Our dog had absolutely wrecked the television remote...
Sure, you could still use it well enough, but the plastic was all mangled and sharp where she had gnawed on the edges and the back remote panel didn't close quite so well anymore.
Mom didn't even want to listen to dad go on about the dog chewing the remote so she bought a replacement before he even came home.
To the delight of my sister and I, we found that both the new and old remote worked at the same time.
Bingo.
We hid the old remote in the cushions and left the new remote on the side table between the couches. Dad took the bait. He sat down on the sofa with the remote and began surfing the channels until he found something and put the remote down.
My sister and I looked at my father, then each other, and wordlessly, with nothing but a nod, we knew it was game on. Slowly I slid the old remote out of the cushions and we hid it between us. My sister punched the channel down button and the channel changed.
My dad sighed, picked up his remote and changed the channel back. My sister and I looked at each other trying not to laugh. This time I punched the up channel button and again the channel changed... my dad sighed again, this time much louder and more annoyed and grabbed his remote, changing the channel back.
We were doing our best to compose ourselves. This time my sister muted the show. My dad, starting to get really annoyed and barely able to contain his annoyance at the situation says, "what the hell is going on with this damn thing" to no one in particular, punching angrily at the volume button on the remote.
At this point we can barely hang on... and I hit the off button shutting that right down and now my dad with, "you gotta be f****** kidding me...!" And at this point we can't take it any more and my sister and I are laughing hysterically and my dad looks at us and instantly realizes that we are somehow controlling the tv... and we all had a good laugh at that.
Which may have in a way backfired because for the longest time, any issue with the tv, remote, and or vcr... or really any technology really... dad was certain we were somehow controlling the device...
So maybe the joke was ultimately on us?