Anyone know a hitman?

This journalist’s contact book lets him down

OOPS. THIS IS EMBARRASSING. A reader asked me to put him in touch with a contract killer.

But there’s not a single one in my contacts book.

Having said that, there IS one tax inspector, two chief nursing ward sisters and a school matron, which some people would say are pretty much the same thing.
*
The reader had written to me for help in committing suicide.

“Is there any way to find a professional contract killer to do it? Tks!”

said the email from a gentleman whose initials are HL.
*
I wrote back advising against using hit men (they mess up the wallpaper) and suggested he instead take his problems to counselors, who are cheap, clean, and often rather cute.

*
Why ask a columnist for help hiring a murderer? Probably because I wrote a column in September in which a reader named Dancer who lives near me remarked that out-of-work contract killers approached her husband in a park to offer a discount murder for the equivalent of US$38.

Mr Dancer politely declined, being unable to think of a single person he wanted killed.

I was shocked. “Not even one?” I said.

Wow, now THERE’S a nice guy. (I wrote a list in case he gets the same offer again.)
*

Meanwhile, one gang of killers-for-hire in Asia last week tried to raise their market value by using modern marketing methods, a reader from India told me.

They posed for photographs, listed the guns they knew how to handle and documented previous hits they had made.

Inspector Chandra Dhar Guar told the Times of India that the villains did this corporate brand-building so they could charge more per killing.

Officers who busted the gang are confident of getting a conviction. Imagine the trial.

Judge: “Are you contract killers?”

Gangster: “No, my lord.”

Judge: “Then why are your faces on this brochure which says Contract Killers R Us?”

These villains are surely due for a MAJOR oops moment. (More oops moments.)
*

It must be dumb criminal month.

From the US a reader sent the story of Scott Wellington of New Hampshire, who told his bosses his wife was sick. They gave him sympathy.

He said she was dying. They passed a hat around and gave him US$7,000 for medical expenses.

He said she’d died. His boss sent a condolence card to his house—which Mrs Wellington opened.

She apologized for her husband’s stupidity and offered to return the money last week.

The twist in the tale is that the boss told her she could keep the money for all she had to suffer in being married to a guy like that. Now that’s a wise and generous human being.
*

I did meet a real killer once, on a jungle trek through Sarawak in Malaysia.

An old, skinny man living in an Iban longhouse told us that he used to be the district’s main headhunter, and still had the shrunken heads of his victims to prove it.

I told him that people in the outside world no longer used the word headhunter. “We prefer to say executive search consultant,” I told him. “It’s better for marketing.”

He nodded politely although I’m sure he thought I was an idiot.
*
*
*
ON OTHER MATTERS…. Apologies for not being able to reach you guys for a while. I hung out with a real-life revolutionary (Jose Ramos-Horta) and commenter Angela. Will report more when I get the pictures downloaded.

In the meantime, I looked up Liftie’s allegation about the doctor who did poo transplants, and it’s all true. The full amazing story is here. A woman was dying so he opened her up and put her husband’s poo inside her, saving her life.

Chamin, I looked up Newater – this is Singapore sewage which is treated and then reused as fresh water. Eww. Chamin, I wish you had told me about this BEFORE I spent four days in Singapore…

Thanks also for the animal vids, fascinating.

 

Technorati Tags: dumb criminals,marketing,iban,headhunter,sarawak,shrunken heads,scott wellington

Comments

[Jason]

Fortuna's from a head-hunting tribe, but apparently when the Catholic priests finally got to their remote mountain valley they put a stop to such acts. Now instead they eat the body of Jesus and drink his blood! ;)

[Lift Lurker]

I look in my rolodex under 'H' and I say rats! I also have no hitman in my network.

No assassin under 'A' either.

Or thug under 'T' (under 'L' there is no local thug, or even lowlife thug).

I do have suicide bomber under 'S', but someone already used him, so have to cross that out.

Of course I have the usual: dentist, plumber, taxi, lawyer, doctor.

But Uncle Nury's article make me think how many prestigious profession are not in our rolodex but should be:

- Historians - those who do not learn from the past are condemn to repeat it.

But the past is so big we need historians to guide us.

It is hard to find historians because they do not advertise in back of magazines. I wish there was "Dr Anton and his crystal ball - let him tell YOU about the PAST!"

- Grammarians - I am sure many business proposal or resumes we submit are thrown away because of grammar.

- Physicists - what is the clunking sound in my car? At the end of the day it always about physics. What do car mechanics know that physicists do not?

- Cosmologist - "Watson look up in the sky. What do you see?" I need better answers.

- Ornithologist - i wish i knew what kind of bird poop on me.

- Linguist - when British person say to me 'I hear you, and with greatest respect, that's very interesting' what do he really mean?

http://languagelog.ldc.upenn.edu/nll/?p=3154

only a linguist can help. If we have a minister of Linguistics at cabinet level, I am sure there will be less wars in the world (the wars will be bigger and longer, but less of them).

- Microbiologist - is this milk really past its due date? It still smell ok.

- Humorist - this funeral is too sad, we need to liven it up.

- Mathematician - how do we split this restaurant bill?

[wordpress developers for hire]

Nice bollywood photos. The scenic beauty of Indian cinema is perfectly described.

[Bianca Schlimm]

"Holmes, don't you see, the sky is eternal dance hall - with singalong!"

[Ram]

What do car mechanics know that physicists do not?

They know that one should know Auto-Mechanics but not necessarily Quantum Mechanics to make the car run smoother...

[Bianca Schlimm]

Ram: I tought you are a cyclist?

But no matter. For the wheel to get you anyplace, pi must be ENDING someplace. Otherwise it would not turn, not move.

I stole this idea, and am tired of quoting...call me a thiefy

[Bianca Schlimm]

Is it common knowledge that there are buddhist motives in STAR WARS?

Whoever has time and money might come to Berlin Freie Universität on Thursday and Friday – it will be fun!

[Bianca Schlimm]

LL: Is rolodex liftuanian (for filofax)?

Jason: what sort of books do you write?

Nury: I do have a sword of supposedly head hunters here at home. even worse feng choix:
my grandmother bought it in Asia (Hitler fan at the time)
think Mr. Wong would make me throw it away??

[grandpa]

"Fortuna's from a head-hunting tribe, but apparently when the Catholic priests finally got to their remote mountain valley they put a stop to such acts."

Now , they are civilized:they give their future in-laws a sword(otherwise called machette, sabre) to make them believe that they have a chance .....

[grandpa]

"I looked up Liftie’s allegation about .....and it’s all true"

I would not like to sound like i am defending the fan of a lower class of transportation system, but....

Uncle
I am shocked that you can doubt the seriousness of our comments.
You did not know that we are inspiration for the politics of major nations?!?!?!

[TS]

I thought it was common knowledge that cleaners are running a sideline of assassination.

They get in after hours to do their business, clean up the place and dump the trash.
There is no traces left.

[Lift Lurker]

Thank you grandpa.

When the time comes, I visit you everyday in retirement home and bring soup and we play chess and help you remember people's names and we will ride Lifts together.

[grandpa]

LL
For this to happen you would have to ride one of my airplanes first....;
As about you helping me when i am old , you might be surprised..
I am from the generation fed on natural products.
We had to walk miles and miles to go to school with tons of books...
We are un.. destructible
I am afraid that you may have to live another decade or two before you see us waiting for somebody to feed us soup

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iNXTRhg6ZAc

Aaaaaarrgh ,those young brats

[rafanjr]

..."When the time comes, I visit you everyday in retirement home and bring soup and we play chess and help you remember people's names and we will ride Lifts together."

...can't wait till the time comes, considering that i walked several stretches and eat backyard vegetables, i could be your geriatric shrink...

[Ram]

@Bianca: Cyclist...well, kind of!!!

There are certain things for which there seems to be no end... Pi is one such thing...

Pie
I wish I could determine pi
Eureka, cried the great inventor
Christmas pudding, Christmas pie
Is the problem's very center.

[TS]

If Pi had an end, the wheel would not be round.

[TS]

“Wheel” Furnivall said out loud, staring into the darkness.
Ned: “Gah?”
Bob the Sapient’s northern cousin, Furnivall, had been visiting for some days. Ned the Neanderthal still hadn’t got used to Furnivall’s habit of saying strange words out loud at the oddest moments.
It was night and the three of them sat around the fire outside the caves they lived in.
“Don’t mind him, he’s been working on that word for years” Bob said and continued “He likes to come up with new words and apply them to things that he feels they are right for”.
“Gah” Ned replied.
Furnivall realised that he was being talked about and looked at Ned and Bob.
“I’m close to something with that word.” He said “The way the word just rolls off the tongue, it just begs to be applied to something that will move the human race further along it’s development.”
“Wheel” Furnvall said again.
“Wheel guv’ner” Bob repeated.
“Gah!” Ned exclaimed.
“Snack?” Bob said.
“What a vulgar word” Furnvall said “But snappy, have you got any ideas as to what you might use it for Bob?”
“No no, we already use that word for small meals between meals” Bob said. “I merely asked if you wanted a little something to eat... a snack.”
“Ooh, I’d love a ‘snack’ and I will spread the word as well” Furnivall said “the meaning goes well with the word, well done cousin.”
Furnivall continued “In my neck of the woods I have invented and introduced a great many new words and inventions that have been very useful for my people”.
“Another word I’m working on is ‘Pop’ ” Furnivall said “I like the way the sound of it just jumps at you. I just need to mate it with the right thing or event, I’m not sure it works on its own”.

Bob went into his cave and came back with his arms around a big bunch of corn cobs. He dropped the cobs on the ground, picked two up and handed Ned and Furnivall one each.
“I leave the corn cobs in the little depression in the rock with some water in the morning before I go hunting. When I get home at night they are nice and soft and you can eat the kernels right off the cob” Bob explained “You just got to remove the the husk before you can get to the kernels, a very nice snack”

As the three of them was engaged in removing the husks from their corn cobs, Furnivall suddenly jumped up “I got it, I got it, WHEEL!, it’s so obvious that I can’t believe that no one have thought about it before” He danced around “the time saved with the ‘wheel’ will change the way of the world”. “You know how the elders always reminds us not to waste time on things that have already been invented and do not need to be invented again?” Furnivall did not wait for an answer “this is it!, the word ‘wheel’ will replace that whole sentence” “now they all they have to say is ‘stop re-inventing the wheel”.

Bob and Ned was impressed.

They had finally gotten the husk removed from the corn cobs. The corn kernels was not soft and tender as expected. The water in the rock depression had evaporated before the corn was cooked. Instead the yellow kernels was dry, hard and completely inedible.
Bob shrugged his shoulders “At least they are so dry that they should burn well”.
He picked up all the corn cobs from the ground and dumped them on top of the embers of the dying fire.

Furnivall was very satisfied with the resolution of word ‘wheel’ that he had had on his mind for so long and said “sometimes these new words and meanings just jump at you when you least expect it, now I can concentrate on ‘Pop’ “.

The embers from the fire set the corn husks alight...

[Lift Lurker]

pi is another example of what you get when you let scientist loose in laboratories and give them computers instead of bananas.

They come up with strange new ways to compute pi: my method can beat yours! my method is more elegant! my method can compute up to 12 gazillion decimal points!

But when a monkey unwind the circle O and lay out the circumference in straight line --------, it is clear this line has begin and end. it has definite length.

Its length is not 3.141592654 ad infinitum, but 3.14 inches (or maybe 3 inches?)

What the mad scientist are doing is like computing how many steps it take to get from point A to point B.
Of course each step can be break down into smaller step, and each smaller step can be break down into smaller step, until they come to conclusion that it take an infinite number of step to get from point A to point B .

But any child can say it is 1 meter apart and the scientist has no clothes.

Instead of using supercomputers to compute pi to the nth decimal, the scientists should just go around the world, unwind every circle they find and measure the straight length, and divide by the diameter.

That way they will find the 'real' ratio, not the imaginary ratio.

The bonus is they will acquire ability to finally "square the circle" (or in other words changing the primitive cylinder shape of fuselage into elegant square of Lifts

Gah.

[Chamin]

Bad timing, I was just a bit too late with the water thing.

May be you can take this trip's dose of water as enough medicine for lifetime, and go for mineral water from the next trip.