You never know when your number is up, when the fat lady is going to grab you by the balls and make you sing that last swirling high note for her. This thought might make some decide to take up rock climbing, hang gliding or BASE jumping, to really, in their minds, start LIVING. I’m not advocating living your life like some sort of goddamn kamikaze. What I’m trying to say is that you just never know and that maybe it doesn’t hurt to be prepared. That’s why I concentrate on fending off death. I don’t go dancing crazily about and acting like some damn fool trying to live a life that would make me uncomfortable because the truth is everyone is WATCHING and they think you look like a huge ass pirouetting under that disco ball. I carry my roscoe, my Mom’s brass knuckles and an attitude forged from my life on the streets. Go ahead, laugh, be a dove and shove a posy at me but when that bad man comes in the darkest hour with his fists full of sharpened steel I’ll be ready to smash his teeth in and you, you’ll probably be dead.
--Private Detective Burma Ludlow