Prank of the Century

… because that’s what good friends are for.

We recently had some tenants vacate our rental house in Phoenix. Which is a very special story and you can read about it here and here, but what you need to know now is that, amongst the grime and broken furniture and non-functional cars and other trash that they left us, there was one really cool present:

A giant stone tortoise.

As in, this thing weighs like 300 pounds of poured concrete, tortoise.

Well one of our friends, we call him Sleepy E, he secretly liked the tortoise and wanted it for his backyard. So we told him we had already promised it to Frick’s significant other, St. Yvonne.

And then we began secretly plotting how we could give the tortoise to him in the most inconvenient and annoying manner possible…. Because that’s what good friends are for.

Here’s all you need for a good prank:

1. A giant stone tortoise (or turtle, for the non-biologists among us)
2. A very tall ladder
3. A pickup truck to transport said very tall ladder
4. An orange bandanna borrowed from Payson’s wife to “flag” the end of the ladder where it sticks out past the back of the pickup bed (for safety!)
5. Someone to run the video camera and 5 strong men of questionable intelligence
6. It also helps if you have a full moon, but that is optional

The big unknown that could throw this whole plan in jeopardy was that Sleepy E and his wife have some dogs that like to bark at strange noises. We were very concerned about how we were going to accomplish this prank without alerting the dogs, who would then awaken the household with their barking.  Well, it turns out the neighbors were having a very loud party that night, which easily drowned out the sounds of the prank-in-progress.  Prank completed successfully.

AND NOW I GIVE YOU…..

A Giant Stone Tortoise on the Rooftop