Who were they?

[Iconoclast]

Hi Abe,

Here's what we know:

March 9, 1992 - Eddie Lyons claims he was working at Battlecrease House, Mike Barrett rings Rupert Crew saying he thinks he has Jack the Ripper's diary, and at some point that day or during the following few days, Mike seeks an 1880 to 1890 diary.

During these first few days, what does Mike know about the origins of the diary? Presumably very little and very possibly nothing except that he doesn't want to lose possession of it. He had never heard of Paul Dodd. He fears someone might take the scrapbook off him but he had no idea who. He is simply panicking that that might happen. So - rationally or irrationally (it doesn't matter which) - one idea is to seek a surrogate he could potentially use to pass off as the 'thing' he has recently acquired (which he suspects was 'liberated' from a job Lyons was on).

The order takes around three weeks before it is fulfilled by which point Barrett has convinced himself the threat is largely over. Earl rings with news of the totally useless 1891 diary. Barrett has no interest in it but - realising he doesn't need to pay straight away - just accepts it, having no intention of paying for it at all.

And that's the end of the 1891 diary story. Mike doesn't 'hide' his purchase away for 2.5 years. He just forgets all about it because it was so very obviously irrelevant. And then he is in confessional mood and he remembers the impossible diary and decides to cite it as evidence of his having hoaxed the scrapbook.

None of this is complicated. I would advise against trying to decipher what is relevant and what is mud from RJ's latest concoction as it's all mud. And I wouldn't spend any time wondering why Mike would think Dodd would come looking for him: he didn't need to know if anyone would, he simply had to be concerned that it might happen.

By the time Mike agreed to accept the completely useless 1891, tiny diary, its use was over (until such time as he decided to employ it as part of his master hoaxer story). It was still March 1992, almost April, and his state of mind was calmer. No-one had come to his door looking for anything at all. He was home and hosed and therefore felt comfortable to take the scrapbook to London. Still a risky thing to do as he suspected he had stolen property on his hands, but a risk he just couldn't resist in his excitement to test the scrapbook's authenticity.

Don't overthink it, mate. And watch out for the mud being slung around.

[rjpalmer]

Mike, worried that the rightful owner might come knocking, buys a surrogate, but since no one does come knocking...

Mr. Bundy, sir.

Let's recall that someone did come knocking, eventually: Paul Dodd--in the guise of Paul Feldman and Robert Smith, who got wind of the 'Battlecrease Caper" and began asking questions about it, including questions to Mike Barrett.

Just think: here was Mike's big moment! The big day had arrived!

Having planned for this eventuality--news of Eddie Lyon's alleged theft leaking out--did Mike whip out the red diary and reveal to Feldman and Smith that this is what he had bought from Lyons for 25 pounds?

Did he, &$%#.

Mike said nothing of the sort, and simply denied knowing Eddie. And that, unfortunately, means that Tom's theory is relegated to a fantasy world that never happened, above and beyond the illogical white noise inherent to its conception.

The second glaring issue is that for Tom's theory to 'work,' Tom must pretend that everyone involved was a moron.

The investigating officers (or, if you prefer, Dodd, Smith, and Feldman) have to be so remarkably dense that they simply accept Mike's explanation--completely unconcerned that Mike is admitting to:

a) buying a Victorian diary in a pub from one of Portus & Rhodes' alleged March 9th employees.

b) Mike is admitting to buying a BLANK VICTORIAN DIARY in the weeks before showing up in London with the dodgy diary of Jack the Ripper.

No one--not even Barrett--would assume that such a cover story would work. The last thing in the world Mike would do is bring up blank Victorian diaries.

Mike might as well have rung up Martin Earl in Cambridge and handed the phone to Feldman, Dodd, Smith, and Bonsey. "Here you go, mates, I bought a blank Diary before heading to London a few weeks later."

What criminal, in the history of crime, has done such a thing?

And of course, Mike didn't: he kept the purchase a secret for the better part of 2 1/2 years.

This is a dog's breakfast of a theory that even a starving dog would not touch.

But I don't mean to be rude about it.

Rather, my only purpose here is to offer constructive criticism to Tom as he prepares a new edition of his masterwork.

It is a thankless task. I tend to receive abuse for my generosity, but Tom doesn't need to thank me. I'm happy to help.

[Al Bundy's Eyes]

Not sure what I've started here....

For Mike's surrogate diary to come into play, he has to have shown the 'Diary of Jack the Ripper' to Doreen, as per RJ's imagined scenario. That's the only way Dodd or the police would know about.

He can't very well produce the blank and claim that's what he bought from Eddie. He still needs to explain where the thing he showed to Doreen came from.

So, keeping the non fraud angle, any explanation has to be that the red diary was for pre trip to London use. And if he's not shown the written diary yet, how does Dodd know Mike has anything?

Mike buys diary of Jack from Eddie, knowing it came from Battlecrease. Mike, worried that the rightful owner might come knocking, buys a surrogate, but since no one does come knocking, he confidently takes his stolen book to sell in London. Why would Dodd come round, if he didn't know anything had been knicked? Would Mike genuinely be worried that Dodd would know that an old diary had been taken and that said diary was nothing short of extraordinary? How would Dodd know anything had been taken from under his floorboards in the week or so after 9th March? Unless he was a regular down The Saddle too?

No, it's not working for me thus far.

Question for you Ike; What would cause Mike to believe, in the days after 9th March, that Dodd knew something, and something worth chasing at that, had been wrongly taken from his home? I think that's probably going to be the crux of your surrogate diary conundrum.

[PRIVATE INVESTIGATOR 1]

“Repeatedly” is an obsession and it wasn’t a valid question. He did not have to detail anything about routes. That’s what you wanted from the journal.

Everyone here makes certain points repeatedly.

I do so, especially when they are obviously such strong points that they are not properly addressed.

You have now repeatedly accused me of having an obsession.

According to your own definition - but not mine - you have an obsession.

[Iconoclast]

Hello Mr. Bundy.
I’m trying to imagine Mike’s fiendishly clever plan in action, and as Caroline and Thomas like to write fiction, I thought I'd try my hand at it.
Police Sergeant Bonesy/ Paul Dodd arriving in Goldie Street:
“Knock, knock. Open up. It’s Police Sergeant Bonsey, here, with Paul Dodd, the owner of Battlecrease. We are investigating a rumor.”
(Mike Barrett) “Oh, hello.”
“Are you the bloke who recently brought the Diary of Jack the Ripper to London, with its reference to Battlecrease?”
“Yes.”
“We heard a rumor that you bought the diary from Edward Lyons, in a pub, for 25 quid.”
“Uh….let me explain… it is true I bought a diary from Edward Lyons in a pub a few weeks ago for 25 quid, but it was a different diary. AND I DIDN’T KNOW IT WAS STOLEN.”
“Wait. It wasn’t’ the same diary—the Diary of Jack the Ripper---that you recently brought to London?”
“No, sir. It was this little blank Late Victorian Diary from 1891. Very tiny, sir, very tiny. It's maroon. You can see it is maroon."
“Why did you want a blank diary?"
“I…uh… I…”
“Why did you buy a small blank diary for twenty-five quid from Edward Lyons?"
"I..uh...I..."
"WHAT WERE YOU PLANNING TO DO WITH A BLANK DIARY???"
“Oh, no! Nothing , sir, nothing! I just have a fetish for blank Victorian Diaries. I like them. I like owning blank Victorian diaries.”
“Are all the diaries you buy in pubs blank?”
“I..er…I like to see what blank diaries look like. The blanker the better. I especially like them to have at least twenty blank pages. So, when Eddie offered it, I jumped. And, er, please don’t tell my wife, Anne.”
Satisfied, as Mike knew they would be, Bonsey and Paul Dodd kindly bid Mike a ‘good night’ and left, scratching their heads.
(Dodd while leaving)
“To be honest, Bonsey, I didn’t know what Eddie had taken from under my floorboards, if anything. If this Barrett chap had shown me a broken egg timer, that would have worked, too. He could have saved himself the 25 quid.”
(RJP, viewing the scene from afar, and smoking his twentieth bowl of ganja)
"Dude. This is all starting to make sense…"

True to form, Muddy the Mud Boy has done his utmost to create a mocking scene in order to make an argument appear as facile as he possibly can. How did he do that, I hear you ask? Well, he decided to focus on a period of time well beyond the purpose of requesting the surrogate diary. He decided to have Mike Barrett already back from London where he had presented the scrapbook to Rupert Crew. Nevertheless, the conversation didn't have to go that way. Try this, for example:

Date: Any date at all after March 9, 1992 (including after April 13, 1992]
Policeman: Good day. I believe that you recently took possession of an old book within which was written a record of the thoughts of Jack the Ripper. Is that correct?
Barrett: That's sort of true, officer, yes. I bought an 1891 diary from someone in the pub, but it was blank, unlike the thing you've just described.
Policeman: My information is that it had writing in it.
Barrett: Then it can't have been the one I now own, I guess.
Policeman: Might I see this 1891 diary, please, sir?

--- Scenario if Barrett had not yet received the 1891 diary ---

Barrett: You can, yes, of course, but I sent it off to a friend to take a look at it for me. It'll take me a week or two to get it back but as soon as I do you are welcome to see it.
Policeman: Oh. Okay. Can you give me the name of this friend?
Barrett: I could, but he has a very weak heart - I'd rather not give him a fright if that's okay with you. I'd rather just get it back off him and then show you if that's okay with you.
Policeman: Can you at least give me his name?
Barrett: I could but I won't, officer. Mistakes can get made and I do not want him being contacted.
Policeman: Okay. I guess I'll need to come back in a week or so to see it for myself.
Barrett: That's no problem, officer.

--- Scenario if Barrett had received the 1891 diary ---

Barrett: You can, yes, of course, it's just here on the dining table.
Policeman: [Looking at 1891 diary] So you bought this in the pub?
Barrett: I did, yes.
Policeman: Who did you buy it from?
Barrett: I didn't know the man, sorry.
Policeman: Did it not occur to you that it may have been stolen?
Barrett: No. I wouldn't have bought it if I thought it was stolen property.
Policeman: I see. Did anyone else witness this transaction?
Barrett: No. It was just me and him. We got chatting, he showed me the diary, I have an interest in that sort of thing and I just asked him if I could buy it off him and he said fine. I paid him ten quid.
Policeman: Okay. That's not really the version I heard.
Barrett: What version did you hear?
Policeman: That you paid £25 to Mr Edward Lyons for the diary of Jack the Ripper.
Barrett: Well, you just need to look at it - I clearly didn't.
Policeman: Hmmm. It would certainly seem that way, sir.

This conversation could have happened at any time after March 9, 1992, and up to and including the day the world found out about Mike Barrett and his diary of Jack the Ripper, so he could have still been nicked for his actions and his lies and still lost possession of the scrapbook, but - and here's the rub - that's entirely irrelevant because all that matters here is what was going on in Barrett's head on March 9, 1992, when he decided to seek a surrogate for his scrapbook should anyone ask. Nothing else matters. No invented scenarios are relevant. All that matters is what Mike Barrett thought he needed to protect him from losing his newly-acquired and very valuable possession.

Would Barrett's mind have worked this way, I hear you ask? Well, I don't know, but this discussion reminds me of one Christmas Eve in the early 1970s when my dad (who was not beyond a bit of slight roguery if he could make a gain from it) was taking me to my nana's house to exchange presents. He reversed out of the driveway in the dark, went too far across the street, and stopped when he felt the impact of a small collision. He got out and realised that he had broken the brake light of the neighbour's car over the road. Rather than fess up (as we all would have done), he drove away having first picked-up the broken parts of his own car's brake light (which had also got broken).

When we returned home again a few hours later, a policeman came to our door and said that our neighbour had accused him of smashing his brake light to which my dad denied all knowledge of any collision. The policeman then asked if he could see the back of my dad's car to which my dad happily opened up the garage and obliged. The policeman could see that my dad's brake lights were both intact so he had to accept my dad's story and he went away. The neighbour was seriously pissed-off but ultimately knew he couldn't prove anything.

Why did this story spring to mind? Well, because my dad did not simply break my neighbour's brake light that night. He also stopped at the first parked car he saw of the same make and model to his own car, and he stole the relevant brake light from that. He then screwed that onto his own car.

I remember asking him why he had done that, to which he replied, "On the off-chance the neighbour finds out and calls the police. Probably won't happen, but I'm covering my tracks".

Whenever I think of Barrett's actions in 1992, that incident around twenty years earlier just bobbed to the surface of my brain over and over again. Thought I'd share it with you all.

PS Remind me to tell you the story of the stolen tin of beans from the local mental hospital. It'll cork you.

[erobitha]

I already knew that Canter is a criminal psychologist.

That does not excuse his howler about the Whitechapel Murderer and Sabbath observance.

I do not know what you mean by 'admin'.

Repeatedly making a valid point about the lack of any details about routes taken by the murderer does not amount to an obsession, as you well know.

“Repeatedly” is an obsession and it wasn’t a valid question. He did not have to detail anything about routes. That’s what you wanted from the journal.

[PRIVATE INVESTIGATOR 1]

It is only at the end of the journal he wishes for it to be found. If the writer is to be believed, it is the realisation of all that he has done wrong has caused an apparent regret. It is only then he identifies himself in any overt way.

Until that point the text is consistent with someone writing for their own enjoyment.

Dr Canter is primarily a criminal psychologist. That’s his expertise.

Your obsession with directions and admin is a reflection on you more so than the diarist.

I already knew that Canter is a criminal psychologist.

That does not excuse his howler about the Whitechapel Murderer and Sabbath observance.

I do not know what you mean by 'admin'.

Repeatedly making a valid point about the lack of any details about routes taken by the murderer does not amount to an obsession, as you well know.

[rjpalmer]

Hello Mr. Bundy.

I’m trying to imagine Mike’s fiendishly clever plan in action, and as Caroline and Thomas like to write fiction, I thought I'd try my hand at it.

Police Sergeant Bonesy/ Paul Dodd arriving in Goldie Street:

“Knock, knock. Open up. It’s Police Sergeant Bonsey, here, with Paul Dodd, the owner of Battlecrease. We are investigating a rumor.”

(Mike Barrett) “Oh, hello.”

“Are you the bloke who recently brought the Diary of Jack the Ripper to London, with its reference to Battlecrease?”

“Yes.”

“We heard a rumor that you bought the diary from Edward Lyons, in a pub, for 25 quid.”

“Uh….let me explain… it is true I bought a diary from Edward Lyons in a pub a few weeks ago for 25 quid, but it was a different diary. AND I DIDN’T KNOW IT WAS STOLEN.”

“Wait. It wasn’t’ the same diary—the Diary of Jack the Ripper---that you recently brought to London?”

“No, sir. It was this little blank Late Victorian Diary from 1891. Very tiny, sir, very tiny. It's maroon. You can see it is maroon."

“Why did you want a blank diary?"

“I…uh… I…”

“Why did you buy a small blank diary for twenty-five quid from Edward Lyons?"

"I..uh...I..."

"WHAT WERE YOU PLANNING TO DO WITH A BLANK DIARY???"

“Oh, no! Nothing , sir, nothing! I just have a fetish for blank Victorian Diaries. I like them. I like owning blank Victorian diaries.”

“Are all the diaries you buy in pubs blank?”

“I..er…I like to see what blank diaries look like. The blanker the better. I especially like them to have at least twenty blank pages. So, when Eddie offered it, I jumped. And, er, please don’t tell my wife, Anne.”

Satisfied, as Mike knew they would be, Bonsey and Paul Dodd kindly bid Mike a ‘good night’ and left, scratching their heads.

(Dodd while leaving)

“To be honest, Bonsey, I didn’t know what Eddie had taken from under my floorboards, if anything. If this Barrett chap had shown me a broken egg timer, that would have worked, too. He could have saved himself the 25 quid.”

(RJP, viewing the scene from afar, and smoking his twentieth bowl of ganja)

"Dude. This is all starting to make sense…"

[Iconoclast]

I see where your coming from, even if I don't buy into it. And yes, the benefit of hindsight can solve many arguments.

I think hindsight gives us all a little bit of perspective; by definition, we see things from a wider viewpoint because without hindsight - in the moment that events are 'live' - our priorities cram into a small space in our heads and dominate our thinking and therefore our potential and actual actions. With the wider perspective of hindsight, we are all used to thinking, "Okay, I could have thought and acted a little differently had I known a little more".

For me, Barrett could only try to source a blank diary as a surrogate (is that a suitable term? I think so)

Agreed, good word (and better word).

Barrett's state of mind in my opinion would be one of worrying about Dodd finding out that something of value, something of note, came from his house.

Agreed. If Barrett had received something from a questionable source and it was of obvious high value, he'd not unreasonably be concerned to protect what he had (if he possibly could). There was a clear money-making opportunity here and Barrett didn't have a lot of that so it is likely that he would be motivated to preserve his money-making opportunity. A 'wealthier' person (someone who did not see the value in gaining more money at the expense of someone else) might have handed the artefact back if they were asked to do so therefore they would not be fussed about finding a surrogate to protect what they had.

I mean, if Dodd caught wind that an 'old book' or similarly non descript item was taken, I don't imagine he or Barrett would be giving this much thought.

Value is often a subjective quality, of course, but I agree that - in this case - the value of this item would be pretty obvious to Barrett and he would therefore know that it would be of value to everyone else so he would also be able to calculate the inverse, that if he felt it lacked value so would the true owner.

The Dodd threat, in March 1992, would only matter if Barrett knew that Dodd knew more specifically what was taken, in which case a blank book wouldn't serve as a surrogate.

Agreed, this is a sticking point in my argument. Is it possible that Barrett planned to copy out some or all of the scrapbook text into the 1880-1890 diary in order to help him pass it off as the original item, no-one knows? At that point, Barrett would know that it was almost certainly then a he-said, she-said situation which could not be proven either way.

I'm toying around with the theory, as you're aware I believe Barrett sourced a blank diary for fraudulent purposes, but I can't quite make this line work. If he'd sought out a filled diary, maybe, because that could be passed off as a surrogate, certainly more so than a blank.

I think a blank Victorian document without dates would be the obvious preference because - if you ignore whether or not text was already in it - that's what he got from Eddie Lyons. In this regard, I am arguing against my own theory, but that is because I am seeking to be realistic and honest. The sensible thing would have been to seek any genuine Victorian document which was undated, but I can't ignore the possibility that Barrett acted irrationally when he made his request.

I'm not seeing any non fraud arguments for the diary request that convince me it was for any other reason.

I agree. The only such argument we have ever heard was from Anne Graham herself who claimed her husband just wanted to see what a Victorian diary looked like. In reality, I think there is a reasonably strong probability that she was simply repeating what Mike had said to her when she had asked him why he ordered the useless diary.

Hey ho, I doubt either of us will change the others mind, just bouncing around ideas really.

We don't normally debate much, Abe, so it is a pleasure to do so with someone who appears to be pretty open to all possibilities unless the evidence rules them out or rules them implausible.

Cheers,

Ike

[Al Bundy's Eyes]

Abe,

I am right behind your rights to state the evidenced facts wherever they are in the public domain, so I would agree that - with the benefit of hindsight - the lack of publicity in March 1992 should have reassured Mike that what he had acquired would not be suddenly taken away from him so he had no need to seek an artefact which he could use as a facsimile (I won't say doppelganger again after it was deliberately misunderstood by another poster) for the scrapbook he had acquired from Eddie Lyons (and which he could very well have suspected was a knock-off).

The problem with your proposition, however, is that the only thing that matters in this particular situation is what Mike Barrett's state of mind was and someone's 'state of mind' can never be in the public domain by the very definition of what it is (even if someone states openly what their state of mind is or was, we cannot be certain that is or was indeed their state of mind - this is just an obvious limitation of what 'knowledge' means). In this case, we do not know what Mike's state of mind was on March 9, 1992, so 'objective truths' about the level of publicity (or whatever) have no bearing in this discussion. They may be obvious to us, especially in the retrospect of three decades, but I put it to you that Mike Barrett had no such luxury on March 9, 1992, and - actually - when he did have some amount of luxury by the end of the month when no-one had come knocking at his door he was so relaxed about the threat that he accepted Martin Earl's offer of a diary which was nothing like what he had originally asked for, full in the knowledge that he didn't need it anymore and that he had no plans to pay for it.

Hope this helps.

Ike

Hi Ike,

I see where your coming from, even if I don't buy into it. And yes, the benefit of hindsight can solve many arguments.

For me, Barrett could only try to source a blank diary as a surrogate (is that a suitable term? I think so) for Dodd. Barrett's state of mind in my opinion would be one of worrying about Dodd finding out that something of value, something of note, came from his house. I mean, if Dodd caught wind that an 'old book' or similarly non descript item was taken, I don't imagine he or Barrett would be giving this much thought. The Dodd threat, in March 1992, would only matter if Barrett knew that Dodd knew more specifically what was taken, in which case a blank book wouldn't serve as a surrogate.

I'm toying around with the theory, as you're aware I believe Barrett sourced a blank diary for fraudulent purposes, but I can't quite make this line work. If he'd sought out a filled diary, maybe, because that could be passed off as a surrogate, certainly more so than a blank. I'm not seeing any non fraud arguments for the diary request that convince me it was for any other reason.

Hey ho, I doubt either of us will change the others mind, just bouncing around ideas really.

[Iconoclast]

Hi Scott,

Publicity would only kick in when it was revealed that Mike had 'the diary of Jack the Ripper'. Dodd would only be aware about publicity by virtue of that publicity being about something newsworthy. A blank old book wouldn't generate any, and a blank old book therefore wouldn't fob off Dodd if he knew that Jack's diary had been lifted from his floorboards.

Of course, it's possible that the old book was blank when Mike got it...

Abe,

I am right behind your rights to state the evidenced facts wherever they are in the public domain, so I would agree that - with the benefit of hindsight - the lack of publicity in March 1992 should have reassured Mike that what he had acquired would not be suddenly taken away from him so he had no need to seek an artefact which he could use as a facsimile (I won't say doppelganger again after it was deliberately misunderstood by another poster) for the scrapbook he had acquired from Eddie Lyons (and which he could very well have suspected was a knock-off).

The problem with your proposition, however, is that the only thing that matters in this particular situation is what Mike Barrett's state of mind was and someone's 'state of mind' can never be in the public domain by the very definition of what it is (even if someone states openly what their state of mind is or was, we cannot be certain that is or was indeed their state of mind - this is just an obvious limitation of what 'knowledge' means). In this case, we do not know what Mike's state of mind was on March 9, 1992, so 'objective truths' about the level of publicity (or whatever) have no bearing in this discussion. They may be obvious to us, especially in the retrospect of three decades, but I put it to you that Mike Barrett had no such luxury on March 9, 1992, and - actually - when he did have some amount of luxury by the end of the month when no-one had come knocking at his door he was so relaxed about the threat that he accepted Martin Earl's offer of a diary which was nothing like what he had originally asked for, full in the knowledge that he didn't need it anymore and that he had no plans to pay for it.

Hope this helps.

Ike

[erobitha]

Hi Scott,

Publicity would only kick in when it was revealed that Mike had 'the diary of Jack the Ripper'. Dodd would only be aware about publicity by virtue of that publicity being about something newsworthy. A blank old book wouldn't generate any, and a blank old book therefore wouldn't fob off Dodd if he knew that Jack's diary had been lifted from his floorboards.

Of course, it's possible that the old book was blank when Mike got it...

But that isn’t the point.

Publicity did kick in. Dodd was approached numerous times and was involved in many discussions with researchers. He had no proof to pursue anything.

If he did (which he didn’t) he would be presented with the Tony D provenance and Mike would give Eddie the 1891 diary to hand over as an insurance policy.

Thats my theory.

[Iconoclast]

Thanks Ike. Dodd would have eventually learned that something was taken from his house when the publicity kicked in. Did Mike visit Eddie to try to coerce him into silence?

Hi Scotty,

I suspect that you already know that Mike famously visited Eddie Lyons at his girlfriend's house in Fountains Road. All we know of that visit is what Lyons has said and - as I recall - the mood music of that visit was that Mike was concerned that Eddie would say that he had found the scrapbook in Battlecrease House. I would have to check my specifics before I was dogmatic, but that's how I recall how Lyons described the meeting.

But you used the term 'coerce' and I don't recall any specific detail which could be interpreted as coercion. As I say, I'm saying this from memory. I'd have to check my facts if your question were to be pursued in any greater depth.

Cheers,

Ike

[Al Bundy's Eyes]

Thanks Ike. Dodd would have eventually learned that something was taken from his house when the publicity kicked in. Did Mike visit Eddie to try to coerce him into silence?

Hi Scott,

Publicity would only kick in when it was revealed that Mike had 'the diary of Jack the Ripper'. Dodd would only be aware about publicity by virtue of that publicity being about something newsworthy. A blank old book wouldn't generate any, and a blank old book therefore wouldn't fob off Dodd if he knew that Jack's diary had been lifted from his floorboards.

Of course, it's possible that the old book was blank when Mike got it...

[rjpalmer]

So Caroline, is the suggestion here that Mike may have ordered the maroon diary as a substitute to give to Dodd in case he came crying foul for theft?

Hi Scott -- while we eagerly await Caroline's candid analysis of Tom's theory--perhaps a first in the history of this forum---could you give me a rough idea of how much ganja a guy has to smoke before Tom's theory starts making sense?

Much obliged