I personally love the practical joke, as long as it all comes off well, in jest, with no harm done either physically or emotionally. But unfortunately this is rarely the case as others have described above, especially if you are the but of the joke. Having been on both sides fairly frequently and evenly, I wanted to relate an event that I pulled on my college roommate 30 years ago that I still regret, as although relatively benign caused a rift in our relationship that has never healed.

My roommate was a bit overweight, and would run across the street from our dorm to do a fast workout before racing back to the dorm still sweaty and smelly in his workout shirt, jock strap, sweatpants, and gym shoes literally 5 minutes before the cafeteria closed, then load up a full tray of food with at least double helpings of entrees and sides as well as several drinks for rehydration, a rather overloaded tray definitely requiring two hands to hold and carry. As he crossed a large open expanse area of the cafeteria space, open to view from the whole cafeteria, one of my other roommates distracted him briefly while I snuck up behind him and "pantsed" him (pulled his sweatpants down to his ankles), leaving him standing in the middle of the cafeteria in nothing but a sweaty jock strap and sleeveles tee-shirt holding a burdensome tray of food stuffs. All present laughed heartily, including my roommate/victim, but our relationship was never tha same after that, and several followup revenge-type pranks enacted by him were nealry equally painfull and embarrassing to me, although socially unmentionable in a family forum.