Let me introduce you to 'Bob'...
I remember my first day at college. Nervous and excited in equal measure, and happy to get out of the violent hellhole that was my secondary school, Tertiary College was going to be my big break, my new dawn. I got chatting to all the unfamiliar types, cracking jokes and making myself feel at home. It was going to be great here.

It was later on the first day that the first omen to hint that my utopian dream was doomed entered into my field of vision: Bob.

Bob... from the start, I knew their was something wrong about him, but I couldn't tell what. It was only later that I found out. Bob didn't just tell lies, his whole persona and history - as told to me and my friends throughout my 2 year eventual nightmare that was my A-level studies - was complete and utter bollocks.

I'll start with the simple stuff. Bob was fat, ugly and thick. No matter - he played keyboards in a band, which was pretty cool. Now, this was believable, there are many musicians not known for their intellect. So, I couldn't wait to hear his skills, and during a visit to Fox's in Meadowhall, I badgered Bob into giving me a demo. Scouring the keyboards, I noted a worried look on his face:

"Most of the keys on these units are too small."

Eh? Too small? Surely his fingers aren't that fat? Despite the shop having copious numbers of keyboards, not one of them was in Bob's size.

Then it dawned. He was lying, and had been found out. But this was just the start.

Then there was the time when he said he'd built a railgun - railguns use the power of magnetism to drive bullets at high velocity into targets. It's the kind of stuff seen on apocalyptic sci-fi movies, not in provincial Yorkshire colleges. Openly bragging about this (in Physics, of all places) - the tutor commissioned him and his equally stupid friend Jughead to build one for the College Open Day. Amazingly, Bob agreed!

The day came, and the Railgun was ready. Except it was made out of steel bus-bar, blue-tack, and the kinds of magnets you get in kiddy educational sets. There didn't appear to be anything that the local Scout Troop should have been fearful of, never mind the US Military. Did it work? Did it fuck. Bob claimed that my oscilloscope display had 'interfered with the electromagnetic force' and tried shouting me down during our demos. That the crowd were more interested in my ability to make wobbly shapes on the oscilloscope than the 'My First Physics Kit' shambles on the other side of the room spoke volumes.

The last story I'll tell you though, was the killer. Bob claimed to have come from a highly intellectual family. For example, his dad was a polymath, interested in loads of things but his true love was photography. So much so, apparently, that he lectures on photography and taught classes at the local community centre. Bob showed a lot of pride in his old pa, and he seemed to want to emulate such greatness.

I thought this was rather noble, and was finally thinking that Bob wasn't that bad a person after all. Except, during said discussion, it transpired that this too, was complete bullshit. Because of one simple claim.

Bob was adamant, and I mean adamant, that...

HIS DAD TAUGHT *BLIND* PEOPLE PHOTOGRAPHY.

And we're not talking visually-impaired-needing-glass-types here, I'm talking the full blown David Blunkett-braille-reading-guide-dog-needers. Doing photography. He said that despite this rather significant hindrance, they could 'still appreciate that they were taking a great picture'. Eh?

Never mind the fact that he was lying, he wasn't even able to tell believable lies. I can just see him in his bedroom, plotting his latest fib, thinking 'this is a cracker' despite the fact it's less convincing than Andie McDowell's acting.

I had to put up with these lies for years. Like his idea for soundproof paint, or that he'd shagged this girl I'd been seeing at college prior to me meeting her (I'm surprised he could have found his cock), or that he'd had trials for Sheffield United, or various other claims that we continually laughed down by my and my cadre of chums who were all finding college life too much and just needed this guy to fuck off.

In the end, it turned out that Bob was a pretty unremarkable lad, from a pretty poor part of town, his family down on it's luck and despite the aformentioned lie, his dad was a top bloke who once got us out of a heavy-shit disciplanary. There was a point that I felt bad about giving him grief about the bullshit that spewed forth from his mouth.

But then I realised that he was the worst kind of liar, one who believes their fabrications and makes out to be better than they are. Those types deserve all the shit they get, in my eyes.

Harsh, but fair, no?

Length? Bob's is probably about three inches, but he'll be out there bragging it's anaconda like...
(scentless_apprentice takes two bottles into the shower!, Fri 30 Nov 2007, 20:07, 3 replies)

They get shit in your eyes?

( OneSullenBrit *air sandwiches*, Sun 2 Dec 2007, 13:36, closed)

...

Did Bob make your two years hell? He seems like a mild annoyance rather than a life destroyer...
( Naked Ape call me Caitlyn, Tue 4 Dec 2007, 13:51, closed)

Railguns.
Although it sounds like this one was fairly cack, it is possible to make a working railgun at home. Have a look at www.powerlabs.org/
(Half of Stephen Fry's right buttock pissed on your dog on, Tue 4 Dec 2007, 16:58, closed)