It’s becoming more difficult to separate fact from fiction as we live each day.

If someone doesn’t like what he or she has read on the pages of a newspaper, it’s called “fake news.”

Which brings me to that topic. Just what is fake and what is true.

I’m in trouble again for seeking proof of a fantastic story an unfamiliar voice related over the phone.

I have an unpublished number, but he got it from somewhere. I asked and was told it wasn’t important.
 It seems the caller knew a huge crime had happened because the uncle of his aunt’s third husband heard it from his next-door neighbor who has taken an ancestry DNA test that proved she is a 125th cousin twice removed from George Washington, who could not tell a lie.

The caller couldn’t tell me the name of the DNA ancestor, but said it cost a “lot of money” to get some of his spit tested and it is proven accurate because “they say so on TV and you know it’s a felony to lie in an ad.”

Really?

Anyway, word on the street has it that three people were murdered and their bodies were stashed in a secret cave on the side of San Antonio mountain.

“Has anything been reported to law enforcement?” I asked.

“No. They’re all in on it.”

I asked what “it” was.

“You know. Gold and pot.”

Okay…

“Well, maybe it was a pot of gold.”

I asked if there is a map.

“No. Someone stole the map early on.”

So, how did the murderer find the cave?

“You have to drive to the big rock, turn and drive to the flat rock.”

I asked if the caller had been there.

“Well, not personally, but that old cop who died 20 years ago knew about it. That’s why he’s dead.”
I knew him. “He succumbed to old age.”

“Yeah. They came for him and put him in a secret rest home.”

The call was going nowhere. I told the caller to report the murders to law enforcement and have the investigating officer call me.

“I knew it. You’re one of them. You’re not gonna write my story, are you?”

I told the caller to make an official report. He said I ought to do the story because he told it to me and he wasn’t going to let “any one of them” in on it.

But it needed to be in the newspaper so someone would be thrown in jail.

“Who?”

“I won’t say.”

The bad thing about cordless phones is that they can’t be slammed down on an unwelcome caller.

I pushed the button that let me cancel the call.

A conspiracy rooted in prehistoric times has been perpetuated on humanity and only one person knows the answer.

I just hung up on him.

“Fake news” depends upon who is quoted and who listens.

I know this because one source had a DNA test that proved he is a direct descendant of John the Baptist.
Enjoy the day.