Patience may be a virtue, but waiting is so grating Sydney Morning Herald daily guest columnist Liar, I thought, listening to the phone call in which he said he would be there in 10 minutes. He was supposed to be there when his mobile rang. No call to warn of his tardiness. It takes at least 20 minutes to get there on a good day with no traffic. He is still eating. He will still brush his teeth and do all manner of things. He won't leave for at least five minutes. How does he envisage he will get there in five minutes? He was already at least 25 minutes late. These "punctured punctuals" (referred to as PPs) know they are wrong, otherwise why lie? If they admit to being 25 minutes late, the person patiently waiting (PW from here on) will be mad. Advertisement In 15 minutes, PW will call again and PP will say, "I'm on my way." Those words will falsely lead the PW to relax, thinking: ''He'll be here any minute now.'' But what PPs don't say is they are nearer the start of the trip than the destination. Even when the seasoned PW gets clever and asks, "How far are you?" a PP will give a position that seems acceptable to the PW, not where they actually are. By now, PW is on the verge of losing patience altogether. This deception does not allow the PW to stop wasting time waiting and make other plans