I have a friend that I’ve known since high school, and this is a little vignette I laugh about every time I think of it. My friend’s maiden name is Petty, she’s left handed (like me) and has a VERY distinct handwriting. Back in high school she dated this guy that she’s now married to. So one day back when we were in high school, she mentions to her boyfriend in a very nonchalant way that she’s Tom Petty’s cousin (which, of course, she is not). She adds very little to her story–something like, “yeah, we’re cousins but don’t see much of each other, what with him being on tour so often.” Then she says nothing more for months. She waits.

Her family had this old half-strung guitar hanging around the house, and one day my friend signed it, “Tom Petty.” I can still see it in my mind–my friend’s non-disguised handwriting on this dusty, old guitar. She then tells the boyfriend that Tom popped in for a visit and for some odd reason autographed his full name on this nasty guitar for the family. Even more odd, the boyfriend believed her! He was bragging all over his school for days about it! After about a week, she came clean to him. He pouted for a bit, but got over it. Now that’s true love.

In reminding her of this story recently, she e-mailed me this in response: “I do tell the Tom Petty story to everyone. My old boss [I'll call him Rebel] really liked that story and told all of his friends. Anyway, I got Rebel on a much better story than the Tom Petty one. It was around the time that Julia Roberts was in town filming ‘The Pelican Brief.’ He would go out for lunch every day looking for Julia. Well, one day I told him that I was invited to go to a farewell party for her that the Hilton was putting on (at the time, my brother-in-law worked at the Hilton). Anyway, he fell for it and even begged me to take him with me. The next day he couldn’t wait to hear about the party. I made up a story about what she was wearing and how she looked. He told me that he was going to put his tuxedo on, meet me in the lobby of the hotel and beg me to take him to the party. Anyway, I told him that I had something for him. I then took out a cocktail napkin and written on it was, ‘To Rebel, what an intriguing name. Love Julia.’ [I am sure that my friend again wrote this in her non-disguised, distinct handwriting--handwriting her boss should certainly have known in an instant]. He was so excited, he carried that napkin around for months and showed all of his friends. Well, one day as I was walking out of the office for the day he told me something and then he said, ‘You are so gullible.’ ‘Ha,’ I said, ‘let me tell you about being gullible.’ Then I came clean on the Julia story. Needless to say, he did not speak to me for at least a week.”

I LOVE this girl! This is what I’d told her in response to her e-mail: “The thing about what you do is, you set the trap sooo in advance and then patiently wait for your prey to take the bait! And then you just wait some more.” Man, she’s got skills!