While April 1st marks the day of new forms, fees, and filing locations (oh my!), it is also known as the national holiday for pranks! Our office loves to celebrate the holidays and April Fool’s Day was not an exception!
In fact, here’s a story about a past prank pulled by managing partner Murali Bashyam, and our IT department as told by their prank victim, our former paralegal Pamela.
“I got to work one morning, booted up my computer and got to work. I started a document and realized the screen was not showing what I was typing. Foul language was popping up! Not ALL the words were changed, just some of them, but they were common words (think “the” “and” “to”). I checked my keyboard and couldn’t see any keys stuck or anything. It dawned on me that something was very wrong with my computer so I ran to Murali’s office to tell him, and ask what I should do. He seemed really concerned and insisted we call our IT guy right away. He put Chris on speakerphone and told me to describe to Chris what was going on. Chris said worryingly “Oh no. Somebody’s hacked into your computer and given you the Autocorrect Virus”. I freaked out. “What?! You’re kidding! I didn’t do anything, I swear. I haven’t downloaded stuff, how could they hack me”. (Keep in mind this was more than 20 years ago. The internet was very different.) I was so upset. Chris said I needed to stay off the computer until he could look into it remotely. “It may take a few hours. Hopefully nothing is damaged beyond repair”. I distinctly remember saying “I can’t believe they were in my computer! I feel so violated!!” I think it was at that point Murali could no longer hold back. He burst out laughing, and then Chris did too.”
Pam had then spent years attempting to get back at Murali but thankfully this did not cause a prank war to start in our halls. While many pranks have been pulled at our office by various staff members, attorney Murali has kept his title as Prank King. As his reign went on, it was decided that he should retire the title and his pranks and our office can once again continue to work hard on April 1stwithout fear or paranoia of another classic Bashyam Prank.