fantasy death?
one delightful colleague of mine lies constantly, to the extent that none of us are sure if she even exists. For example, she claims to be a post-doctoral researcher to anyone she meets, despite the fact that she has no PhD, and when questioned futher it turns out that her PhD took 1/2/3/4/5/6 or maybe 7 years to do, but she ran out of money/didn't write up in time/was beaten to a publication by another lab/fell out with her supervisor/was abducted by aliens* etc etc

That's a minor thing though. What gets to me is her Zelig**-like ability to know everyone in the world, and to be everywhere something of interest has happened.

This was best exemplified on July 7th 2005, and for many months since then.
We work in a central london research lab, and found ourselves close by the bus and russel square bombings on that day. Both this colleague and I were in the lab at about 9 am, when we heard about the 'incidents' on the radio. 'bummer!' we think, assuming this is yet another london undergound colossal failure, and thinking of our friends who have to travel in on no doubt crowded and delayed trains. Oh well, let's get back to work. So we kept working. Then we heard a 'boom' from outside. Must be a skip being dropped by incompetent builders we think. again, oh well. back to work. Then we heard on the radio what had actually happened. Cue ashen faces, shocked voices, and all of us in the lab trying to contact friends and colleagues to make sure they are all right.

Twenty minutes or so later, I hear my colleague talking to a mutual friend, going 'oh, it was awful this morning at king's cross, so delayed, I had to walk in eventually'. Strange i think, she was in early today. whatever.

an hour or so later, our boss is in the lab. deluded colleague is now saying 'of course, i heard the bang, and felt dust being sprayed out of the tunnel, and just ran away. now i realise it was a bomb - scary!' I was a bit confused, as i was talking to her in our lab when the bomb on the picadilly line train went off. neither of us was in a tube station...

Then at lunch i heard her telling someone 'oh, thank god i wasn't in the bombers carriage, it was so scary walking down the tunnel though, thank god i had clean clothes with me to change into, i was so covered in dust!' I had to query this. 'but you were in the lab when the bomb went off?!'
'oh, when the TUBE bomb went off, but I had to run away from the BUS.'
me: 'wha?! we were talking to eachother when the bus went up, we heard it!'
her: 'yes, but look at this cut on my hand, that was from the bus shrapnel!'
me: 'oh FFS'.


More recently, i have heard her telling people that she was on a train that blew up in IRA times, in a pub that some nailbomber attacked when that went off, in new york on 11th september 2001, in madrid etc etc.
if this is the case, then maybe i should publish her travel plans from now on to prevent more deaths - she is clearly bad luck...

I'm just not sure what she gains from this fantasy world, apart from shellshock and breathing problems. weird.

Apologies for length, everytime she lies, it gets bigger.

* this is one excuse not used so far. we have a sweepstake going for its first use...
** maybe not that zelig-y, but i'm young, and don't really know any other way to describe it. sorry :-)
( ascorbate, Thu 29 Nov 2007, 13:13, 1 reply)

Scaryduck's confess-o-matic
My entire life is a complete fabric of lies, for which I am very sorry (apart from all my QOTW posts which are 100% of TRUTH).

This for example:

I went years telling people that I was a rather talented and enthusiastic musician. This resulted in an offer to go on a European tour with a well-known goth-rock band* as their keyboard player at the height of their fame.

The awful truth was that while I had spent the best part of a grand on a very excellent Korg Poly-61 keyboard and assorted add-ons, I was, in fact, a complete musical dyslexic who had been booed off stage as a result of my eardrum-rending musical ineptitude. Twice.

Legendary Goth Rockers: I lied.

* who shall remain anonymous, but their name rhymes with Boards of the Poo Lurch
( Scaryduck LIKES EGG, Thu 29 Nov 2007, 13:08, Reply)

I once employed a bloke
who seemed quite normal until he told us that:-

1. He had coached the UK basketball team - he was 5'4" and fat.
2. He had been personal security to Princess Di on tour in Australia and had danced with her.
3. He had been in the SAS.
4. He was a qualified mechanic - but had no tools.

I suppose it could have all been true, but when he told you these things within the first 5 minutes of meeting him you somehow found yourself nodding and smiling inanely because you just knew he was making it up.

There was lots more but I can't remember it all.

I sacked him.
( Blackdogmanguitar is out with Fat Larry's Jazz Band on, Thu 29 Nov 2007, 13:07, Reply)

This is the story of "They"...
I told a few lies when I were but a wee'un not long after suckling at my ma's teet.

One that still makes me laugh is blaming my dad for filling the shampoo bottle up with water. At the time it was only my parents+ me and I were 4...Jokingly, to this day, whenever the story is brought up, I still claim it was him!

But this story isnt about me. No....

It would instead be about a friend from College, Tom (Name changed to protect the guilty)

Tom was an ok guy. We got on well. One day we were sitting around talking and someone asks Tom what his dad does for a living. "My dad works for the Government...MI5"....right..... Giving the guy the benefit of the doubt, we ask for some details. His dad has been to the gulf (a lie in itself, MI5 are responsible for security within the UK...MI6 deals with security outside the UK...common knowledge), worked in London, dealt with "unsavories" etc...

And on another day we were in his house. He says "oi, come here, take a look at this"....and points to a cupboard under the stairs...." see this, in there is a red button, you cant push it cos its a panic button directly linked to my dad's work"...."open the cupboard and let us have a look" we cry. Desperate to take alook at the mysterious button of doom. If someone tells you not to push a button, you're *obviously* going to do all you can to push it.

At that point one of the *ahem* fatter of out company drags Tom out of the way, and looks inside...there is indeed a red button. So we do whatever 17 year old would do...push the button.

The adrenalin kicked in, panic set in Tom looked close to tears we froze. Listening, and then we heard it. The sweet sound of..............Nothing. Absolutly nothing. No police. No helicopters. No Ambulances. No mysteriously well dressed guys with ray-ban's on called "Mr. Smith". Nadda, nothing.

We left soon after with Tom claiming "they" will be here any minute now. "They" never arrived.

I later found out his dad is a builder.

Length? No matter how many times we pushed the button, it didnt reach MI5 HQ
(drain_bamaged, Thu 29 Nov 2007, 13:02, 2 replies)

As a habit
When I was younger, in school up until the early years of university, I told a metric buttload of lies. Casual ones, big ones, sometimes to claim I knew what I was going on about, sometimes to keep up with a conversation, sometimes just to make me look better. One thing I frequently did was to tell cool stories I'd heard, from other people or off websites as my own, or as happening to people I know. Or, I'd add in details that didn't happen.

It became a habit. I didn't even think before I lied, to friends, family, work colleagues. Any moral qualms I had with it just vanished. I'm not so good at lying under pressure, and am as transparent as glass when confronted on a fib, but the casual throwaway lie became utterly trivial. This caused a problem because I also wasn't able to keep lies straight.

My point is that it's easy to start off with a few lies, nearly all of us do that and there's nothing wrong with a white lie here and there. But it's easier than you think to start telling more and more, and end up well, addicted to them. I managed to get myself out of the rut, but it wasn't easy. What I do nowadays is try to force myself to cite where I got the story from if it didn't happen to me. If I got it from b3ta, I say that this is a b3ta story. If I got it from elsewhere, I say so. If it actually happened to me, then I can tell it. I still have to keep myself from adding in extra details to make the stories cooler or more impressive. It's hard work, and it's not pleasant either - I'm really quite ashamed of how I was when I was younger. I'm still not 100% over the habit, but I do try.

For example, the story I posted in the Desperate Times QOTW about the dog was in essence true. But, the detail about him getting a haircut afterwards as revenge was added afterwards (sorry about that), because it made the story funnier and better.

Hate to be a downer, but it's a cautionary thing. I wasn't a pathological liar, I was just a normal guy who wanted to be more interesting and accepted, having the answers. Having lying becoming a habit rather than an exception is not as tricky as you think, and you can build quite a reputation for untruthfulness without even knowing it.
(calamarain just invented dehydrated water, Thu 29 Nov 2007, 13:01, 6 replies)

Chris
Chris was a housemate for a while when we were undergrads. His life was an unending tale of woe - possibly. Among his problems was that he could never get laid, because (apparently) his penis was so large that it'd never fit, and he had to use a pint glass as a condom.

Many of his other problems stemmed from the time he was run over by a Rolls-Royce and woke up in a ditch a little later holding an open and full bottle of Newcastle Brown that he had not had before.

He would tell these tales with such a look of open-faced innocence...
( Enzyme is powered by sunlight, Thu 29 Nov 2007, 12:57, Reply)

All of my stories have been completely true.
Really- they have. In fact, if anything I've understated them.

Come to think of it, though, that's not necessarily something I should be proud of...

(Yes, I've led a very weird life.)
( The Resident Loon Not a demographic. Do not measure., Thu 29 Nov 2007, 12:53, 1 reply)

back at school...
Aged about 12 and starting to "rebel", I once took a marker pen into the toilet with me after school and spent a good ten minutes creating a stick-man scene. Just doodling, really, nothing particularly offensive or obscene but permanently-inked graffiti nonetheless.

Unbeknown to me, my squeaky-tipped-pen noises had been overheard by a teacher also visiting the toilet. He eyed me suspiciously as I left the toilets but didn't say anything.

The next day he approached me in the corridor and said "If you don't answer me instantly, I'll know you're lying: was that graffiti on the toilet wall when you went in last night?"

A brief bolt of panic shot through my head as I tried not to think through the implications of pausing while coming up with the right answer and I simply blurted out the first answer that came into my head: "yes!"

He frowned and, knowing neither he nor I could prove anything, walked off.


I've often wondered about that moment. I simply didn't have time to think, yet I lied instinctively. I'm still not sure whether that makes me a pathological liar by nature.
( sanityclause is waiting until, Thu 29 Nov 2007, 12:53, 2 replies)

Car clubs
I've been a member of several car clubs over the years and it's always amusing.

Essentially you'll normally have an online forum, much like this one, where people go on and on about the mods etc they've made to their cars and how it's got 200bhp and their metro cuts up porsches etc etc.

Then sooner or later someone arranges a rolling road day to get cars checked and adjusted etc. Always there is some smug git with his "200bhp cavalier turbo etc" who has the smile wiped from his face when an unimpressed spanner monkey takes it off the rollers having measured a totally standard 120bhp etc.

Yup astoundingly a bodykit and alloy wheels don't make your car go faster.
(golddust QOTW now revolves around being a cunt, Thu 29 Nov 2007, 12:52, 4 replies)

Some-one who i went to school with
claimed that his cat died of bubonic plague!

Not sure if a pathological liar or just bullshitter of the highest order, but a chap at work is known as fiveskin*
Everything anyone has ever done, seen, owned, visited, eaten, looked at, watched, purchased or dreamt of he has got something bigger, better, been there but thought it was rubbish, blah blah blah blah blah blah ad nuaseum

he is a bit of a cunt to be honest.

*ie if i have a foreskin, he has to go one better, and has a fiveskin
(Halfy By light alone, Thu 29 Nov 2007, 12:51, 1 reply)

Troof
Everything I write is 100% true.

Except that sentence.

And that one.
( Panjandrum brought to you by tea and biccies, Thu 29 Nov 2007, 12:51, Reply)

Another uni story... moneybags.
Whilst in freshers week we met moneybags. Moneybags was rich. Moneybags had £200 cufflinks. Moneybags had nice suits. Moneybags was set to inherit millions when he was 21. One of my friends lived in a house with moneybags and others. So 2 years after coming to uni moneybags crashed his housemates car. It should be fine, afterall moneybags has money, it's a shit car, he can just buy it outright, right? Nope, his parents were even abdabbing about the excess that he should pay. If you haven't guessed yet, moneybags had no money, and now he has no friends.
( Slippery Mick ‏, Thu 29 Nov 2007, 12:50, Reply)

Students (2)
Another student, another stupid plagiarist. Reasons for suspicion in this case:
1. Essay did not answer assigned question
2. Essay did not really have anything at all to do with the course
3. Essay's one and only footnote gave the URL of the website from which said essay had been cut and pasted.

D'uh, again.
( Enzyme is powered by sunlight, Thu 29 Nov 2007, 12:50, 4 replies)

I'd just like to say
All of my posts are completely true.
(frankspencer, Thu 29 Nov 2007, 12:47, 7 replies)

It'll bring out the scotsman in you...
...on holiday once I was having a few drinks and finding myself in a Scottish pub I made the mistake of asking for my first drink with a scottish accent. Something in my head just thought that would be a good idea at the time.

It slightly backfired when the scotsman behind the bar, obviously bored with the slow night, was so glad to meet a fellow countryman that he began chatting to me and asking where I was from etc.

This meant I had to increasingly tell lies about my whole scottish upbringing (having grown up in North london!) yet drink like a fish.

I kid you not when you're plastered at 3 in the morning in a hot country it's not that easy to carry off a glaswegian accent and keep a massive series of lies going. Somehow I managed it and was even propositioned by a scotty lass in the bar. Sadly she was short, ugly and incredibly drunk so I declined. I was however very amused to see her fall flat on her face (literally pancaked!) just 5 mins later when trying to leave with her friends.
(golddust QOTW now revolves around being a cunt, Thu 29 Nov 2007, 12:46, 4 replies)

Students
Most of my contact with liars comes in the form of students passing off others' work as their own. A particular favourite was a student who produced a couple of paragraphs that I was sure she hadn't written. There were three reasons for my certainty:
1. I had recommended the paper she ripped off.
2. I had sent her a .pdf of the paper she ripped off.
3. I had written the paper she ripped off.

D'uh!
( Enzyme is powered by sunlight, Thu 29 Nov 2007, 12:45, 2 replies)

All drugs dealers
especially those selling pills - "yes, they're pure MDMA" - hmm, really ?
Special mention in a converse way goes to the mushroom shop in Amsterdam which sold us "beginner's mushrooms". This phrase was to cross my lips laden with sarcasm - lips which had ingested mushrooms a few times before - when I had to shepherd a group of us across Amsterdam after a moderate quantity of said "beginner's mushrooms" got us all absolutely cunted.
Drugs - just don't do them*

*unless of course you're out for a good time, when they may or may not work. Funds can go down as well as up, your mileage may vary.
( I_Was_Mordred, Thu 29 Nov 2007, 12:44, Reply)

busted
in my first year at uni, i had a friend who claimed he used to be in busted, as the drummer, and they threw him out cos he couldnt jump high enough with his drumkit.

this was obviously amusing bollocks, so fair enough, but so was almost everything else he ever said, to the point that i couldnt be sure if any of it was true, even things which were totally feasible...
(skankgirl, Thu 29 Nov 2007, 12:44, 1 reply)

I've known a couple in college...
While doing A-Levels.

There was the girl who spoke Swahili, was raped by uniformed police officers for wearing a Cradle of Filth tee, whose parents were in prison for various violent crimes...

I went round her house, possibly the most middle class country pile you could imagine, and her mum made me a lovely cuppa.

Liar number 2 was even worse. In his 21 years on the planet, he'd managed to survive a heart attack, leukemia, a brain heamorrage AND lung cancer, what's more, he'd successfully fathered two children and was a renowned concert pianist in the US.

He was a part-time Bus Driver, nothing more exciting than this.
( Sonic James Doom forgetting the date since... umm..., Thu 29 Nov 2007, 12:39, Reply)

Drinking
One guy I know is known behind his back as "Bullshit [Name Removed]" because he can never tell the truth about how much he drinks.

He'll tell a tale of derring-do and rambunctioness resulting from a giant amount of [insert beverage here]. Then you'll see him hammered after a reasonable amount, because you've been drinking at the same rate as him and know how much/little he's had. Proof his liver is made of liver and not steel, yet he persists...
( mr_wicksy is.... old., Thu 29 Nov 2007, 12:36, Reply)

Roar
This bloke said he'd deliver a ton of horse manure for my garden for free, turns out it was a load of bullsh!t.
(oneinthepink is at your cervix m'lady, Thu 29 Nov 2007, 12:34, 1 reply)

Pop!
Whilst working in York for 2 weeks I went out for the night with my new found friends and had the pleasure of meeting a young lady...

Got on well with her and arranged a date for the following night.

On the date she went on and on with all sorts of improbable stories including one about how she'd had a baby when she was younger but had to give it up for adoption and it now lived in America.

"Okay...." I thought.

Anyway, the night went on and eventually we ended up in my hotel room, we hopped on the good foot to do the bad thing and she bled all over the sheets.

I resisted the urge to ask if her name was actually Mary but turns out it was her first time.

Surely she must have twigged that was one lie that might be a little obvious?
(golddust QOTW now revolves around being a cunt, Thu 29 Nov 2007, 12:33, 3 replies)

I don't lie
I simply make the truth more colourful.
( chickenlady b3ta's very own Elizabeth Taylor, Thu 29 Nov 2007, 12:33, Reply)

I've...
... got the first post. Of course.
(Le Misanthrope last procrastinated on, Thu 29 Nov 2007, 12:32, Reply)

Mr M@
I see your "v" shaped lies!
( Cawl, Thu 29 Nov 2007, 12:32, 4 replies)

My mate
grows his stories. They multiply depending on the company.

The fight was 2 drunks, when with his mates.

The fight was 3 guys and a drunk, when with acquaintances.

The fight was near Apartheid-Riots when with strangers :|
(Schumann makes awesome quiches., Thu 29 Nov 2007, 12:31, Reply)