10 Cringe-Worthy Colleagues Whose Sense of Humor Keeps the Workplace Lively

6 hours ago

They say laughter is the best medicine, but in the workplace, it’s also the best survival strategy. Between the endless emails, awkward Zoom calls, and coffee that tastes like disappointment, every office needs those colleagues who turn mundane workdays into a live comedy show. The pranksters, the quick-witted masterminds, the ones who can make even the most soul-draining Monday feel like happy hour.

So, let’s raise our staplers to the real MVPs of the office: the 10 colleague stories whose sense of humor keeps everyone sane, entertained, and occasionally questioning HR policies.

1.

"I look over a small group of people that make service calls. I recently had a scheduled appointment with a client that my subordinates knew was going to take about an hour (out of office kind of appointment).

My client ends up canceling, and I return to the office about 50 minutes ahead of schedule. I walk in to find two of my subordinates jousting, using rolly chairs as horses, and broomstick handles as lances."

© rachelyoun / Reddit

2.

" A coworker of mine went on vacation 4–5 years or so ago and came back to the entire contents of his desk wrapped individually in tinfoil. His pencil cup, every single pen and pencil, every personal belonging, his keyboard and mouse, everything.

Some of it is still wrapped in tinfoil to this very day. "

© VexingRaven / Reddit

3. "My coworker went on maternity leave, so we prepared a surprise for her and decided to grow a lawn on her desk."

4.

"My buddy had this hand lotion on his desk that he used everyday soon as he got into work. I found the same brand/bottle and bought it, emptied it out, then filled it full of mayonnaise. Made sure it was the same weight as his current lotion before making the switch, just in case.

He came in and used it! I screwed up and started laughing way too hard and had to fess up, who knows how long he would have kept putting mayo on his hands before realizing something was up!"

© Kelluthus / Reddit

5.

"A buddy of mine at work would put fake people in all the bathroom stalls. Shoes, clothing, and the printed faces of people. He locked the stalls after everything was set up one evening. About an hour into the morning the next day, several ladies were gathered outside the restroom whispering about the homeless people in the bathroom. They ended up getting our tall CFO to go in and check it out. He came out laughing. The whole company laughed after we discovered the prank."

Trashy_southerner / Reddit

6.

"A small, funny, and ultimately harmless prank I can pull on the job site is that we have a laser pointer left by the plasterer that shoots out ~100 laser pointers that is useful in highlighting a section of wall/area rather than a specific spot.

Whenever the Super’s laser pointer fails I hand over this Plasterer’s pointer, and he tries to point at the wall, 'So as I was saying I think if we notch out the beam here' - shoots 100s of dots across 5’ of wall...everyone gets a good laugh."

Rhacbe / Reddit

7. "My coworker got married...so we put 600 balloons in his office."

8.

"The site manager was giving some Mexican guys a hard time. It happened to be the middle of winter and the site manager set his gloves down. The Mexican dudes filled his gloves with red chalk. When he put them back on, it was a mess.

Also saw a dude roll up another guy's air hose. Then he took a roll of tape and taped it all together. It was a huge mess.

He goes carrying it out to the guy who he thought owned the hose and said, 'Here, I rolled up your hose.' The guy goes, 'That’s not my hose, I already put mine away.' The dude didn’t realize, but he taped up his own hose. Was so funny. That guy never lived it down. "

Accurate-Historian-7 / Reddit

9. "I decided to start wearing weird hats at work until someone says something."

10.

"I was on a large landfill project (waste management type landfill, not artificial island type), and the Geotech used to whine and bitch all the time about how hard his job was. He'd take off for hour long lunches, and go to every progress meeting and OAC meeting, even though his boss attended, and he had no reason to be there. Normally I'd be ok with him wanting to grow, but if he was off site, the contractor couldn't place fill because of the really tight environmental specs and the required testing which was being enforced by the local municipality even though the landfill was privately owned\operated.

One day, when his boss came and picked him up at the work area and took him up for a meeting, the guys on site decided they were going to prank him for wasting their time. They took the equipment and some lifting straps and picked up the little Honda Civic hatchback he drove and set it on top of the sea containers being used to store assorted small tools and materials. It was funny as hell when he got back. His boss finally got the point too about us not being able to work and switched out the Geotech for one who actually knew what he was doing."

Eviloverlordxenu / Reddit

Work would be unbearable without these office comedians turning chaos into comedy. From epic one-liners to dramatic coffee machine meltdowns, they keep us sane. Here’s to the coworkers who make us laugh—may their jokes never run dry.

Share your favorite coworker story in the comments!

Preview photo credit Kelluthus / Reddit