If you were commuting to work on the southbound 42 around 8:15 this morning and heard someone toward the rear exit suddenly emit a burst of laughter — laughter far, far too jarringly loud for 8:15 a.m. — the reason can be found on pages 21 and 22 of the Simon & Schuster paperback copy of The Men Who Stare At Goats:

In the mid-1970s, Echanis published a book titled ‘Knife Self-Defense for Combat,’ which advocated the controversial technique of noisily leaping in the air and spinning around while attacking an enemy with a knife. This approach was hailed by some knife-fighting aficionados but criticized by others who believed that the leaping and the spinning might lead one accidentally to stab oneself, and that one should keep one’s footwork simple when armed with a knife.

Two pages later, I wanted to quit my job and devote myself to re-reporting Jon Ronson’s fantastical tale, but will opt instead to review the movie version of Goats for the American Prospect on Monday.