Nominative determinism - and its reverse - is quite interesting.

I (genuinely) have met a bloke called Richard Head. Poor sod.

I have also met military personnel whose surnames were Coward and Chicken. Always wondered if they were proving something by their job choices?

I also once knew an Army guy called Major Fury. Instant Marvel superhero, beats Captain America?

On BS merchants, there was a kid I was friends with at school for a few years, then his parents broke up. He and his sister stayed with mum. After which he kept telling stories about how his dad was a deep-sea diver (may have been true), SBS, astronuaut, had a car that would do 200mph, whatever, I forget the detail. We all wrote him off as a BS artist. Sadly we weren't adult enough at 14-15 to realise that all that nonsense was a way of dealing with his parents' break-up and his dad shacking up with another woman and his sense of loss and reduced self-worth and possible misplaced sense of responsibility for the divorce.

We all present a public persona that is not a full representation of who we really are, or how we really feel. Not least on anonymous forums, I as much as anyone else here. But also you guys reading this. So we should understand (even if we have not done it) how easily people can move from a "curated" (I hate that word, outside museums) version of themself into outright lying and get locked into it.

My old schoolmate did that. But, looking back, he wasn't a bad guy. Just an OK guy in a bad place. Probably we should have "intervened" and had a conversation to help him deal with his issues. Instead we either ignored him or called him a wanker. As a divorced parent, trying to do the best with my son, I feel a bit guilty about that.

Back on topic. Yes, I have heard cobblers about guns and shooting over the years. In the airgun sphere, mostly about OX springs and galvanised dustbins, or guys who confused feet with yards.