The lingerie department is the only one that she can reach in her wheelchair. Nevertheless, she is fired the next day because of complaints that a woman who is so obviously not sexually attractive selling alluring nightgowns makes customers uncomfort...
I suppose it is submerged memories that give to dreams their curious air of hyper-reality. But perhaps there is something else as well, something nebulous, gauze-like, through which everything one sees in a dream seems, paradoxically, much clearer. A...
Fantasy imposes order on the universe. Or, at least, it superimposes order on the universe. And it is a human order. Reality tells us that we exist for a brief, beleaguered span in a cold infinity; fantasy tells us that the figures in the foreground ...
If you’re an Orthodox believer, then what sustains this framework is the obligation that you follow. But if you live in a democratic, liberal world whose motto is: “Make choices and manage your choices according to what is good for you,” then t...
Have you ever kissed anybody?" he asked and took a sip. I smirked. "There aren't a whole lot of opportunitiesin the digital world. I did practice on my hand once. It didn't do anything for me". Justin coughed on the water he was swallowing and I slap...
Remember the Golden Rule? "Treat people as you would like to be treated." The best managers break the Golden Rule every day. They would say don't treat people as you would like to be treated. This presupposes that everyone breathes the same psycholog...
What everyone agreed was very nice, was the way Clémence had carried on. Obviously, she wasn't the kind of girl you'd ask again: she'd ended up showing off everything she'd got, and she'd puked all down one of the muslin curtains and completely ruin...
All I really, really want to do is find a very, very fine chocolate store that I can walk into and then figure out how in the world one manages to pick out just a few chocolates out of all those very many chocolates! If I am one day able to walk into...
Stories serve multiple purposes. At a basic level they are great entertainment, which is essential for living a happy and healthy life, but on a deeper level stories help us explore issues that are otherwise difficult to address. On one hand a good b...
Like vampires and extremely rich people, black folk can sense one another. Use your Spidey Sense (Blacky Sense?). Use your blackdar to inspect the workplace for signs of Other Negroes. They may be working security for the building. They may be in adm...
Governments are deemed to succeed or fail by how well they make money go round, regardless of whether it serves any useful purpose. They regard it as a sacred duty to encourage the country’s most revolting spectacle: the annual feeding frenzy in wh...
Fast Eddie: What if I don't pay ya, Bert? Bert Gordon: [laughs] You don't pay me? You're gonna get your thumbs broken again. And your fingers. If I want 'em to, they're gonna break your right arm in three or four places. Minnesota Fats: You better pa...
Red: [narrating] And that's how it came to pass that on the second-to-last day of the job, the convict crew that tarred the plate factory roof in the spring of forty-nine wound up sitting in a row at ten o'clock in the morning drinking icy cold, Bohe...
I would never normally approach a woman in this way, but I couldn't help but notice that you have the eyes of a lady I was once desperately in love with. " "What a shame to love only once," she said, showing her white teeth in a wicked smile. "I've h...
Everyone tends to think of October as being an autumn month. Not so much in south Alabama, usually. There, it's another warm, if not hot, summer month. But the Alabama summer heat will sometimes get broken by cooler days. The haze of the depth of sum...
In a variation on James's recipe for interesting experience--the familiar leavened by the novel--Hobbs's "art of choosing difficulties" requires selecting projects that are "just manageable." If an activity is too easy, you lose focus and get bored. ...
If you only had 48 hours left to live, would you spend it like you normally spend your weekends? If not, why spend 2/7th of your life wasting your free time? After all, free time isn’t free. Free time is the most expensive time you have, because no...
From Time for College - Mr. Chiardi & Other Stories It was time for Junior to go to college. He’d sprouted pubic hair and was eyeing all the girls. “I want to go to college,” he said. “Yes,” I replied, “It’s time.” His mother, my wife...
The next morning after finishing my interviews, I found myself with some time to kill before the bus arrived to return me to Whitby. The term "time to kill" suddenly sounded awfully harsh. Was "time to waste" better? No, "waste" is so un-Benedictine....
Mothers who know do less. They permit less of what will not bear good fruit eternally. They allow less media in their homes, less distraction, less activity that draws their children away from their home. Mothers who know are willing to live on less ...
Mr. Goodkat: [his first lines] There was a time. Nick: [groggily looks at his watch] 4:35. Mr. Goodkat: You misunderstood. I wasn't asking for the time, I was just saying... there was a time. Nick: There was a time? Mr. Goodkat: Mmm-hmm. Take Brown S...
