Senior Joey Spaletto’s life revolves around goofs and gaffs. His sense of humor is a characteristic about him that everyone, especially his friends, enjoys. However, his life wasn’t always as hilarious and carefree. 

Moving to Michigan the summer before eighth grade, he left all of his friends, and more specifically, his supremely important lady friend. Joey found himself bored, alone, and having no one to really share his Fortnite funnies with.

“I was born and raised in California,” Joey said. “I moved here in eighth grade from San Francisco because of my dad’s work. I left everyone and my girlfriend there—it was an eighth-grade heart-shredding breakup with the boo thang. It was especially hard moving here because that summer, I didn’t know anybody, and I had to go the entire time doing absolutely nothing. It was boring, so I started gaming because I had nothing to do.”

Originally starting out with Pokémon cards and advancing to Nintendo games and then Roblox, he found himself swarmed with online media. But, little did Joey know that his gaming obsession would lead to the reason he would discover his lifelong friends. 

“I used to be a big Pokémon fanatic; that was the one thing that got me through the summer that I moved here—playing Pokémon games and Pokémon cards,” Joey said. “But when eighth grade started, I actually made friends through Roblox. That was where the goofs began. We played Roblox together, and in summer 2019, we joined a cult—a Roblox cult, one might say. [My friends] made moving here a lot better. Now, we like to do funny bits and shenanigans.” 

However, Joey’s media presence goes further beyond just video games. During quarantine, he developed a love for making short reaction videos on TikTok with absolutely no context. It was a shock to Joey when some of those videos began to blow up—expanding his reach to people throughout the world, giving him a platform to make more people laugh. 

“Some might know me as a paper chaser,” Joey said. “I’m quite TikTok famous; I have over 9,000 followers, and my most famous video got around 2 million views. All I did was scream at the camera, and it got millions of views and 200,000 likes. I remember another one of my videos got famous; I was just jumping down the stairs, and it got thousands of views. It’s all just part of my personality and making people laugh.”

Millions of people on the internet might find Joey absolutely hilarious, and think his bits are top tier. However, throughout his years, he has run into a few small altercations where his goofs have gotten him into a bit of trouble.

Regardless of the punishments he’s received for his jokes, Joey’s shenanigans will never cease. He finds immense joy in producing a smile on people’s faces and creating a laugh. It’s a huge part of the person he has become today.

So whether it’s launching fireworks at his own house, faking the scores on his mini-golf score sheets because he’s just so terrible, or causing a ruckus because he’s so passionate about Santa Claus existing, Joey lives to make his friends, amongst others, happy. 

“I’m funny because I just want to be funny,” Joey said. “Making other people smile and seeing people laugh gives me happiness, and I like making other people’s days.”