Wednesday, September 17, 2008

LATTE DAY 1 - AMANDA ASHBY


How's this for fabulousness? Amanda Ashby, author of YOU HAD ME AT HALO is here to party with us all the way from New Zealand!

When Linda said the theme of her blog party was lying I knew I had a problem because, well, I don’t lie. Not that I’ve got anything against lying you understand, it’s just that I’m spectacularly bad at it. As in large flashing neon signs sitting above my head to let everyone in a twelve mile radius know that I’m about to attempt to fudge the truth.

And if that’s not bad enough, my characters aren’t big on lying either (well, part from the occasional white lie such as forgetting to tell their mom that they’ve turned the entire school into zombies).

So you can understand my problem.

However, then I remembered that while I’m not big on the lying front, my parents on the other hand had no such scruples.

I first discovered my mother was a liar when I caught her eating chocolates in her bedroom. The same chocolates that I had asked her about half an hour earlier and she had denied all knowledge of. I was eight at the time and was pretty shocked. If she lied about chocolate what else could she lie about?

As it goes quite a lot.

For a start, that whole Santa thing turned out to be a big bust and don’t even get me started on the tooth fairy. Though, if I’m fair, I can’t blame my mother for that one, my father was the guilty party thanks to his inability to throw anything away – including a collection of teeth.

But it didn’t stop there. Oh no, after they finally decided to stop perpetuating the existence of fictional characters they moved onto greener pastures. We’re talking about those famous lines: your school years are the best years of your life.

Oh, really. Well, I would beg to differ.

My school years were most definitely not the best years of my life. They weren’t even the best seconds of it. In fact, all I can remember is that they were filled with homework, pimples, the inability to say anything intelligent in front of cute guys, not to mention all the worry and self-doubt.

If anything my school years were a complete waste and I only wished I knew then what I know now (especially when it comes to wearing leg warmers because truly, there is just no excuse for them. Ever.)

So, now it’s your turn. What is the worst lie your parents ever told you?

Up for grabs are some famous Australian cookies called Tim Tams and the best bit is that whenever people send you chocolate-coated cookies from another country they have absolutely no calories in them (and would I lie to you about something like that?)

Note from Linda... I've had Tim Tams! My friend Mai in Japan got my whole family hooked on them. Mai, you might want to enter this one... : )