I can’t tell you how many people have called to ask that I write one more column about funny things I’ve found in old notebooks.

OK, no one.

But that’s all right. I know my three readers are dying to hear about the strange, out-of-context scrawlings I have discovered on forgotten notebook pages. I call them widows, these meaningless strings of words stretched across otherwise barren sheets of paper. One day, they meant something. But time has swept away those meanings and left behind confounding sentences that would foil master cryptologists.

“Eight officers on their bellies,” for instance.

What could it mean? I recall no recent mayhem that required cops to get down and squirm like inchworms on the ground. Maybe the policemen’s ball got out of hand. Or maybe they were searching for night crawlers.

Or another: “It’s fascinating. It’s a really good body.”

I have no idea. The release of the Sports Illustrated swimsuit issue? An over-excited mortician? The more I read that line, the more the meaning recedes from me.

“I have a whole folder of mysterious animals.”

Like many remnants that appear in discarded notebooks, this one sounds like a really, really bad pickup line. I see a wormy guy sidling up to a pretty lady at a bar and giving this line a whirl.

“Squeezed and snapped.”

The mind reels. I have no idea what I might have come across on my beat that would be both squeezed and snapped. A boa constrictor with bubble gum? An orange wrapped in rubber bands? It’s an enigma. It sounds like the title of a horrible movie. Or the description of a particularly gruesome injury. I don’t know. I’ll never know.

“Disruptive. Inattentive.”

Wait a minute. That sounds like a comment from my yearly job review.

“Kaput.”

What? Nobody says kaput anymore. That went out of style with “Hogan’s Heroes.” Why then, is that word jotted, in quotes, by itself on a sheet of notebook paper? It drives me crazy. If someone in the world of cops and criminals is still roaming around muttering archaic words like that, I want to know about it.

“I can’t write with these bony fingers! I am dead!”

It sounds as though I had a lively interview with a dead person. But no. It was Halloween, and I was on a ghost tour in Boston. That was the year I dressed up as a dead reporter for the holiday. I scratched out the note and handed it to someone. I don’t remember why. If my notebooks ever get subpoenaed, lines like that will get me committed.

“Secreted in body cavity.”

I believe this must pertain to drug smuggling. I really hope it pertains to drug smuggling. The possibilities otherwise are disturbing.

“Likes to irritate Rex.”

The only person I know named Rex is the big cheese at the newspaper. Peculiar. I have no idea what this line means or who … wait a minute. Never mind. It’s another comment from my job review.

“It’s not unusual.”

I swear, I have not been listening to Tom Jones. And if I were, I surely wouldn’t jot down lyrics and leave a paper trail of evidence behind. Listening to Tom Jones in the wrong neighborhoods can get you hurt. Not that there’s anything wrong with Tom Jones. I mean, “What’s New, Pussycat?” That song cranks. Not to mention “She’s a Lady.” I’ve said too much.

Here is a picture rather than a sentence. It’s a light bulb with bushy hair scribbled in ink. There’s a mouth, a nose and a pair of eyes with elegant lashes. Pretty little light bulb. I must have had a great idea, though it doesn’t seem likely.

“Stay.”

Just that one word and nothing more. High times at dog-obedience school? The terse plea of a man being dumped by his lady? Myself trying to talk myself out of quitting? Who knows? Not me. Another word without a meaning in the literary graveyard of notebooks.

“Underwear.”

Deep inside a cluttered notebook, written at an upward slant, that one word sits exposed and embarrassed. It’s troubling. It makes me uncomfortable just to look at it. It’s as though I flipped to the wrong page and caught a sheet of paper getting undressed. I fancy I can hear the high, startled shriek of someone caught in their skivvies.

“Word that Pete says funny.”

I know a lot of Petes. The only one I recall saying a word funny was a cousin I haven’t seen in 20 years. He said pillow funny, I always thought. Pronounced it “pellow.” This is obviously code. By what great case was so delicate that I had to use secret language for the word pillow? I don’t know. And if I did know, I couldn’t tell you.

“Padded room.”

This one written in magic marker. I suppose no one will be surprised to learn that these two words appear in one of my notebooks. It’s like a prophecy.

And with that, so concludes another episode of “What’s Inside the Freak’s Notebook.” I think we all learned something here today. I know I did. Now please stop calling and asking me to write about this stuff. All three of you.

Mark LaFlamme is the Sun Journal crime reporter and literary sleuth.

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