THE CONE REDISTRIBUTION PROJECT

I'm one of those people who just loves to cause a ruckus, the louder, the better. (My friends are now saying, yeah, that's news.) I wish I knew where I got this from, because both of my parents were both very sweet people who did everything possible to keep my proverbial cup from running over, and believe me, it DID.

Give me a rubber band and I will pull both ends until the thing snaps.  Countless balloons fell prey to my childish hands; of course since I was little I had no access to sharp objects, but that didn't stop me from squeezing them until they exploded.

As an adult at a posh gala I organized a motley which took the centerpieces (huge gaudy orbs filled with helium) and shoved them out under the tent walls until they "escaped." We were really, really bored.

Next day there was talk that some tables were decorated and others were not. We never got caught. The balloons must have hit the stratosphere.

I gravitate towards persons of similar ilk, or maybe they gravitate to me, who knows, I haven't quite figured that out. It's been quite awhile since I masterminded any such silliness-- matter of fact the last caper was ultimately dubbed "The Cone Redistribution Project."

It was a simple enough premise at the onset-- find an orange road cone and deposit the thing on someone's front porch. Technically, you could say we were stealing, but instead we preferred to think about it as "harvesting" the cones, wrapping them in protective blankets for safe transfer and then "reseeding" them elsewhere.

It started one night when I wanted to goof on a couple of friends -- and before I knew it a boatload of people were talking about the mysterioso appearance of the cones on their porch. It quickly skyrocketed until the "conings" involved multiple cones, and several people to pull off the heist. Nine arrived one night (I was in Florida but had conned someone to do it for me so that nobody would suspect me), and the hapless couple totally wigged out.

It didn't take long before The Cone Redistribution Project got completely out of control and there were copycat conings everywhere. They showed up on cars, in the middle of the roads, in public and private buildings, and in one particularly brilliant stroke, someone received a video of a cone. Some of us coned the parking lot of the state capitol building.

Needless to say there were countless hours wasted riding around "harvesting" the cones until I had collected enough to make a showy display.  What's interesting is just how many people were game to go with me -- I rode shotgun while my cohorts would leap from the vehicle, grab the cones and jammed them in the trunk of the car. I had another crew with a large garage where I was allowed to store a number until we had "harvested" an alarming amount, the better to freak out the next patsy.

Those were good times.  Sigh.

I hope that anyone who reads this doesn't get crazy ideas (HINT! HINT!) and revive The Cone Redistribution Project. It is such a silly, silly, silly thing to do.

Amen, and pass the mustard.