Sex, Lies, and Videotape. Without the sex. Or videotape. Ok, just some lies and forgery, and NAPS.

When I was a child, there was a period of time when my mother took very frequent naps.
After some investigation, trial and error, and the like, I eventually decided that these nap times were an excellent opportunity to ask for permission to do various things that I wanted to do. I also found these afternoon interludes useful for asking important questions about life, what in the hell there was to eat for dinner, and the occasional attempt at getting a permission slip signed. I swear I wasn't nearly as rotten as this paragraph is making me sound.

My mom and I got into a fight that ended with me being practically hysterical once, her being completely unconscious- because I was trying to ask her something or another, which was undoubtedly a terribly pressing situation. She responded with some weird sleep talk about helping myself to 'whichever pop I wanted to get from the window.'
This makes sense when you are in a convenience store, and there are bottles of soda in a visi-cooler display window. This does not make sense when you're a seven year old in your living room trying to figure out where the soda that you're supposed to help yourself to is hiding in the windows. :( Womp, womp.
Speaking of hysterics, we also got into such a heated conflict related to the viewing of an episode of The Golden Girls once (when I was 3 or 4 I think) that it ended in the cops being called. But that's another story for another day. A story that makes me feel like good old fashioned white trash, and is funny anyway.

When I was in first grade, I somehow came to the conclusion that it was a good idea to tell enormous lies about myself and my life. I can't quite remember the thought process that was going on in my six year old brain behind this, but I was probably dying for attention, afraid of people not liking me, and desperately seeking approval. Anyway, some of my most memorable whoppers: In addition to myself, I said my mother also had twin little girls. Infants. I was in charge of babysitting them while my mom was at work, after school. Since I was so responsible. Whatever kids I told this to, it somehow got around and got back to my teacher, who called my mother very alarmed and threatening to call children's services if she was in fact leaving my goofy (though creative) little six year old ass in charge of some helpless, drooling, poop machines. My personal favorite? I have absolutely no idea where I dreamed this one up, but on the day we were supposed to talk about what our parents' careers were, I said, "My mother is a traveling physician. Her latest trip was to Tokyo" and proceeded to weave an elaborate tale about her good doctorly deeds. I don't even remember what my mom was doing for work when I was in first grade, but it certainly had nothing to do with some Doctors Without Borders shenanigans. Apparently I decided she needed a promotion. Even if it was only in my head.

This early pathological lying streak should have been a warning that my deviance would progress. In second grade, we were required to have planners in which we wrote down our homework assignments. We were supposed to check off our assignments after we did them, and then have our parent(s) sign off that we did our homework and had them look over it. At this point in my life, my  mother was still a very sleepy lady. She had grown irritated with my experiments in sleep questioning, so I tried to stay on the other side of the house and be as quiet as possible, or lie on the floor by the stereo with headphones on listening to the beatles or simon and garfunkel all loudly, unless it was some sort of life or death situation. So what was I to do about this signing off on homework doing business? I decided that I could just help my mom, and sign her name for her. Yeah, 2nd grader commits forgery. Guess where I copied her signature from? Her checkbook. Preparing for financial fraud? Maybe.
I was very confident in my adult signature replication skills, and proceeded to use this technique for a little while. I'm not sure how long that while was. I just remember my teacher, who incidentally was about a half an inch taller than me and looked about 3 years older than me, calling me up to her desk during a 'quiet time.'

Apparently most adults don't sign their names in pencil... and if they do, they don't have to erase and try again.

Busted. Not as slick as I thought I was. In my defense, I hadn't really learned to write in cursive yet.
I took a lesson from that, though.

I worked hard.

I practiced.

I learned to forge signatures more effectively.

My head is harder than a diamond. The only thing that I am aware of that can pierce through my rock solid tard-wall of stubbornness is another stubborn asshole of comparable capacity that has a way with words.