Weekend, 6-7 September 2008
Perfect Timing
Yesterday, I went out and planned the best way to kill a man. Nothing new in that, of course. I can’t remember how many people have died by my hand over the years. They’ve been shot, stabbed, overdosed, strangled, torched, blown up with a variety of Improvised Explosive Devices (IEDs), been run over by moving vehicles, pushed down staircases, ridden off the edge of cliffs, had their throats cut, and their skulls shattered with blunt instruments. Or, on more than one occasion, finished with a single empty-handed blow.
And, let me tell you, it’s been fun.
But yesterday I went and walked the actual killing ground, which is something I haven’t done in a while. So, what was different this time?
Everything.
This week’s Word of the Week is deadline, which was used for years in the newspaper business, where writers had to have their copy filed by a certain time in order to make the following day’s paper, or the story was considered dead. It’s a word that strikes terror into the hearts of authors everywhere, which is rather appropriate to its original meaning − it was supposed to. During the American Civil War, the prisoner of war camp at Andersonville used a white painted line instead of external walls or wire. Marksmen placed around the perimeter had orders to shoot any prisoner who attempted to cross that white line, no questions asked. Hence, you were allowed to go right up to the deadline, but woe betide you if you went over it.
I know the feeling . . .