they could fix it before it creates a problem."
"They don't because nobody ever notices what's going on in the background when things are working perfectly."
"Once things fails then everybody notices and if you are the one person that fixed it you become the hero."
"They can also use then chaos to reach a goal they couldn't get before if things were working correctly."
"There's many examples of this in every day life that I didn't see before until I realized what was happening."- atapes
GiphyYou know what they say about people with small hands
"If your hand is smaller than your face."- FallofTheKnight
The all knowing glow.
"When someone asks you a question and you push your glasses up while light comes out of it and covers your eyes for some reason."- JonEregor
Those giveaway behavioral quirks
"Wearing glasses and saying things like 'ah yes', and 'I see' while you pensively rub your chin."- iuytrefdgh436yujhe2
Thinking Reaction GIF by ABC TV + IVIEWGiphyEncouraging others
"When they explain something they make the people around them feel smarter, not dumber."- redkat85
Being one step ahead.
"The capacity to understand complex things, see patterns where regular people don't."- Ostepop234
"They have this tendency to make you go 'Ohhh, why didn't I think of that?' when listening to them talk."- did_it_forthelulz
Why Didnt I Think Of That Cillian Murphy GIFGiphyAn endless love of learning
"A passion for knowledge and expanding understanding of complex concepts."
"The plumber can be just as insightful as the scholar."- KatatoniK94
Of course, one shouldn't always be fooled by what they see.
As many people are masters at appearing much smarter than they are.
In fact, one important sign of super intelligence is being able to separate those who appear smart, from those who actually are.
