DRUM ROLL PLEASE!

The time has come to reveal the truth, or rather to reveal the lie I told in the #tenfactsonelie Guessing Game post! I had been tagged by @tattoodjay to participate! Ten of the facts about me are TRUE, but one is FALSE! I had asked you to guess which one which one is the lie.

Sorry that I did not manage to write this post at the weekend when the other post closed, but I had a slight altercation with a tree branch which scratched my cornea. I needed to rest my eye.

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Image ©Diane Macdonald. All Rights Reserved. Camera: iPhone 8 Plus
^{Click on the image to view full screen!}
A stock image of my painting can be found at Getty Images here, and art prints can be purchased on Fineartamerica here

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One of my favorite hobbies is sumi-e (Japanese style) painting. Until I started classes a few years ago, I had not touched a paintbrush since High School!

The Truth
Sumi-e is the Japanese word for Chinese style ink wash painting. The painting of the wild orchids above was created with black Chinese ink, and Chinese watercolor paints. The “orchid” is one of The Four Gentlemen, - four plants - the orchid, the bamboo, the chrysanthemum and plum blossom in Chinese and eastern painting representing the seasons and different virtues. I could write a very detailed post about The Four Gentlemen, so I will spare most of the details here. Suffice it to say that the orchid represents spring and fragility. Because its fragrance is not overpowering, it also represents humility. Sorry @tattoodjay, but you were wrong.

Often when I wonder if I will still be submitting images to stock and writing on Steemit in 20 years time, I think of my art teacher who was 90 when I first took her class 5 years ago!

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I have also been at the home of boxing great Evander Holyfield and sat in his private boxing ring. I even have a photograph somewhere to prove it.

The Truth
Sorry, @robertandrew, but your guess was incorrect. While a student at Southeastern Center For the Arts (Now The Creative Circus) in Atlanta, Georgia, I did an internship with CNN and went to his house as an assistant to a staff photographer, and we interviewed and photographed him in his boxing ring! I diligently searched for the photograph that I have, but I'm afraid it's buried somewhere in the big plastic tote boxes that house all my loose photographs! You'll just have to take my word for it.

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Although I have no interest in wrestling, I have met many pro wrestlers including Rick Flair, Hulk Hogan, The Rock and Stone Cold Steve Austin among many others.

The Truth
While doing my internship with CNN, I would attend the televised wrestling matches as an assistant to the staff photographers. I also met them all in the more intimate studio setting where we did their head shots! Sorry, @linguktaiwan, but you did not guess correctly

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I have had several careers in my lifetime, but have been a professional photographer for 24+ years now. I graduated from college three times and my first career was as a schoolteacher. After graduating the second time I became a COBOL programmer, and then finally I studied as a photographer. I have also been a technical support agent for a software company, a real estate agent, a free lance writer, a “head hunter” and an entry level manager.

The Truth
Yes, this is all true. No one guessed this one as the lie.

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I have had 21 home addresses in my lifetime throughout Scotland, England, Canada and the USA, but have lived at our current address for 23 years now!

The Truth
This is also a true statement which no one guessed as the lie.

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When I was 2 years old I questioned the credibility of Santa Claus. He brought me a beautiful doll's house (which I still have), but I looked at the chimney and announced to my parents that it was too big to come down the chimney. That's when my Mom
old me about the magic powder that Santa uses to shrink things for bringing them down the chimney!

The Truth
No, @enginewitty! Nice try, but it was not a rocking horse, and I still do have the doll's house!

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I hate looking into a mirror in the dark! I can remember just about every detail of my childhood – what someone said to me, and what I said back. My first memory is of looking into a mirror in the dark and screaming in terror at the dark reflections in there. Years later my aunt told me about how she babysat me one time, but couldn't figure out what was making me scream in terror each time she walked past a certain spot in the room. She said that it was a mystery we would never solve. Imagine her surprise when I told her that I was terrified of our dark reflections in the mirror!

The Truth
Strange, but true! This really happened, @daveks, and I try to avoid looking in mirrors in the dark because I see monsters looking back!

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I have been on 2 airplanes that made emergency landings. The first one was on my very first flight ever to Canada to visit relatives when I was 14. An engine on the turbo prop plane failed, and I was sitting right at the wing and saw it. The plane landed in Newfoundland without incident, but fire trucks and ambulances lined the runway. The second time was on a flight from Aberdeen, Scotland to Heathrow when the plane was struck in several places by lightning on the landing approach, wiping out the radar and all the lights inside the plane. The pilot changed his mind about landing and we ascended again and circled the airport for hours before finally having to land before we ran out of fuel.

The Truth
Yes, @janine-ariane and @deadgrlsuppastar, this really happened to me. One of my sons has a phobia of flying since he saw the lightning strike the plane when he was a child! Both of my kids thought it was fun at the time, but I think that looking back as an adult, has made my oldest realize that it was not a joy ride. He's a white-knuckle flyer!

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I like shoes! Until today, I owned 20 pairs of shoes and sandals, and today I added 2 new pairs of sandals to my collection. I have given away dozens of pairs to charity, but still have my favorites that I won't give away.

The Truth
Sorry @ninahaskin and @saffisara, but I really did own 20 pairs of shoes the day I wrote the post, and I did buy two new pairs of sandals at Rack Room Shoes because I could not resist the deal of buying one pair and getting the second pair at half off the listed price! I ended up getting the second $54 pair for $11, because they were on the clearance rack and I got 50% off the clearance price!

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I have skated many times the length of the frozen Rideau Canal in Ottawa, Canada; I have skied a black diamond run at Copper Mountain, Colorado, and I have parasailed in the Bahamas!

The Truth
No one guessed this one as the lie!

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English, and Scots Gaelic are my primary languages, and I was once very fluent in French. I am quite out out of practice, but I can hold a conversation, and make myself understood. My best subjects at school were English, French and German. I was not too great at Latin which I studied for 3 years anyway. Interestingly, Latin has been the most useful of the languages I have learned, because sometimes when I see a word I have never seen before either in English or some other language that I don't speak - like Italian etc. I can guess the meaning because of what I remember of Latin!

THE LIE

No one guessed it! @manorvillemike suggested that I was incapable of lying, but he was wrong - at least in this fun guessing game!

While English and The Doric Scots are my native languages, I only know a few words of Scots Gaelic, which is spoken mainly on the west coast and in the far-flung western isles of Scotland. I'm from the east coast. I am pretty fluent in French and did study Latin. However, my language teacher was unable to persuade me to study German, and I chose to study biology instead!

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I hope your curiosity has been satisfied! It's your turn now!

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For those wishing to participate, here are the RULES
Post 10 facts and 1 lie about yourself
Invite people to guess (one guess per person)
Offer a prize (SBD, an upvote, comment, or resteem, or your undying devotion) to those who guess correctly
Wait until the post payout to reveal the correct answer
Use the tag #tenfactsonelie as one of your five
Tag your friends to do their own!

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I managed to finish the first grueling set of tasks for the sndboxsummercamp project by @sndbox, and was very fortunate to be chosen along with some great photographers and filmmakers to go forward to the next step in the Quest. Read my compilation post here.

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For those wishing to participate in this week's #wiwcontest, read about the rules and find the theme here.

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Thanks for taking the time to read this! I appreciate it. Please check out my photography-101 account here for tips and tutorials about photography.

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