Mulholland Books offers spy technique pointers from Mischa Hiller’s Shake Off, and as a rank amateur who would probably get killed in a fight while trying to be brave, I feel I should counterbalance some of these tips.

• Know your cover. “If you can believe just a bit of your cover story then you can convince your listener (and even yourself) that it is all true.”
  This a good point. When Mrs. Pollifax went to Mexico, nobody knew she was a spy.
• Incriminating evidence to ditch? Use the restroom. “It is easier to flush soaked paper than dry.”
  And you can flush select memories by soaking and flushing your head. Actually, money, as in the wad of cash you took from that jeweler, does not dissolve in water, so if you have someone down the sewer line ready to grab it, you can pass a huge number of bills via the toilet. This is not labeled “money laundering”. That requires detergent.
• Watch your back. “You should always sit at the back of the bus when you get on, because surveillance like to sit at the back to get a good view of you embarking without having to turn around.”
  Be sure to greet the back-seat surveillance when you sit down.
• Finish the job.
  You’ll have to go to the post to read the explanation on this one about killing someone. I think it’s a bit confused. I know you can shoot someone in the head and not kill them, especially a small caliber weapon, but if you’re holding a gun with “a massive kick” like it says, then you’re probably holding a gun that will take the target down in one or two shots. Four to five shots? Surely that’s excessive, especially at close range. When shooting, you want to aim for the upper body, and if you take him down on the first shot (and before Interpol arrives–they’re still around, right?), then you can run up to him and plug him with your remaining bullets. I mean, what else are you going to do with them?