A joke?

We recently had a guy call in with a phone reference question at the library. He called the circulation desk, and started to ask me his questions, and while I could have answered (with all my reference experience!!), I chose to pass it along to the librarian. But not until after he started the question with me!! Here's the convo...

Man on Phone: Yes, I was wondering if you have a dictionary.
Real Librarian: Um, yes, we do!
MP: Well, could you look up a couple words for me? I need to find the definitions for the words "Jerk" "Yank" and "Tug."

Well, me being...well, me... I think this HAS to be a joke. I mean, not that I'm dirty minded, but...ok, I'm dirty minded, and my mind went immediately to the "nasty." And I have to admit, I had to hold in the giggles. Wow, I'm really immature...

Anyway, there was a helpful fabulous librarian sitting at the reference desk, looking like she needed a good reference question, so I passed the phone call on to her. The call lasted a good 20 minutes, and I heard her give the definitions no fewer than 3 times each, along with examples of each (no fewer than 3 times each), and had to try explain each term multiple times and in multiple ways (while I sat at the circulation desk giggling).

A couple days later, a different librarian was sitting at the reference desk while I was at the circulation desk, and I heard her say "You need the definitions of 'Jerk' 'Yank' and 'Tug?'" I immediately burst into giggles because I knew where this was going. She went over the same things (multiple times) and gave several examples of each - and looked at me like I was crazy.

I also immediately shot an email to the first librarian to tell her the Jerk Yank Tug guy was on the phone again. We decided it might be a crank, so we thought we'd talk to our branch manager. She said she had gotten a call from the same guy, looking for the same terms at one of the other branches while she was sitting at the reference desk!!!

Theories? Well, it could be a joke. It could be a "secret shopper" type who is just looking to see if they can find a cranky librarian. Or could it be a news channel doing an expose' on the library to see if they could trip us up or see if we would answer his questions without questions. Or it could be a legitimate question...

I'm leaning towards joke. But maybe that's just 'cuz I'm dirty minded...