Watch as school board somehow fails to realize it's being pranked (hard)

Who could have seen this coming.

Readers will be shocked to learn that on Aug. 26, "Phil McCraken," "Eileen Dover," and several others with suspiciously homophonic names failed to show for the public comment section of the Henrico County, Virginia, school board meeting.

The meeting, which is available to watch courtesy the Henrico County Public Schools website, depicts a seemingly exhausted school board chair, Roscoe Cooper, reading the names of individuals who — presumably — signed up to speak.

"Phil McCraken," intones Cooper. "Phil McCraken?"

When Mr. McCracken fails to materialize, Cooper moves on to the other names on the list. "Ophelia McHawk," he says to no reply, before trying "Eileen Dover," "Don Keydic," and "Wayne Kerr."

Cooper proceeds to look down at his desk and appears to briefly shake his head in despair, before resignedly continuing on.

"Aaron Sorkin... Aaron Sorkin?"

The relevant portion begins at the 3:12:40 mark of the below video.

Look, we get it. It's been a long, tough year and a half for all of us. And with public officials forced to navigate the constantly changing health landscape amidst an ongoing pandemic, members of the Henrico County School Board can and should be forgiven for occasionally being a little slow on the uptake.

Hopefully they got as much of a laugh out of this incident as the prankster behind it. We're sure it's much deserved.