I confess

While on the snow festival trip this year (see post and pics in the next day or two, I promise), I got the chance to read a nice little book called "The Time Machine Did It" written by prolific Simpsoneer John Schwartzwelder. He's a funny guy and the book follows suit. While not the funniest stuff I've ever read, it is at least consistently funny to a high degree through its entirety (only takes an hour or two to read probably). It seems as if every sentence is a joke. As one reviewer said, it isn't often you find such a reckless commitment to entertainment. It may be a cummulative effect too. To experiment, I'm just going to put some quotes down. If they make you laugh, great. If not, go back to reading Ziggy or whatever else does.

Just a little backstory. This is a detective story told from the gruff and dumb perspective of the sub-par detective Frank Burly. He is seeking a figurine for a client and finds that a time machine may be involved.

And away we go.

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I entered the office and paused in my reception area (not everyone has a reception area) to talk to my secretary, Elizabeth Squirrel. She was reading one of those love magazines that tell you what love is like.
"Any calls?" I asked.
She didn't look up from her magazine. "What am I, your secretary?"
"Yes."
"Look, just leave me alone."
I went into my inner office and sat down at my desk. I wondered if I'd had any calls.
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He went on and on about how delicate space and time was, but frankly I didn't buy it. I mean, if you think it's so easy to change the course of world events, try it. You don't need a time machine. You're already living in somebody's past and someone else's future. Just step on a bug or something and see what that gets you. See if now you were never born, or suddenly now there's fifty Hitlers in your bathroom, crapping all over everything. It ain't going to happen. Anyway, that's what I figured.
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Then I tried something I always try at least once in the course of an investigation. I put on a ten gallon hat and adopted the persona of my alter-ego Billy Bob Burly, a loudmouthed Texas oilman, and tried to con some useful information out of a crook I saw hanging around outside a cigar store.
Like always, my impersonation wasn't perfect. My accent kept slipping from Texan to Swedish, and my cowboy hat kept falling off. But I kept plugging away. You've got to give the scam a chance to work. But I wasn't conning much information out of this particular mark. In fact he wasn't saying anything. He was just looking at me like I was a train wreck. Pretty soon, as usual, I was forgetting my lines and having to start over, until I finally just tore up my script, jumped up and down on my cowboy hat and sat down on the curb to brood, telling the mark to get away from me or I would shoot him.
Now I've seen detectives on TV work that same con with 100% success. It works every time for them. I've tried to talk to statisticians about my unbeliebable 0% success rate--I mean what are the odds of that?--but they say they're not interested. Even though it's their specialty! That's what's wrong with America today, I guess. Something like that. I know something's wrong with America. Maybe that's it.
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It'd be easy to go on. It's a very quotable book. Anyway, if you enjoyed those tidbits, rest assured there are plenty more. It's not a steal at $15 dollars, but it's worth reading.