IJ study archive

the .3+ narrated in immaculate insurance prose — "Due to my surprise at being…"

quote

Due to my surprise at being jerked off the ground so suddenly, I lost my presence of mind and forgot to let go of the rope.

Context

The letter's slapstick barrel-and-pulley catastrophe has one unstated cause the framing memo supplies: a blood-alcohol of .3+, the bricklayer "Impaired." The comedy is that the whole disaster is narrated with perfect clerical composure, "I lost my presence of mind" doing all the work — drunk logic reconstructed, straight-faced, into a chain of physics, the drink itself never named in the account it entirely explains.

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