Speaking as a parent myself, and therefore lying through my teeth...
My seven year old son pointed to the condom machine in the pub toilets and asked "Daddy, what's that?"

"That, son, is a chewing gum machine."

"Can I have some then? They've got fruit flavoured."

"Err... I haven't got any money."

All well and good, but he now asks me the same question wherever we go, and I am obliged to pretend that I am broke. God knows what he thinks the "Novelty" flavour are.

I once cracked the "Two quid a packet, but *what* bubbles" gag to him, just as a test, and he didn't have a clue what I was on about, which, I suppose, was fortunate.

Downfall, naturally, in front of a large audience in the Gents' in Tesco. The little bugger.

I also convinced him, on Children in Need night, that we don't have to donate any money because "we've already done our bit."

"How's that then."

"We gave fifty quid to the children's home to get you."

The threat to send him back always works in those sticky parental moments. Maybe we should come clean sooner or later. He thinks "Oliver" is a documentary.

Edit: Have also told my kids that a) if they get out of bed, killer clowns will eat their brains and b) the really tall steel chimney at the hospital is in fact a rocket that's landed in someone's belly button. Result: son who is phobic about his navel and a daughter who had a panic attack at a birthday party. Whoops.
( Scaryduck LIKES EGG, Wed 14 Jan 2004, 13:56, Reply)

Lie: "we're going to visit Granny"
Truth : Aged six, I noticed mum packing lots of things into giant traverling case.
"What are you doing?"
"Packing your case.... We're going to visit Granny"
"Oh! Goody! I like it at Grannies."

after 4 hours in the car I couldn't help think it was taking longer to get there than usual.

"How long now?"
"Not long."

within the hour I was watching my parents through my tears, as they left me at Lisvane Boarding School in North Yourkshire.
( Happyperson, Wed 14 Jan 2004, 13:54, Reply)

That the tree I was sawing....
...a branch off for my Father wouldn't catapult backwards when the branch was severed and send me flying backwards through the air. It did.

Though, the best I ever heard was a friend of mine who was born in Africa......

He had an older brother who lived in Africa with the parents. They also had a pet monkey. Now, there were a great many family pictures prior to my friend's birth that featured his Mother, Father, Brother and the monkey. His parents told him that the monkey in the pictures was him and they started shaving him because they were embarrassed by him monkey body hair. He believed this till he was 14. He is a ratehr disturbed man these days.
( sick_boy, Wed 14 Jan 2004, 13:46, Reply)

My birthday
My parents lied to me about when my birthday was.

I went into daycare quite young and my pre-school teacher suggested I might be bored staying for another year and that I was ready to start school (yes I must have been a monster). As I went to Catholic schools my parents simply tippexed out the date on my baptismal certificate and typed over the top adjusting my birth date by two months so I would make the cut off date for entry for that year.

So from 4 until about 6 or so I celebrated it then. However I think that on my 7th birthday I got a little confused about the date (and who could blame me) and insisted that it was the day before. When I have tried to piece it together I can vaguely remember as that was the only year I didn't have a proper cake. So from 7 til 11 I thought that this birthday was my real birthday when in fact it wasn't even my real fake birthday which was a day later.

That said I celebrated my birthday on this date til I was 18. I'm still a bit funny about my birthdays to this day. But I'm the only one that celebrates all 3.
(r0slynne, Thu 15 Jan 2004, 12:49, Reply)

Bunnies: It Can't Be Only Me!
I've read through the entire thread now, and have been forced to delurk for my first ever post, by the strange lack of tales about bunnies.

I mean, I can't be the only one who's parents made them quiver with terror at the mere mention of the fluffy toothed ones, can I?

For those of you who had parents who cared and therefore don't understand, it goes like this: the parent describes the bunny as "a hairy creature, with big teeth and big ears, that lives in a hole in the ground". However, they don't also mention that the bunny is a) small b) cute c) hasn't got fangs and d) only eats grass.

So basically I thought bunnies were a sort of giant, hole-dwelling troll. :( My parents never bothered retract their clumsy explanation of what a bunny is when they were having so much fun torturing me. "Be quiet, or I'll let the bunny rabbits have you!" would keep me quiet for hours.

Apparently, it all came to end on my third day at school, when my primary school teacher asked me whether I wanted to help feed the bunny she had bought in. Though I don't remember it myself, they say it took about 45 minutes to coax me out from under the headmasters car...

I still don't like going near bunnies; I have to force myself to remember that they aren't evil. Surely I am not alone in being mentally scarred in this manner...? Come on, confess it, you buggers.

Actually, now I come to think about it, my dad told me that the empty boiler suit that he had left down in the garage crawlspace was all that remained of the last person to annoy him, and my nan told me evil gypsys go around offering doped sweets to children, so they could sell them into slavery in Persia. My family was EVIL.
(IChewCandlewax, Sun 18 Jan 2004, 20:52, Reply)

When I was little
my uncle told me that during ww2 he flew around in a giant meatball bombing Italy. The italians would all be drawn out from their houses shouting "Mamma mia, look at the giant meatball!", making it easier to bomb them.

He was quite mad.
( cheesemaster a screaming naked asian man driving a semi, Wed 14 Jan 2004, 20:52, Reply)

I was informed...
that my parents had died in a car crash and I had to live with my Aunt and Uncle and their fat bastard son Dudley.

And now, several years on, sodding letters are coming down the chimney. I mean, wtf?!
( Barry Chuckle III - the troll with a soul., Wed 14 Jan 2004, 16:38, Reply)

A long time ago......
In the early ninties - when there was nothing on TV, and a young'un had nothing but coal to play with, I had a discussion with my dear mother.

I said - "Mother dear. Will I be happy, will I be rich"

Here's what she said to me - "Que sara sara."
Slightly confused by this anti-englified response I asked - "What the f*dge does that mean?"

"It means kill Sarah. Sarah." she replied, catatonically.

I'm currently serving the 10th of my 13 year sentence.
(Market Man, Wed 14 Jan 2004, 14:03, Reply)

ahh, childish innocence...
I once asked my father (a venerable sage of wisdom and other useful information) why nut, bolts, screws, etc were marked as either "metric" or "imperial".

"Ah," came his sage-like reply, "this is because metric is a new invention, designed to standardise international sizes."

"But what about imperial?" asks I. "Why did we change?"

"It was a long time ago" said he, "the Imperial measurement was invented by the emporer; and only he knew the exact size. When the Death Star blew up, the knowledge was lost, so we had to invent some new measurements. All the imperial nuts and bolts you see now are the last ones made before he died."

I believed that for years...
( vbloke OLDSKOOL, Mon 19 Jan 2004, 23:56, Reply)

Winter sports
It's 1983 and I'm 10 years old. Ski Sunday is on the telly, and I ask my dad why onlookers are banging cowbells and shouting every time a contestant skis past.

He says,
"it's so that blind skiers can keep away from the sides".
(Sharp-Eyed Sharon, Thu 15 Jan 2004, 22:57, Reply)

Fog isn't there
Or rather, fog happens when God gets up late in the morning and hasn't finished making the world...the only bit he's bothered with is the bit around to you and a hazy outline will do for all the far away stuff (unless you want to go up to it and then he'll fill it in.)

I quite like this one,as it made me centre of the universe.I still find myself thinking about fog this way.I cant help it.
(pikey, Thu 15 Jan 2004, 16:00, Reply)

That if I told the truth
I wouldn't get in so much trouble.

Big Lie.

I have no "I like this" boo!
(Bezmina, Wed 14 Jan 2004, 13:37, Reply)

Bad Vibes
When I was about 12 I asked my Dad if he had any spare AA batteries that I could use for my walkman 'cos I couldn't find any.

He said yes, and I followed him upstairs to get the batteries.

he went digging into the top drawer of the bedside cabinet and unscrewed the green end of this predominantly orange ribbed thing.

"what's that dad?" i asked

"It's a joke carrot a friend gave me" he said, passing me the batteries.

a year later I needed some more batteries, and as my folks were out I thought I would go to the "battery drawer".

there were six vibrators and a pot of delay cream.

needless to say i shuddered, especially a few years later when my younger sister discovered the same....
(Lemster the sound of one luma clamping, Fri 16 Jan 2004, 1:48, Reply)

Five-legged horse
"Why's that horse got five legs?"

This is of course because some horses mummys and daddys are magic, and so the baby horses have a special extra leg which it can use when one of the others gets tired. Not at all because it's got a frighteningly large cock dragging along the floor.
(ivor_the_injun, Thu 15 Jan 2004, 12:38, Reply)

Bird Brain
One day before leaving for school I told my mom that Tweety, our parakeet, was stiff at the bottom of the cage. She told me that she would put him in a paper bag and bring him to the doctor. When I got home that day, Tweety was fine, but he was a green instead of blue. My mom told me the medicine does that sometimes.
Tweety lived a very long time, but every so often he would have to go to the doctor and sometimes his color would change.
(Blob, Thu 15 Jan 2004, 1:57, Reply)

Milk
..My father, when I was around 3 or 4, would regularly ask me where milk came from. Being an intelligent child, I replied 'Cows', which would appear to be correct.
However, my Father, being the 'funny bugger' that he is, would advise me that I was correct, but he enjoyed adding that it was possible to get milk from trees, and, in fact, that is where we got our milk from. 'Bollocks' (or some such 3 year old variant) I replied, "Milk comes from Cows and cows alone"

I went to bed one evening, and The Great Bald One (TM) had an evil gleam in his eye.

I awoke, refreshed from my peaceful slumber, and my Father, excited, pointed out of the window. "There" he cried triumphantly. "Milk. On the Tree. I'll go and pick it now". And there, lo and behold, milk bottles were hanging, white and proud from the tree. He had tied milk bottles to the tree.

After that day, for a good while after, whenever people would ask where milk came from, I would reply "cows. And Trees"

He's just that kind of man. And I have become him with my own son. Lying to children for your own amusement is very funny, it is big, and it is clever.
(V3lvetPresley, Thu 15 Jan 2004, 12:22, Reply)

It happened very rarely, but every now and then the tables could be turned....
When I was really young, my parents bought my sister and me each a mechanical alarm clock - the kind with the two bells on top. I took mine up to my room, and about half an hour later my mother came in to find me sitting on the floor, surrounded by tiny clock parts. I was just learning to use a screwdriver. She gulped a few times, said nothing, then turned and walked out.

Another half hour after that, she came in again to find me sitting on the floor, playing with a complete alarm clock - and it worked! She was absolutely amazed. Stunned. She told all her friends about her genius son who stripped an alarm clock down to its tiniest little spring then put it all properly back together again, and it kept perfect time.

What she didn't know was that once I'd taken the thing apart I realized there was no way in hell I could figure out how to get all those pieces to fit back together... so I went over to the next room and took my sister's clock.

To this day she doesn't realize the stunt - and it served me very well when I wanted to take apart the vacuum cleaner, the stereo, and anything else I could get my hands on. I had open reign on the household machinery.

I learned my lesson though - after the clock I made sure I laid all the bits and pieces out in order so I knew how they went back!
(arvana, Thu 15 Jan 2004, 6:37, Reply)

Back in the olden days...
...when I were little, I used to LOVE having baths. So much so, in fact that I hated getting out of the water and would complain vociferously through the medium of hysterical weeping. This quite rightly narked my folks off good and proper so they told me that a monstrous beasty called Tommy Splodger lived down the plughole and he'd come out and eat me if I didn't get out by the time the water ran out of the bath. The gurgle of draining water was Tommy slurping it down eager to get a taste of me! Thenceforth, my exasperated folks had more problems getting me into the bath than out of it due to my terror at being devoured by the drain dwelling Mr Splodger.
(Spicer, Wed 14 Jan 2004, 14:22, Reply)

That when the ice cream van music plays
It means that they've run out of ice creams. bastards.
(baroo_the_cat Valley of Weights, Wed 14 Jan 2004, 13:54, Reply)

Oh, remembered another one!
Not a parent, but my A-level Biology teacher told us about this time back at her old school, when the whole Biology department decided, for a laugh, to pretend to an entire GCSE Biology class that the reason seagulls sleep standing on one leg is so that they don't get eaten by limpets.

The theory was that limpets are carnivorous creatures, and the way they catch their prey (seagulls) is by waiting until they're asleep, then crawling very slowly onto their legs, and then when they wake up, they are unable to walk or take off, and so when the tide comes in, they drown, and the limpets feast. So of course, sleeping standing on one leg halves the chances of being killed by limpets.

Of course, a lot the kids at first thought it was nonsense, so they went and asked the other biology teachers, who were of course in on it, and confirmed her story (and of course these kids were at the age when teachers still had no lives outside the classrooms, and so didn't communicate with each other).

I like to think that someone, somewhere, has failed their GCSE because of this, and now harbours a bitter hatred and a lust for revenge...
(Branfish, Fri 16 Jan 2004, 20:17, Reply)

Wasps and Bees, oh my
My dad told me that bees were friendly and wasps were mean, and that I should run screaming from wasps but be calm and peaceful around bees.

At primary school, a bee came in. All the little kids freak out and run screaming from it. Of course, I stand still, smug in the knowledge that bees are our friends. It stings me. I had such a go at my dad that night.

His response?

"It might have been a wasp in disguise, they're really tricky..."

Gah, parents!
(kiwanotree Meh, Thu 15 Jan 2004, 7:20, Reply)

My *lying bastard* Parents
Told me for the first 5 years of my life that the correct way to spell my name was 'PEST'

i got sent to the headteacher on the first day of primary school because i was "bieng insolent"

they apologised for getting me in trouble that night though

when my dad tried to tell me it was all a joke, i wouldnt believe him
(Mungo Monkey the Magician of Beer, Wed 21 Jan 2004, 13:58, Reply)

Why Mother, WHY?
My mother told me, when I was around 7 years old, that men could have babies, but they come out the bum and it was very messy on account of all the poo.
What the hell is up with that?
(Smell eep!, Fri 16 Jan 2004, 15:39, Reply)

Horse whisperer?
When I was young, my mom told me if you blew up a horses nostrils, it was horse for "let's be friends" and the horse would straight away be docile and allow me to ride it.

When I was older, I tried it. The horse sneezed all over me, and ran off. I was NOT impressed!
(Snitter the Rat, Sun 18 Jan 2004, 11:55, Reply)

Tartan
When I was a litte kid, my mum took me and my brother to buy our first kilts.

She picked out a tartan, and told me that was our Clan tartan. Fully chuffed, I wore my kilt with pride.

Fast-forward twenty years: While preparing for our wedding, my mum phoned up to ask how it was going.

Me: "Good, Mum. Just organising the kilt hire."

Mum: "Oh, good. What tartan are you going to have?"

Me: "What do you mean? The Gordon, of course! The family tartan!"

Mum: "What are you talking about? We don't have a family tartan!"

Me (identity wailing into the depths): "What? It's Gordon. You told me it was the Gordon! We're in the Gordon clan!"

Mum: "Don't be silly, son. That just went with my dress at the time. Anyway, what about the flowers?"

Me: "whimper"

Some people on here say "I believed this until I was 7/6/9". I believed her lies until I was twenty-bloody-six!
(weedom, Fri 16 Jan 2004, 16:15, Reply)

Couple of lies I've told kids.
First one was a few years ago, I was working in a bar and it was Xmas Eve - all the girls had to dress in Mrs Santa outfits (inc. fishnet stockings). I slipped and fell and had four pint glasses in my hands - I sliced the top of my finger off.
Went to casualty and there was a 4 year old boy in there who'd fallen down the stairs looking for Santa (I was the only female, the rest were just drunken yobs).
Little boy yells to his mum - "Mummy, it's Mrs. Claus" and asks what I was doing in hospital. I told him that I had been feeding Rudolph a carrot and that he'd bitten me - he was so into my story that I ended up regaling him with tales of elves and Santa's workshop and stuff. Eventually he said "Mrs Claus, is Santa bringing me a bike?" - I looked over at his mum who nodded so I asked him if he'd been a good boy and he said he'd tried, so I told him if he went home to sleep after he got his stitches, he may just have a bike waiting for him.
Needless to say his mum loved me for taking kids mind off injury. I went back to the bar I worked and got drunk all night :) Yay.

2nd lie was to my (then) 4 year old cousin - Xmas Eve 2000. He was being a little shit, so I told him that the tracks in the sky (aeroplane tracks) were Santa's sleigh, so if he didn't behave he'd get nothing for Xmas.
( Batshitmentalist is sane for once, Fri 16 Jan 2004, 4:30, Reply)

lies....all lies....
being ginger, My parents told me that i had black hair when i was born
Until one day when they left me outside in the rain.................
........and i went rusty..
( mostly harmless John Leslie raped me on, Thu 15 Jan 2004, 19:51, Reply)

Fascist Parents
Having a common name spelt an abnormal way was quiete frustrating when i was a youngster, could nver ever ever find any of they pencils pens or rulers spelling out my name. When i asked my parents why they didnt make pencils or owt with my name on them "becasue there is nobody else in the universe spelt with a k" made me feel proper special til i was 14 and met sumone else spelt with a k. i was heartbroken. They later told me that the reason iw as spelt with a K is that so they didnt have to buy all that junk.

we used to hav routine where my bed time was at 8 and i had to go to bed after coranation street and i would go put my pajamas on at the commercial break. my mum told me last year that they used to record it and put me to my bed at 5oclock so that i would be sleeping all nite. stupid kristine never ever clicked on......
(StrangeKristine, Thu 15 Jan 2004, 1:01, Reply)

Lies your parents told you
We used to drive past a sub power station on the way home. My dad convinced me that Dr Who lived there, and if he was ever attacked by Daleks the only sure fire way to kill them was to lift up their (helmets?) and pour hot tea down inside. Of course in the holidays I made a flask of tea and went down there looking for Daleks....Bastads.
(poodleseatnoodles, Wed 14 Jan 2004, 18:56, Reply)