What’s a lie you’ve told that went too far? – 17 mostly harmless fibs that got out of hand

Everyone, including a Pulitzer Prize winning journalist such as myself, is prone to the odd exaggeration now and then.

It’s when these lies get out of hand that panic can set in. Soon you’re forced to double down on your mistruths for fear of being exposed. To get an insight into the tall tales people are unleashing on the world, franki-pinks put this question to r/AskReddit:

‘What’s a lie you’ve told that went too far?’

Would you fall for these top replies?

1.

‘I once went to pick something up from the office in central London. Took my wife and we went for lunch and a day out nearby.

Boss asks, ‘ah did you try xxx for lunch?’

I said yes when I didn’t for absolutely no reason. It then became a point of small talk for a while across my team.

I had to lie about what I had, what my wife thought, etc

We then considered doing our Christmas party there. Everyone was asking me about it and I just had to continue this stupid lie I received no benefit from telling.’
-Super-Surround-4347

2.

‘I had to emergency watch Succession because I told a friend I’d watched it when I hadn’t.’
-ImpressNice299

3.

‘I’m the same age as Daniel Radcliffe.

When they announced the first Harry Potter film Blue Peter announced a sort of open casting – you just had to write in saying why you should be Harry Potter and you might be invited to the casting.

Spoiler – as I understand it this went nowhere and Daniel was cast completely independently, in part because he was already acting on stage, which, you know, makes sense!

Anyway, I wrote off to Blue Peter and awaited my invite to the casting because I was a scrawny 10 year old with dark hair and glasses and a massive Harry Potter fan so I thought I was a shoo-in.

Time passes and I received no invite (neither did I receive my Hogwarts letter, so I was doubly annoyed). And then in September I started at secondary school.

Call it a combination of being scared I wouldn’t make any friends, and ongoing frustration at my lack of transformation into Harry Potter, but for some reason I told my new classmates that I’d made it “to the final 3” for Harry Potter but was ultimately unsuccessful. When Daniel Radcliffe was announced, I “confirmed” to my new peers that I’d met him at the audition, and added that he was a bit of a prat (i was still childishly annoyed it wasn’t me).

For some reason, this lie stuck with my year group and it became an ongoing joke that I kept up the lie all throughout secondary school.

Daniel, if you’re reading this – I’m sorry. I did eventually tell the truth and let them know that I had no evidence of whether you may have been a prat at age 10 (but I don’t have evidence saying you weren’t so…)’
-PangolinMandolin

4.

‘I was worried that I was behind everyone else in my class when it came to getting our first boyfriends (I really wasn’t) so I made one up. I went above and beyond the usual “he goes to a different school” to avoid being caught out. Hence, my imaginary boyfriend was a Dutch boy I’d met on holiday in France with my family.

I told everyone about him and how we wrote each other romantic letters and were planning to meet up at Christmas. Of course, they all wanted to see the letters so I had to disguise my handwriting and write them myself. I’d told them “Christian” was teaching me Dutch so, since this was pre-internet, I had to use things like instruction manuals to find Dutch phrases conveniently translated from English that I could put into the letters and “teach” myself.

I had to think about this imaginary guy all the time to make sure I didn’t forget any of the details about him. This is why almost 30 years later I can remember details like the “fact” that he lived in Voorburg, just outside The Hague, and had a twin brother called Caspar. What he looked like was easy because he was inspired by an actual hot Dutch guy (or, more accurately, a set of identical twins) around my age who was staying right by us on holiday but in real life I was too shy to speak to them. It got pretty exhausting after a while and I had to end the relationship because we were just too far apart.’
-tiptoe_only

5.

‘I once told someone at a wedding (I was 15) that I was a massive Jane’s Addiction fan like them to seem cool, but was totally unprepared for ‘what’s your favourite song?’ ‘All of them I mumbled lamely’ and slunk off in my puffy dress.’
-Uhurahoop

6.

‘I used to claim to be good at basketball when I was in secondary school to impress the Polish kids in my class who loved basketball (I’m not, I’m just tall for no reason). I was slightly exposed when my PE teacher took it upon himself to start a basketball team and invite me to try out and I was practically falling over the ball.’
-Vixtol

7.

‘I told a boy that I was trying to impress that I could skateboard. Eventually, he said we could meet up at the weekend and I was briefly elated, until he said to skate. I borrowed a board off of someone and showed up to this park. He went down a small incline and I followed, eyes closed and arms out. He looked a bit confused when I opened them and I tried to blag it was a move (called Daredevil or something because, yeah, wow, so daring…). Thankfully, he ran into another skater boy and I said see ya later boy before he could realise I was gone. I blagged it but I think we both knew it was for the best, and he never asked me again.’
-BananaHairFood

8.

‘Me, aged 14: Sorry I didn’t do my homework, my dog died

Teacher: Oh that’s sad, what was your dog’s name?

Me: Err, I don’t know’
-potatan

9.

‘Told a woman I really liked Nicolas Cage like her. One of those throwaway things you say when you’re first going out. 25 years of marriage later I still haven’t found a way of telling her I can’t stand him. Genuinely terrible actor.’
-smoulderstoat