Everybody knows the Kraft Macaroni and Cheese Box, right?  The blue box… “The Cheesiest”…  Yes that is the one.  Well, I will tell you this much right here and now.  The little flap thing, on the side of the box, which reads… “TO OPEN PUSH HERE”?   This is a great big fat lie.  It doesn’t EVER open when you push there.  It just bends the holy crap of the box.

These are lies they told us in our youth.  There were a bunch.

Okay.  Saturday Morning Cartoons were full of them.  One of the classics was The Road Runner.  Dag nab it.  That bird was as fast as lightning.   Meep. Meep….. and swwwooooooossssshhhhh.  Away that bird would go, always, always, always leaving the Coyote eating a puff of dust.   But the thing of it is, coyotes can run at speeds of 43 mph.  And roadrunners?  Only 20 mph.  That makes the coyote, crossing the finish line, 23 mph faster than Old Meep Meep.  Lies.

And how about the Dancing Hippos in Fantasia.  Now where the heck do I start with THAT one?  Never mind that the hippopotamus is one of the deadliest animals on the planet, and it can easily outrun a human.  Again, I say.  Meep. Meep.

Since we are on the topic of Disney.. … I have to bring up Mickey Mouse here.  Okay, the dude only had four fingers on each hand.  AND… he always wore gloves.  This has Mafia written all over it, if you ask me.  The high pitched voice, the cute red shorts, and big ears..???   ALL of that was part of his Witness Protection Program.  Along with the no-fingerprints-left-behind-gloves.    I am pretty sure his real name was Mickey the Knife.

Finally, one of the worst lies of them all.  If someone shoots you in a cartoon, you will be just fine… unless of course you make an attempt at drinking a glass of water.   And as such, water will promptly begin spouting from the bullet holes which have just riddled your body.  Other than that… you are pretty much good to go.

We see lies everywhere.  From the time we are very young until the day we die.  Not only do we see the lies… we take part in them.  According to Psychology Today… we really don’t have much of a chance against it.

We, as humans, are predisposed to lying…., both by behavioral conditioning as well as by cognitive evolutionary biology.  We start as early as 6 months of age… with fake crying and such.  But we get pretty good at it, by the time we are four.

I used to lie a whole bunch.  Oh, the error of my ways.  But now… a little older and wiser…., I try to always tell the truth.  I think we are better people when we tell the truth, seek the truth, and promote the truth.  Like my dear old Dad used to say…..  Honesty is the best policy.

Yet.  Now and again, I will pull a fast one over on you here… in my writing.  But that is called Fiction.  Which can be a good thing.  I learned it from Cartoons.  Meep. Meep.

Honesty is more than not lying. It is truth telling, truth speaking, truth living, and truth loving.  —  James E. Faust

The secret of life is honesty and fair dealing. If you can fake that, you’ve got it made.  —  Groucho Marx