A school board meeting in Henrico County, VA provided a moment of unintended comic relief as the list of people who signed up to speak began looking like a prank à la The Simpsons.
A video of the Aug. 26 meeting immortalized the prank. The meeting had been called to discuss a litany of topics as the fall semester approaches. Having reached the public comment section, the speaker began calling for those who had supposedly registered to voice their opinions to the board. After uttering a couple of the dubious-sounding names, the joke became apparent.
“Phil McCracken?… Ophelia McHawk?… Ilene Dover?” called the speaker, seemingly oblivious to the hilarity he was unleashing. The stunt is one that any fan of Bart Simpson would know too well, having watched him repeatedly prank call Moe’s Tavern. Pseudonyms like “Ivana Tinkle” and “Hugh Jass” have become commonplace utterances in schools and playgrounds thanks in no small part to “El Barto.” The running joke has gained enough attention to spark theories that Moe must have known that his tormentor was Bart, but chose to keep accepting the 10-year-old’s antics out of the goodness of his heart.
The likely explanation for the school board speaker’s failure to notice the gag is fatigue, given that more than three hours of discussion had taken place before he read the names.
Source: YouTube, via Henrico Citizen
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