Becoming the world's worst

On my eighth birthday, my parents gave me a thick red book filled with seemingly useless facts. It wasn't until I learned how to read (my 16th birthday) that I actually opened the book. But once I scoured the pages of the Guinness Book of World Records, I was hooked.

For years afterward, I dreamed of participating in the longest debate (503 hours, 45 minutes), creating the biggest string ball (11 tons) or being the largest marsupial (the adult male red kangaroo).

I desperately wanted to break a world record but didn't know
where to start, so I talked to math teacher Peter Engelmann, a former world record holder for marathon hand clapping. Engelmann told me that to be the best, I would need endurance and determination.

Filled with confidence, I began on my quest. I would have to focus on records suited for a man with my particular talents, which include spitting and making rude body noises.
My first attempt, I decided, would be to produce the world's loudest burp (118.1 decibels). I would have to get to work.
After 13 cans of Code Red Mountain Dew, I realized I had no decibel-measuring device in my house. I would have to utilize the ultimate, if unofficial, barometer of burping ability: my dad.
Before I could even begin, however, he let out an earth-trembling burp. I was officially shot down and ready to move on to another record.

Disappointed but still hopeful, I thought my next attempt should be something really easy—something like the fastest six-digit square root calculation.

The record, set at the Indian Institute of Science, is held by a man who found the square root of 732,915 in 63.8 seconds.
Sitting down at my desk, ready to begin, I realized that I had no judges. No one was home except my sister and two tabby cats. I asked my sister to give me a random number, and she gave me, quite frankly, an easy one: 937,803.

"Yes, yes, yes!" I screamed with joy. I knew this one. Five seconds later I gave my sister the answer: 968.4.
"That's impressive, Chris," she said. "Next time try doing it without a calculator."

Embarrassed by my stupidity, I left the house in tears, refusing to come home until I had redeemed myself. But what could I do that would top every other person in the world? At what am I truly excellent?

I had a sudden flash of brilliance. I do have a special talent, and that is outright, baldfaced lying. In my head, I recounted all the windows I had broken playing baseball, all the prank phone calls to neighbors, all the times I let the cat pee on my sister's bed (three this week, so far). I was a genius, and it was time to put my innate ability to the test. The world record test.

To set the real world record for lying, I would need to visit England, home of the World's Biggest Liar Competition. But because a trip abroad was not feasible, I settled for the next best thing: downtown Silver Spring.

After taking in the wide variety of sights, including City Place mall and City Place mall's movie theater, I decided to approach random individuals and see if my lies could make the grade.
They could not. When I approached a group of teenagers and told them that I was actually Dr. Dre's illegitimate son, they didn't go for it. Go figure.

Walking home, I wondered how I could face my family and friends. That's when it hit me: By dropping the ball on three world record attempts in the span of a few hours, I had unintentionally become the world's greatest failure.