Music

Misheard lyric in the 'Fresh Prince' theme song puts an entire county of schools on lockdown

by Aaron Zorgel

March 4, 2013

An entire county’s worth of Pennsylvania schools were put on secure lockdown last week, when an eye doctor’s receptionist misheard a lyrical reference to the Fresh Prince Of Bel-Air theme song on a student’s voicemail. When 19-year-old Travis Clawson didn’t show up for an appointment with his optometrist, the office receptionist gave his cellphone a call, and was treated to this clever little voicemail greeting:

“Hi, you’ve reached Travis Clawson. I can’t come to the phone right now, because I’m all shooting some b-ball outside of the school.”

Good one, Travis! But when it comes to voicemail messages, enunciation is key. Here’s what the receptionist (mis)heard:

“Hi, you’ve reached Travis Clawson. I can’t come to the phone right now, because I’m all shooting some people outside of the school.”

Yikes. Any ’90s baby probably would have spotted the reference a mile away, but a certain receptionist believed she had just been alerted to a possible murder threat, and saw fit to let authorities know about it. The police put Ambridge Area High School on secure lockdown immediately, as they began searching for Clawson. Here’s where things get hilarious: when one school goes on lockdown, it’s the school board’s policy to lockdown all area schools. So, for a full twenty minutes, every school in Beaver County (there are 51 total) was thrown into an emergency response situation as police tried to pinpoint Clawson’s location and investigate the alleged threat. All that fuss because some kid mumbled through a Fresh Prince reference on his voicemail.

It turns out, police didn’t have to look too far to find ol’ Travis. When the whole thing went down, he was maxin’ and relaxin’ all cool in the Ambridge Area High School guidance counselor’s office. When questioned by police, Clawson was quick to point out that the message was a pop culture reference, and not really anything worth freaking out about.

Receptionists just don’t understand, I guess?