Monday, May 09, 2011

Possible Evidence of Insanity/Eggnog Recipe

"I felt despair. Though it seems to me now there's two kinds of it: the sort that causes a person to surrender and then the sort I had which made me take risks and make plans."
Erica Eisdorfer, The Wet Nurse's Tale

For some time now, I’ve been thinking of re-naming this blog: “Notes to Self” and with a subtitle: Looking for a foolproof plan and an airtight alibi. My idea is to post tips that I come across for committing the perfect crime. There are several problems with this.

The first and more obvious problem is that in the event I ever stumbled on the details of a perfect crime, some clever detective might track down the blog and it would be submitted as evidence of premeditation. So you see my dilemma.

The second problem is that I have not come up with very many ideas. Accordingly, I have graciously decided to share the few tips I have unearthed with the entire internets. By disclosing these ideas I have implicitly decided never to use them. Well, now, explicitly.

1. Arsenic poising wasn’t testable until the Marsh test in 1836. Thus, it is now too late to use this colorless, tasteless poison and remain undetected these days. If you have a time machine, you might want to consider transporting you and your intended victim back before 1836. On the other hand, you might simply go back and dispose of this Marsh fellow before he comes up with the test.

2. Don’t just wipe the pistol clean of fingerprints: remember to wipe prints off the bullets.

3. The lethal dose of nutmeg is 5 grams. Disclaimer: I’m not sure if this is true, not to mention whether subsequent tests would indicate nutmeg poisoning. I can’t remember whether I got this info from the google or whether it came to me in a dream. If I were going to use nutmeg (which, of course, I’m not) I’d offer it to my intended victim(s) as Killer Eggnog, and put in enough Southern Comfort to mask the nutmeg, i.e. a lot.

BTW, always use Southern Comfort instead of rum to make your eggnog. See, even if you don’t contemplate criminal activity, you now know my Daddy’s secret to good eggnog.

You can thank me later.

5 comments:

Lucy Corrander Now in Halifax! said...

What a brilliant idea for a blog.

I wonder how many posts you could manage on this theme.

'Poisoned by Nutmeg' sounds like a good name for an old fashioned detective story.

Lucy

Cicero Sings said...

You are too funny! And me quite partial to nutmeg too.

My Mom always made her own eggnog ... no comparison to the commercial stuff. It would depend on her mood whether she used Southern Comfort or Rum.

Paul said...

Given what happens to a bullet -- the explosion in the chamber that propels it, its flattening when it strikes its target -- can you really expect to get a fingerprint from it ever? I suppose sloppiness in handling the bullet casing might be a problem for the murderer though.

There was an early episode of the original Superman television series (I watched in in re-runs) in which the interpid newspaper team of Clark Kent, Lois Lane, and Jimmy Olsen were trying to prove the innocence of some man about to be executed for murder. Clark Kent tells the authorities that they should look for fingerprints on the bullet itself rather than merely on the pistol. I'm willing to forgive this lapse of logic. And anyway, at the last moment, Superman bursts into the execution chamber and throws his arm across the switch to prevent contact and save the innocent man. (He'd gotten a written reprieve from the governor.) I wonder what he would do about lethal injection.

I've always worried about nutmeg. Tasty and yet lethal.

Anonymous said...

That is a good name for a mystery. Now, I am waiting for your book.

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