The long game

I leave the apartment at five in the morning with a rolled up carpet over my shoulder. Throwing it into the trunk of the car, I drive to my office.

There are not a lot of people around, but there are some. Some students studying late in the study hall. Old people going past the building on their morning constitutionals. I open my window, turn up my speakers, and start to play a selection of choice screams that I've collected from horror movies.

This is part of my long game.

In an earlier blog post, I explained how a murderer should respond to Columbo's questions. Simply not try to come up with explanations to his questions. But a detective like Inspector Morse is another story.

Clever bugger, this Inspector Morse! In a recent episode a baddie had a air tight alibi, he was seen by several people in a bar at the time of the murder. Checking the alibi with the bartender, who verified that that man was there, Inspector Morse asks if he is a regular. He wasn't. The bartender had never seen him before. "Looks like he was constructing an alibi," says Morse to the cop next to him.

A good alibi should fit into a well established behaviour pattern.

I'm building an alibi. Don't misunderstand, I'm not planning a murder. This alibi is not only for me.

The screams from my window would make as good an alibi for someone murdering me as for me murdering someone else. But if there is a murder near my office in the early morning hours. A good solid alibi for whoever perpetrates it is going to make for a more entertaining show for all of the viewers.

I often go to sit in bars at various times of day, establishing a presence. This alibi is mostly for me. I make an ass of myself, and always ask people the time.

And I often yell at people in the Costco. If I am the one to get killed, I want there to be a lot of motive going around, too.

The movie over, I shut off my VPN, and Google what the lethal dosage of arsenic is, and where I can buy some. They don't sell it on Coupang, but it looks like I can get it on Ali Baba.

Dripping blood from a cut I make in the palm of my hand, I walk back to my car, and drive home in time to take Lisa to school. I glance off a light-pole, on the way. Best to have a bumper full of scratches.