Lie #24:
We discovered a signal hidden in our satellite feed. The aliens were using our own network to synchronize their planet-wide attack. Evidently, they knew how to hack a satellite system but setting the time on their ships was a bit of a mystery. They had traveled 23 light-years with all of the clocks blinking "12:00:00".

As the countdown reached it's final few minutes, we shut down the network and restarted it, wiping out their countdown clock. That is why, three decades later, we have giant spaceships hanging over every major city, waiting for a signal that will not come.

They do provide some nice shade in the summers.

Lie #23:
A half-day's walk into the Old Forest, the store palisade begins. Great columns of rock, 100 paces around and three or four times taller than the tallest tree march in a perimeter around the virgin woodland. Each pillar is an hour's walk from the next. It is said that they form a huge semicircle 50 leagues long. The palisade is not a legacy of a bygone age. Foresters have reported repairs - leaning columns reseated and eroding columns replaced - although they will not venture to guess who does that work or why.

Lie #22:
Everywhere I go, there is "Reisling uber alles" graffiti. Something has to be done about these white wine supremacists.

Lie #21:
The seventh planet was also a catastrophe planet. I was beginning to realize why we seemed to be alone in the universe - because we are. This planet was a mystery at first that slowly resolved into a horror. The usual causes were missing. There was no world ending planetary collision like Catastrophe Planet # 4. There was no evidence of technology run amok like a petite black hole (Catastrophe Planet #2) or a soupy, unlivable atmosphere (Catastrophe Planet #6). There were just fifteen thousand year old ruins inhabited by large herbivores, abandoned space platforms and habitats, and a decaying satellite system.

It took me almost two decades to realize the horror. What I was seeing was evolution at it's worst and most effective. The large, dumb herbivores were the descendants of the people who built the space stations. Evolution doesn't care about civilization. It cares only about perpetuation of the genetic line, not what that genetic line contains. Intelligence is only conserved as long as it is useful.

At some point about 30 thousand years before, some genetic shift happened and a trait that was more effective than intelligence arose. The people with that trait outbred and outcompeted the smart people. Over time, the population became less intelligent. Their cities fell apart because they didn't know how to keep them running, and eventually they lost everything, even language.

I still have nightmares.

Lie # 20:
I confused "artesian" and "artisan". Now I have a well in the backyard overflowing with parmesan-rosemary bread.

Lie #19:
I'm using the new Bill Kilgore cologne, Napalm in the Morning. Turns out no one loves how it smells.

Lie #18:
During the Manhattan project, bringing a nuclear core to the edge of criticality was called "tickling the dragon's tail". Enrico Fermi, whose paternal grandfather was a dragon, found this culturally insensitive.

Lie #17:
Do you know how much it costs to pull off the whole vampire thing? Big house, silk clothes, creepy servants. And it's impossible to get a job. Lots of companies have overnight shifts, but they all want to interview you during the day.

Lie #16:
The time machine has been independently invented 4 times since 660 BCE. Each time the inventor made the first trip into the future, and returned to destroy the machine to "protect us from those future bastards".

Lie # 15:
Pre-Singularity, folks laughed at me for tilting at windmills. Now that the windmills are rampaging across Indiana, everybody wants my help.

Lie #14:
I wanted to save humanity, one person at a time. I now understand that Ziploc baggies was the wrong way to do it, your Honor.

Lie #13:
They have been repairing the same 10 miles of the interstate I drive for the past 4 years. Simple math shows that it would have taken 330,000 years to create the whole interstate system. This is how we know that Dwight Eisenhower was a secret lizardman.

Lie #12:
The worst part isn't charging through a field of apostasy mines with packets of eschatology spinning past your head. The worst part is the waiting, trying not to think of fallen friends, trying not to wonder if this is your last day. But that is the life of a combat theologian.

Lie # 11:
The Mole People have opened another door from their subterranean kingdom into my basement. How many times do I have to tell them that I am not interested? We need a no-first-contact list.

Lie #10:
When there is a monster under the bed, distract the child so that the monster can escape. Otherwise, you may be facing a worker's comp claim.

Lie #9:
Tip for other biohackers: forget the wings. There is literally no way you can get into a car without stepping on your wing; and when you get your foot caught in your own wing, your wife will just laugh at you.

Lie #8:
The workplace doesn't have to be a place of stress and anxiety. When I am working, I play soft music and burn sandalwood incense. Everyone at the bank seems to appreciate it, and it slows the cops down so that I can make a clean getaway.

Lie #7:
I'm working on my death bed confession options. Right now, number one on the list is "I am the real Anastasia Romanov."

Lie #6:
Dense fog across the Midwest is causing accidents. Sorry about that. Next time I will read the instructions before I start playing with stuff.

Lie #5:
Supervillain startups, consider saving overhead with Volcano Lair Timeshares!

Lie #4:
Gravity was suddenly turned off today.
Thanks a lot, solar transit of Mercury.

Lie #3:
Giving Mom a day off is a good gift. Evidently, permanently replacing her with a robot is not.

Lie #2:
Someone ran over a goose; so I stopped for a gander.

Lie #1
I joined a team that advertised that they play 16' softball. I thought that they confused the single apostrophe for feet with the double apostrophe for inches. Boy, was I surprised.