Chapter "Thrity-One"

I've been on a Raymond Chandler kick lately, just having re-read his novel Farewell, My Lovely. More about Chandler will be written here later. At his moment I'm checking in just to mention the fact that in the Vintage/Black Lizard paperback edition I've been re-reading, chapter thirty-one is misprinted as "thrity-one."

For whatever reason, I noticed this (which I didn't the first time around with the novel years ago), and the fact has captured my imagination. In my daily routine, I see "thrity-one" as an image in my mind's eye, in various fonts and variations, several times during the course; I repose near slumber in my bed at night and the image(s) of the word "thrity-one" hovers in my consciousness, floating aloof like a cloud, like some inscrutable message or omen, perhaps a riddle, one that I can't figure. Or, even that the solving of the riddle is in the fact that it means nothing. Conversely, perhaps it means everything in its meaninglessness.

This conundrum (or non-conundrum) doesn't exactly bother me, however. As far as as an existential anxiety attack oges, it's more akin to chewing gum of/for the brain. My brain asks, "thrity-one?" My brain answers, "thrity-one."

--JTD