19 truths, 1 lie: explained

On 17 December 2019, I put out an experimental?post to share a little bit more about me with my audience. The post contained 19 truths and 1 lie, and it's embedded below. Looking for the answer? It's at the END of this article.

The post led to lots of comments, and now that the cat is out of the bag regarding the answer, I thought I'd explain in a bit more detail. I couldn't do that in the post because LinkedIn posts are limited to 1300 characters, but these LinkedIn articles can be up to 100,000 characters!

The sneaky reveal

I gave people some time to get their guesses in and then told them the answer would be revealed later the same day. Rather than put the answer in the comments or in the body text of the post, I decided to place it in the About section of my profile.

The About section on LinkedIn profiles had only recently been expanded from 2000 to 2600 characters. I shared this info through one of my #LinkedInLearnerLounge posts and this little quiz was a chance to reinforce that learning point.

19 truths and 1 lie

Right, it's explaining time. Remember, these are all true apart from one …

01. No human has ever beaten me at Scrabble. (TRUE)

A lot of people thought this was the lie. As I said in the comments, maybe I didn't even like Scrabble or had never played it. The statement would then have automatically been true.

In fact, I do like Scrabble a lot but very rarely play it and have only ever played against a few different people.

I did once try to learn the Scrabble dictionary, but I decided that life was too short.

02. I wrote a terrible comedy play during university. (TRUE)

This was a handwritten manuscript where I re-imagined the most boring person in our friendship group as a crazed mohawk-sporting killer.

It wasn't funny and the rumours that I destroyed it myself are entirely true. Sorry, Andy.

03. I have one tooth that's back to front. (TRUE)

I saw several dentists before someone noticed this. I'm not actually sure which tooth it is but Dr Morgan said it was surprisingly common. I don't know if that was just the sort of thing that people say to make you feel better.

Anyway, it doesn't hurt and hasn't affected my eating, which is one of my absolute best skills.

04. I used to be a mental arithmetic champion in my school. (TRUE)

Yes, one of my proudest moments was beating a supposedly smarter girl to the mental maths title in front of the whole school. In your face, Emma!

There was one point where I was working things out faster than the teacher could type them into the calculator. He didn't like that, let me tell you.

I'm not so hot at mental maths these days, but I do know all the numbers. Name a number. Bet you I'll have heard of it.

05. I voted 162 times by phone for Leona Lewis to win The X Factor series 3. (TRUE)

This drew a lot of comments from people who either couldn't believe that I was down with the vocal princess of 2006 or who thought that the number of votes couldn't have been accurate.

There was no free voting back then but I managed to register mine without paying a penny. That's because I was working to test an internet telephony device (this was before Skype and Zoom) and one of the boxes had some spare credit loaded on it. My calls were itemised – even I wouldn't have sat there and counted them all.

So, I'm partly responsible for Leona's win. I probably ought to let her know, really.

06. I have the gene that makes coriander taste like soap. (TRUE)

I learned about this only last year. I'd always just tried to play along before, but once I knew that some people really can't stand the taste of coriander (it's called cilantro in the US) and that it's because of genetic reasons, I stopped eating it. Yuck.

07. A couple of nerves in my mouth are in the wrong place. (TRUE)

The same dentist who spotted my weird tooth also realised that the reason the anaesthetics never worked properly on me was because, in his words, "your mouth isn't wired up the right way." After that discovery, dentistry became a lot less painful for me.

08. There's one language I can understand but cannot speak. (TRUE)

I could understand and speak Armenian until I was 5 or 6. After that, I stopped speaking it but could and still can understand it perfectly. This is called "receptive bilingualism".

I was never shown the 37-character Armenian alphabet or any other systematic way of learning the language. Remarkably few of my classmates in South Wales knew much Armenian either.

09. I almost died as a baby during a trip to India. (TRUE)

I don't know much about what happened but it was something to do with bowels. Awful business.

To confirm, I'm not yet dead.

10. I once broke someone's arm during a football match. (TRUE)

Lots of people wanted this not to be true in case I was some sort of nasty brute. It was an accident during an honest challenge. I used to be a half-decent goalkeeper, by the way. My nicknames were El Gato (The Cat) and El Loco (The Mad One). Harsh.

There's a related anecdote about this story but it's too saucy to tell here. If you're a friend, I'll tell you if you ask nicely by DM.

11. I was diagnosed with gout at the age of 24. (TRUE)

Yup, inherited from my grandfather and still the cause of a lot of pain. Some days I can't walk. It's a good job I work from home, really.

Thankfully, there's nothing wrong with my fingers or brain (he says with misplaced confidence).

12. I gave up smoking when my daughter was born 10 years ago. (FALSE!)

Hehe! Big fat lie. Well, it's true that my daughter was born 10 years ago. But I've never smoked, not even once.

It's interesting that a mundane lie got under the radar. Only one person guessed this correctly on the day I put out the original post.

Smoking is horrible. Don't do it ??

13. I've slept rough on two nights in different cities. (TRUE)

Yup, once I was abandoned by a group of supposed friends while out for the night in London. I don't drink any more but that night I was worse for wear and ended up sleeping behind a skip (that's a dumpster, US friends). I briefly assumed the nickname "Skippy" at work when word got out about this.

The other time, I was visiting a university friend in Nottingham. For one reason or another, I couldn't stay with him for one of the nights and ended up sleeping in a field. Random but true.

14. Microsoft gave me their MVP award 4 years straight. (TRUE)

A few people thought this was the lie. If they'd read my profile, they might have picked a different options.

From 2003 to 2007, I was award Microsoft's Most Valuable Professional award for services to users of the Mac version of Microsoft Office. Back then, I used to provide help to people via Usenet newsgroups – a kind of forerunner to modern internet forums.

They sent me loads of goodies but no money, and I never worked for Microsoft.

15. I was once scammed by a member of my own family. (TRUE)

Wasn't nice. Have you ever heard of multi-level marketing (MLM)? Well, I hadn't. Cost me the best part of ￡1000. Don't get involved, seriously.

16. I dislike travelling but have been to Brazil twice. (TRUE)

Both visits were to the north east of the country. The Rio carnival wouldn't have been my style.

Most interesting facts I learned while in Brazil:

• If you hear a motorcycle slowing down behind you, you're about to get robbed.
• If you smell watermelons at the beach, there's a shark in the water. (I'm glad I learned that afterwards.)

17. I went to 7 different schools but got 3As at A-level. (TRUE)

Yup, Mum was a single parent and moved around a lot for her work as a doctor, so we relocated many times. I ended up staying in my last school for several years and managed to catch up academically following some crappy schooling earlier on in life.

I was told I'd never get the grades to become a biochemist, so I opted for maths and computer science instead. Then I got 3As that surprised my teachers. So, I could have been a biochemist all along.

Instead, I now write web content for B2B websites and try to help people with their LinkedIn presence.

18. My full title is Lord John Espirian of Hougun Manor. (TRUE)

So many people thought this was made up. But I never said I was a member of the royal family. My lordship was actually bought for ￡25 on the internet, via Lord Titles.

A great gift idea if you're stuck before Christmas!

Even though I can't enter the House of Lords, I do think my ￡25 investment makes me better than all you peasants, what-what.

19. My first music purchase was Informer by Snow (on cassette!). (TRUE)

A licky boom boom down! Snow's real name is Darrin Kenneth O'Brien. He's Canadian and wears glasses. Pretty fair to say that rap doesn't get cooler than this. Check out Snow – Informer.

20. I've given telephone tech support to the actor who played Holly in Red Dwarf. (TRUE)

Back when I used to be second-line technical support, only the best guys would call our VIP customers. I gave Mac help over the phone to Norman Lovett, who played Holly on Red Dwarf, and also to Peter Duncan from Blue Peter. Great days!

I really wanted to greet Norman with his own classic "All right, dudes" line. Instead, I totally bottled it. Big-time life regret there.

That's it

If you thought this was a cool post, why not do one yourself? You don't need a list of 20. Just have fun.

Want more of this? See the posts prompted by mine:

• Emma Wyatt
• Erica Mackay
• Carrie Eddins
• Sarah Stiffin
• Victoria Tretis
• Julia Gutgsell
• Renske Holwerda (in Dutch so click Translate)
• Mark Farrell
• Ileana Belfiore
• Tova Gitty Broide
• Mandy Borchardt
• Hannah Ludzker
• Alan Hunt
• Kayleigh Parsons-Matcham

When I'm not prattling about with fun like this, I'm busy helping people with their content on the web and LinkedIn. Also, I've just finished writing my book, Content DNA.

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12 was the lie. I've never smoked, not even once.