I asked a friend if he wanted to get a drink and watch the game. He told me couldn't because he was “watching paint dry”. I found out later that he was apparently staining furniture with his wife and they were layering it over time to get the right effect on the wood. – WALE

An employee showed up horrendously late to work one day. He was a foreign exchange student and it was hard to understand what he said it times. When I asked him why, he slowly spoke to me that in his culture, it was a sign of great respect to show up late and wanted to make sure he honored me. - WALE

Once on a vacation to Santa Barbara my girlfriend made me cancel our plans to attend the last day of a festival when she learned one of her favorite actors was buried at the local cemetery. It’s not like he was going anywhere. – WALE

My classmate flaked on meeting up to work on a school project that was worth a large part of our grade. Feeling pushy, I asked what had come up and he told me he told me a meeting had been scheduled last minute. When I asked what kind of meeting, he told me it was the secret kind he couldn't talk about. – WALE

A student came in to petition why he had been dropped from his classes. When I told him of the outstanding payments on his account, he told me that he had never received them and that it must have been the fault of his next door neighbor’s dog who had violently attacked the mail man a few weeks, eating and destroying most of the mail. – WALE

A new employee was late to an important conference call. When asked what had happened, he said he thought it was supposed to be in person and had driven to my office (I conference from my home) only to find no one there, so he turned around and went home. - WALE