A Sydney man who accomplished nothing over the weekend has woken up early this morning to brainstorm exciting stories to tell people at work when they ask what he got up to.

“I spent the entire weekend home alone boozing, playing video games and eating,” the man said. “People who leave the house make my weekend sound a bit pointless, so I thought I’d go in to work prepared with some fake stories of barbecues and Tinder dates to make me sound relevant. I even fake checked in to a restaurant over the weekend.”

The man isn’t alone, with 90 per cent of people inventing stories about their weekends to make themselves appear more normal and interesting to co-workers, according to a CSIRO study, which found that the entire exercise was based on the misconception that people who ask about colleagues’ weekends actually listen to the response.

“People can prevent weekend-performance anxiety by understanding that nobody cares what you did,” a CSIRO researcher said. “It’s a rhetorical question, like asking someone how their treatment is going.”