LIAR, LIAR, PANTS ON FIRE!

Obfuscation is a good word.   According to the dictionary it means “the action of making something obscure, unclear, or unintelligible. An example being: “when confronted with sharp questions they resort to obfuscation”

This seems to me to be exactly the case when celebrity couples announce that they are divorcing.   “It’s completely amicable” they say, “we still love each other very much”.   No, they don’t.   If it was that amicable and loving they would stay married.   In most cases I imagine that the highs of moonlight and roses have been replaced with the “I can’t find any clean socks” and “Did you remember to put the bins out?”  It happens to every relationship but the couples who weather that usually settle into a perfectly happy and comfortable relationship.   But some people need the perpectual high of ‘being in love’.

That is just the beginning – ‘Your call is important to us’ intones a computer generated voice when you call a company to complain or make an innocent enquiry.   No, it isn’t – if it was they wouldn’t make you hang on for forty minutes listening to Vivaldi’s Four Seasons on a loop.   ‘See you later’ say people you’ve never met before, and are unlikely to meet again, when they serve you in a shop.   We all do it.   “We must have lunch” I say to an acquaintance who I bump into accidently after a gap of many years.   If we actually wanted to see each other we would have arranged to have lunch at some point during the intervening years.   These are, of course, mainly white lies and for the most part help the wheels of society turn smoothly.   I can’t be the only person who claims to have read a book that everyone  is talking about when I have in fact only read the reviews but I hear myself saying ‘I found it very powerful’ (I am sure I would have if I had bothered it read it) or the other favourite ‘I found it a bit derivative’ – and what book can you not say that about?  

But then you get the scammers – the out and out liars who claim that they are from your bank and try to persuade you to transfer money to a ‘safe account’ or you get a text purporting to be from your child or an old friend stuck abroad in a desperate situation and needing money.  Apparently if you answer that (most people don’t) you should ask in the text ‘How is Bob or Ken or…?’  If you get a reply saying that ‘Bob, or whoever is fine’ and you know that they don’t exist you can safely assume that this is a scam.  

I, myself, have been approached by Brad Pitt, who apparently for some reason wishes to follow me on Instagram.   I did suggest to a friend that he would have a hard job persuading me that he was in need of money when they pointed out that he was more likely to ask for my bank details because he wanted to send me some money!  How kind of him.   Unfortunately, I fear that there are people out there who will believe these things.   I was listening to a podcast the other day about scammers and this woman in America, who sounded perfectly normal and not like a congenital idiot, had ended up giving this man nearly half a million dollars!!   He said his name was James, he was living in London and that he was half French and half German, which explained his intriguing accent.   Five seconds into hearing a clip of his voice it should have been obvious to most people that he came from somewhere in West Africa.    Her family, who had approached the makers of the podcast and the producers themselves had all told her she was being scammed but she refused to believe them.   The did finally manage to prove it to her when she told him she was flying to London to meet him and he suddenly blocked her. 

A lesson to us all not to be too trusting, on the other hand if your best friend asks you if her new dress makes her look fat be very careful.   If she is still in the shop, trying it on by all means be honest, but if she is just going into a party lie through your teeth!

This blog has been mainly about lying and being economical with the truth, but I just wanted to have a mini rant about packing as an appendix.  I might be economical with the truth from time to time but not with packing.  I’m going away next week and I am already stressing about what to take.   You can read endless articles about sensible, minimalist holiday packing.   I start off like that.  Two dresses, two pairs of trousers, some t shirts and a couple of pairs of shoes.   Then I panic   What if it’s cold – I add a couple of sweaters and a pair of thicker trousers and then some socks for good measure.   It might be wet – I add a waterproof jacket.   Maybe we will be going hiking – better put in the walking boots.   We might be asked to a dance – I haven’t been to a dance for at least a decade, but I would hate to be unprepared.   I’ve forgotten bags – I’ll need one for the beach and then another one for going out to lunch, and an evening one.  Maybe the t shirts are a bit informal – I’d better put in a few shirts as well.   Then I find a unworn skirt that I bought specifically for going away – better put that in.   I’ll need a sun hat and maybe a rain hat.   Oh Lord, I’ve forgotten a nightie and dressing gown – maybe two nighties as it’s bound to be hot.   I think I’m going to need another suitcase.   And that is what happens every time and yet, to my astonishment and annoyance when I get to my destination, I realise that the perfect dress or the ideal trousers were the ones I left behind!!!