Day 3...

And the final day of the Execute Package, at least for 2003, I expect. Today's load consisted of the usual two Form 24s, along with a 6-page radiogram devoted to troubleshooting a cycle ergometer problem. (The cycle ergometer is a Russian exercise device in which the user turns pedals - either by hand or with the legs - against a resisting load.) I am happy to report that I now know entirely too much about this device (or, at least, about how to troubleshoot it).

I rose at a reasonable time this morning and went for a two-mile walk after breakfast. I was aiming for a 4 mph pace and was off by only 20 seconds after completing the loop. In general, I must say I have felt better, i.e., more energetic, these past few weeks since starting Atkins; I even entertain notions of starting to jog, but am easily controlling such impulses. The Russian expression "хорошого по немножку!" [roughly: "good things are to be done in moderation"] would appear to govern, in this case.

Weighing heavily on the immediate to-do list:
A. My invoice for the past week.
B. Completing the translation due tomorrow morning.
C. Completing the outstanding editing pages.

Cheers...

The fruits of childhood snooping...

I would imagine that part of the standoffishness I feel with regard to the Ripper book has to do with the realization early in my life that the aftermath of gruesome real-life murders just don't sit well with me. Nor, do I suspect, does it with most people, and I would imagine that people in professions that bring them into routine contact with death - homicide investigators, morticians, pathologists, coroners, doctors - must go through some kind of mental conditioning to desensitize themselves to their environments. Then again, my imaginings may be completely off base, who knows?

I can't for the life of me recall when it happened, but I would venture to say I was around 10 years old when I ran across a singular book among those on the many bookshelves in the apartment in which I grew up. It had an intriguing title; something along the lines of Practical Homicide Investigation, which for some reason gave me a wholly wrong impression of the contents of the book. I mean, even now, looking at the title, I find it has a sort of innocuous feel about it.

Unlike the Hardy Boys' Junior Investigator's Handbook, which ran on and on about how to follow suspects undetected and perhaps make a plaster impression of their footprints, this book was serious as a hatchet murder and at one time belonged to my father, who apparently used it as a reference when writing stories for "true detective" type magazines (a genre that has today been co-opted by shows like "Unsolved Mysteries" and "America's Most Wanted").

Understand, this was an era when violence on the screen and in books was largely free of blood and gore. For example, in The Big Sleep, shot in 1946, Philip Marlowe (played by Humphrey Bogart) forces Eddie Mars to walk out of a house where Eddie's boys are waiting to plug the first person to come out (it was supposed to be Marlowe). Once the door closes after Mars, it is very thoroughly stitched with automatic machine gun fire. A moment later, the door opens and Mars twists slowly into the room, falls down, and lies still. Hardly a thread is out of place on the man, nor are there even any dark stains of imitation blood. It's almost as if the man simply died of fright and fell down. Try comparing that to the scene in Sam Peckinpaw's Straw Dogs, where the sheriff's demise is quite graphic (it knocked me for a loop in the early 70s).

Comic books, too, had no gore in them, thanks to the so-called "Comics Code," which is a far cry from the kind of stuff you'll routinely find in modern graphic novels, especially a few titles from Japan (Lone Wolf and Cub comes to mind, here).

Mind you, I'm not trying to be judgmental, here. I'm merely saying that at the time I picked up the book from the shelf, I had led a pretty sheltered life. But you probably knew that.

At any rate, I went through the book with horror, for two reasons: First and foremost was the content; it was stuff I (thankfully) had never seen and (hopefully) would never see in real life. Heck, I couldn't even imagine how half the crimes shown could have occurred, and I was depressed to think that I shared a world with people who'd do stuff like that. The second reason kind of hit me in the aftermath: the book exerted a kind of fascination over me that made it difficult to put it down, although when I finally did, I felt no desire at all to ever pick it up again.

And largely the same feeling comes over me when reading "true crime" stories (or watching them on the screen, which I avoid). Focusing my attention on the existence of people with evil motives ruins my day, basically, though for the time my attention is focused, it is riveted.

In truth, the Cornwell book is more interesting to me for the way in which the author develops her case, and for the observations she provides regarding society and forensics at the end of the 19th century in England (in fact, I find myself fast-forwarding through the sections describing the killings).

Time to quit this place. Tomorrow, it's back to the office, for more editing.

Cheers...