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"You should have stuck with the Da Vinci Code," said LaFlamme in her best I-told-you-so voice. "Then it wouldn't have taken you a month to write this next instalment."

I had to agree that the book had been the source of some of my finest jests and that having abandoned it during a particularly silly passage, what I was now missing was real comedic inspiration.

I tried watching the movie but despite being equally feeble I realised it was no match for the book's poor character development and shallow plotting, and again my interest tapered off midway.

"How can such a large book be so insubstantial?" I asked LaFlamme, as if she knew all the answers. Generally she did know all the answers, at least ones that would satisfy a dullard like me. This time was no exception.

"That's part of the skill. If you can prattle on for ages about cornerstones and priories and make people think it's important, you've cracked it."

"I suppose so," I conceded. I always think if I have to endure a 300-page tome it better explain the meaning of life at the very least.

"Let's try and kick-start this baby," LaFlamme offered, and sat down to type in her inimitable floor-shaking manner.

‘Suddenly there is a knock at the door,' she began, ‘and the client Ignacious Spore stumbles in and collapses on the floor, a slip of paper clutched in his outstretched hand.'

"That's quite good," I said, although I suspected it was from the Maltese Falcon. At least Dashiell Hammett was worth ripping off.

The Da Vinci Code And Other Comic Gems

January 25, 2009

"You should have stuck with the Da Vinci Code," said LaFlamme in her best I-told-you-so voice. "Then it wouldn't have taken you a month to write this next instalment." I had to agree that the book had been the source of some of my finest jests and that having abandoned it during a particularly silly … Continue reading →

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"Why would my client want to kill me?" I asked LaFlamme. "I'm not that bad a designer."

It was often hard to gauge what the raven-haired minx was thinking behind the wraparounds, but I never had long to wait for an opinion.

"Spore has you heavily insured," she replied a little coyly. "You're worth more dead than alive to him."

"Insured? How can my client have insured me without my knowledge?" I demanded, confident now that I could get this whole case to unravel like one of the Admiral's bobbly cardigans. "Shouldn't I have some say in that?"

"Clients have all kinds of rights these days," she said matter-of-factly. "They need to protect their investments. It's standard procedure now." She paused to take a full-throated blast from the troublesome red, tamed now in her hands. "In fact the underwriters treat it like pet insurance."

It was hard not to feel humiliated by the notion that my life could have been quoted for alongside the family budgie's. But there it was.

"Don't worry, Spore didn't insure your talent," LaFlamme added.

"That's a pity, because he could have claimed last week when it deserted me." I paused and then spun around to face her. "So what did he insure?"

LaFlamme looked up. "Your soul," she said.

Insurance: The New Rock’n’Roll

December 23, 2008

"Why would my client want to kill me?" I asked LaFlamme. "I'm not that bad a designer." It was often hard to gauge what the raven-haired minx was thinking behind the wraparounds, but I never had long to wait for an opinion. "Spore has you heavily insured," she replied a little coyly. "You're worth more … Continue reading →

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: LaFlamme's take on murder.

"Murder?" I asked LaFlamme. "Who's dead?"

"That's not important," she replied.

"You're telling me my design client is framing me for murder but it doesn't matter whose?" Ordinarily I'd have thought that the subject of any murder might be a critical point but LaFlamme disagreed.

"There's no death," she stated plainly.

"Murder without death?" I fired back. "That's even more unusual." I often begin these conversations with a quest for knowledge and end them settling for a quiet life.

"We both know Spore's a slippery character," LaFlamme continued, now in full flow. "He gave you the world's worst logo knowing you could never work with it. Nobody could. He figured the case would drive you crazy and then he could pin a murder on you."

"But whose murder?" I persisted.

"Yours."

Scenes Of Graphic Violence

December 22, 2008

LaFlamme's take on murder. "Murder?" I asked LaFlamme. "Who's dead?" "That's not important," she replied. "You're telling me my design client is framing me for murder but it doesn't matter whose?" Ordinarily I'd have thought that the subject of any murder might be a critical point but LaFlamme disagreed. "There's no death," she stated plainly. … Continue reading →

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Bluesky

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A week has passed since my last communication, and my state of confusion has deepened. LaFlamme once again lulled me into a false sense of security by plying me with her sherry-like substance until my whole body radiated with a thermo-nuclear glow.

My graphic design talents, shaky to begin with, were now being tested to the maximum with the challenges that the world's worst logo presented me. And LaFlamme's book deal was galling enough without the realisation that the publisher was responsible for the very logo I'd been commissioned to investigate.

"Y'see, kid" she began, taking an ordinary household corkscrew and tackling a particularly troublesome red. "Your client may not have been entirely honest with you." The corkscrew snapped off, leaving a stump of metal still engaged below the surface of the barely dislodged cork. "Metal fatigue," she explained, plunging the cork into the bottle with her thumb - a method much favoured by desperate art students, and proof that art college education is extremely practical.

"My client's never been honest with me," I said, referring to the lowlife Ignacious Spore. "If he ever tried, I'd think he was up to something."

She took a swig from the cork-infested bottle - she was a class act alright.

"Yes, but did you know he was here last night trying to frame you for murder?"

The Truth About Art College Education

December 19, 2008

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I visited LaFlamme with the sole intention of grilling her on her knowledge of my client Spore's nefarious activities. Instead I was dealt a sherry-like substance and a copy of her five-book publishing contract, along with a reminder that my life still sucked.

LaFlamme had out-manoeuvred me again, and what appeared to be an impending revelation about my client made me all the more uneasy.

"Notice anything unusual about the logo?" she asked, nodding in the direction of the contract. Years of graphic design torture had left me immune to the charms of my own trade, to the extent that I now mentally blanked out anything that wasn't 10-point Times.

I took a second look at the document header. And there it was: the world's worst logo. The one that Spore asked me to investigate in the first place.

Now I may not be the sharpest guy around. In fact the Admiral described me as a ‘halfwit', but after thirty minutes in his company a man's likely to lose a great deal of his wit, along with most of his will to live.

But I can put two and two together and get a number between three and five. I gathered all my cognitive powers in an attempt to demonstrate my intelligence and perception at its most devastating and incisive, and with everything I could muster said, "I'm confused."

A Crisis Of Intelligence

December 10, 2008

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As I approached LaFlamme's hallway, I met with the clattering of the ribbon-wound Underwood within. I pushed at the door, already slightly ajar, and there was LaFlamme in exactly the same position as I last saw her several days before. The typing was deafening. I could feel the vibrations travelling through the hardwood table to the floor.

"Have you had any sleep since I left?" I asked.

"I'll sleep when I'm dead," she replied and continued hammering at the keyboard. I figured she was immortal anyway and would need a stake through the heart to stop her.

"There," she said. "Piece of cake." She ripped out the last page from the machine and simultaneously thrust a separate sheaf of papers my way.

"What's this?" I asked, a little fearful of her response.

"Book deal," she replied and filled two glasses with what looked like sherry but could have been anything. I gazed at the papers in disbelief. LaFlamme's self-help book, 'Help Yourself To Drink,' was going to be published as part of a five-book deal.

"Somebody needs to shake these losers to their senses," LaFlamme stated matter-of-factly. It was an interesting way of describing her readership. "It might as well be me."

My hopes of winning the Nobel Prize for splitting the Internet seemed hollow in the light of this. I felt an exasperation that I'd previously reserved for extraordinary pique.

LaFlamme sensed my irritation and handed me a glass. "It's my duty to relate the sum of the knowledge I've gained so far," she said sympathetically. "People need to wake up and realise there is a better way to live."

She paused. "Now drink up. There's something I need to tell you about your client."

The Sum Of All Knowledge: Sherry

December 8, 2008

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I hadn't actually won it yet but I'd decided this would be the name of my best-selling memoir after my brilliant idea (see December 3^rd) had taken the world by storm.

The Admiral pointed out that it would be unusual for a graphic designer to win the Nobel Prize for science, so I reluctantly conceded that I was happy to share the honour with him and his planet-sized cranium.

Splitting the Internet into three was such an obvious thing to do, I wondered why nobody else had thought of it. I tried to recall any precedents. They split the atom and that turned out ok, didn't it?

I left the Admiral to take the initial steps, which presumably involved some vast feats of calculus between the computer and the coffee machine. I had other things on my mind.

With belated world-recognition all but a done deal, I decided it was time to pay LaFlamme a return visit. I had some questions for her regarding a certain lowlife client of mine, one Ignacious Spore.

How I Won The Nobel Prize

December 5, 2008

I hadn't actually won it yet but I'd decided this would be the name of my best-selling memoir after my brilliant idea (see December 3rd) had taken the world by storm. The Admiral pointed out that it would be unusual for a graphic designer to win the Nobel Prize for science, so I reluctantly conceded … Continue reading →

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My barking client Spore had introduced me to Internet café owner and possible genius the Admiral, in an attempt to help me solve the riddle of the world's worst logo.

The Admiral did his technical heavyweight best, even explaining the concept of blogging to me, something I found impossibly silly. But it was this explanation and the dawning realisation that the internet was clogged to the gills with drivel that led to my brilliant idea:

We could split the internet.

That's right, split it into three: web logs, pornography, and the third piece of the trinity - stuff I might find useful. I hated typing all those w's anyway. Now they could have one each. It was crystal clear to me and obviously Nobel-worthy.

w.blogs.com

w.porn.com

w.stuffimightfinduseful.com

I ran the idea past the Admiral and sensed him making a mental connection between great knowledge and great wealth. He was only short on the latter.

"There are manifold logistical ramifications," he said. I wasn't sure if this was good or bad. I wondered if he fully understood the magnitude of the concept, because he clearly didn't feel threatened by my intellectual stature. "But it just might be possible.."

My Brilliant Idea

December 3, 2008

My barking client Spore had introduced me to Internet café owner and possible genius the Admiral, in an attempt to help me solve the riddle of the world's worst logo. The Admiral did his technical heavyweight best, even explaining the concept of blogging to me, something I found impossibly silly. But it was this explanation … Continue reading →

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LaFlamme could type like fury, but the Admiral could use all ten fingers. I took this as a sign of great intellect, as I believe the correct use of a keyboard is taught at phd level in the finest schools. In fact they say that in the future, dexterous digits will be hugely evolutionarily advantageous.

Another sign of his gargantuan brainpower was the sheer impenetrability of his explanations. Even after he relayed the concept of ‘web logs' to me several times, I still couldn't grasp it. I always recognise brilliance by my inability to understand it.

Apparently ‘web logs' are daily diaries written by ordinary stiffs for the purpose of.. here I was unsure. What were they for? And who were they for? He showed me several examples. I just thought none of these clowns should be clogging up the guy's computer with their twaddle. But it was obviously brilliant.

The Admiral said they were ‘good for search engines,' although how being awash in a sea of drivel could be good for anything, let alone any kind of engine, was beyond me.

I'd always thought that the internet was just a vast vault of pornography, exquisitely designed and laid out by some other underpaid and cowering graphic designer. But now it seemed there was an equally vast vault of meaningless typeset gibberish battling it for dominance. How was anything I might find useful ever going to compete with these two behemoths?

But that's when I had my brilliant idea.

A Sea Of Drivel (.com)

December 1, 2008

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: My barking client Spore awakes

"Oh my god, he's dead!" I cried out, on seeing my client's pentacle-decorated body on the floor.

Spore sat bolt upright. "Dead? I'm not dead. I always sleep like this." He shook himself awake.

"What's with the satanic cross?" I asked suspiciously. I already knew Spore was barking, and that was before I saw a five-point star on his nightshirt.

"You ought to know that symbol is no more evil in origin than the swastika," he declared. He still had me confused with the professor of Religious Symbology at Harvard.

"Look Spore, I'll come to the point." I didn't want to waste any more time with this nutjob. "I need an advance." I explained about the theft of my computer and how I'd been led astray by a wild woman.

"You disappoint me, dear boy," he replied, his fingers making a revolting waxy sound in connection with his ear. "Let me introduce you to somebody who might be able to help."

He donned his familiar gabardine and we set out towards the shopping precinct. Finally we reached what used to be Geiger's bookstore. A sign now said ‘Internet Café.'

Spore pointed to a short stocky man with a balding pate. "Meet the Admiral," he said.

Religious Symbology: Should I Care?

November 28, 2008

My barking client Spore awakes "Oh my god, he's dead!" I cried out, on seeing my client's pentacle-decorated body on the floor. Spore sat bolt upright. "Dead? I'm not dead. I always sleep like this." He shook himself awake. "What's with the satanic cross?" I asked suspiciously. I already knew Spore was barking, and that was before I saw … Continue reading →

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