practical joke

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Only a handful of Conservative MPs voted for him as speaker: one constituent says he was chosen by Labour as a “practical joke”.
衹有議會中的一些保守人士投票贊成他作爲發言人：某個選民說他被工黨選中純屬“惡作劇”。
Note: These tweeters may well be Harvard doctoral candidates playing an elaborate practical joke, but the verbiage and profile photos seem to indicate otherwise.
注：這些微博文章可能是哈彿博士研究生精心設計的惡作劇，但是從措辤和簡介照片來看似乎不像。
"When Obama won, my colleagues played a practical joke on me -- they made me wear a suit, a tie, and took pictures of me posing as Obama," Anas told reporters on Saturday.
阿納斯上周六接受記者採訪時說：“奧巴馬勝選那天，同事們搞了個惡作劇---他們讓我穿上西裝，打上領帶，扮成奧巴馬拍照。”

So there is this story about his Uncle Hoskins who takes his horse and cart with Richard in the back and drives it into the middle of the Mississippi River as a kind of practical joke on Richard.
有個故事是關於他的叔叔Hoskins的,他讓理查坐在他的馬車後,卻連人帶車掉到密西西比河裡,這被作爲了一個理查的真實笑話。
耶魯公開課 - 1945年後的美國小說課程節選

Second, please stop comparing Twitter to Zynga (which is a game publisher) and Groupon (which is an accounting practical joke).
FORBES: Yes, Twitter is Worth at Least $7 Billion
In some countries, bamboozled bargain-hunters, abandoned in an obscure field as part of a giant practical joke, would probably turn furiously on their tormentors.
ECONOMIST: An ingenious satire on supermarkets has Czechs chuckling
The real question facing industrialised countries is how to create a legal environment that counts cyberaggression not as a kind of practical joke, but a grave breach of the legal order, akin to terrorism, international organised crime, or aggression against another state.
ECONOMIST: Cyberwarfare

a joke that makes someone seem silly and involves a physical action rather than words

A practical joke is a trick that is intended to embarrass someone or make them look ridiculous.