Public Service Announcement

This is a public service announcement—one I wish I had received before lunchtime today!

I’m currently reading The Black Dahlia by James Ellroy. It’s a pretty good book (apparently far better than the movie from what I hear) and it’s keeping my interest when my mind really should be on the ins and outs of Human Resources. It’s a fictional story based on the factual unsolved and heinous murder of Elizabeth Short in Los Angeles, who became known as the Black Dahlia.

So, I’m at Borders today during lunch to peruse the paperbacks which I should not buy. Then I notice a book called something like The Black Dahlia Files. It’s written by some guy whose previous books include one insinuating that JFK and the mob did in Marilyn Monroe. Well, this piece of, um, investigative journalism, attempts to prove the theory that the mob did in Elizabeth Short. But, more importantly, it has pictures.

I thought it would be interesting to see what Elizabeth Short looked like and boy, oh boy did I find out. Without any warning, this book contained the actual CRIME SCENE PICTURES! Yes, there was the bisected and cored body of the Black Dahlia, her chopped up face and then, if that wasn’t enough, crime scene and autopsy photos of several other murders!

Hello, could there not be a warning? I mean even CNN is nice enough to put a warning out before the show anything of potentially objectionable content. (I’m not sure if the content is actually objectionable since I usually opt not to take the chance and switch over to the Food Network). And this book was right there on the front table, where anyone over 3 feet tall could have gotten to it!

I’m not saying, exactly, that the pictures should not have been published. Okay, out of decency they should not have been published. What my gripe is that anyone just browsing would have been subjected to that. Honestly, did it really belong on the front table? If someone is really that interested in mutilated corpses, they need to be shopping in the back of the bookstore. Now I face a sleepless night—thanks so much Borders!

And now, on a light note, my favorite quote of the day!

One of the greatest diseases is to be nobody to anybody.
-Mother Theresa