“
Why couldn't Jesus command us to obsess over everything, to try to control and manipulate people, to try not to breathe at all, or to pay attention, stomp away to brood when people annoy us, and then eat a big bag of Hershey's Kisses in bed?
”
”
Anne Lamott (Plan B: Further Thoughts on Faith)
“
And instead you rolled a rock over me and turned your back. I spent all that time drowning and surfacing in you, over and over and over, and all because in the end you could not bear to do the one thing I asked you to do. I wanted you to use me, you malign, double-crossing, corpse-obsessed bag of bones, you broken, used-up shithead! I wanted you to live and not die, you imaginary-girlfriend-having asshole! Fuck one flesh, one end, Harrow. I already gave my flesh to you, and I already gave you my end. I gave you my sword. I gave you myself. I did it while knowing I’d do it all again, without hesitation, because all I ever wanted you to do was eat me.
”
”
Tamsyn Muir (Harrow the Ninth (The Locked Tomb, #2))
“
There's something creepy about any repeating dream, I think, about knowing your subconscious is digging obsessively at some object that won't be dislodged.
”
”
Stephen King (Bag of Bones)
“
Some people might get obsessed with figuring out how they wound up on the F train in drag, with no bag and only one shoe, but that’s simply not my style. What’s done is done. I’m sure I had my reasons.
”
”
Josh Kilmer-Purcell (I Am Not Myself These Days)
“
God and Satan play poker with Tarot cards for the soul of an alcoholic sandwich-bag salesman obsessed with Bernini’s ‘The Ecstasy of St. Teresa.
”
”
David Foster Wallace (Infinite Jest)
“
Okay, dumbass. Perspective time," Gordon muttered as he ripped the greasy bag open. He would force himself to eat. He was not going to become an obsessed basketcase. He wasn't.
"First of all," he said, yanking the utensil drawer open." He is capable of murdering a huge juicer in the middle of the street and then disappearing with the body within seconds."
He removed one of the cartons and shoved his fork into the mound of noodles. "Two, he is probably a sociopath. Three, he thinks I'm a complete ballsack of a moron.
”
”
Santino Hassell (After Midnight)
“
The black bag I made for her is hidden at the back of her closet—the woman’s bag that Lilith complimented.
”
”
Avina St. Graves (Death's Obsession)
“
Sifting through long forgotten stories of my childhood and writing on a daily basis, I became obsessed with following the threads of my memories, one leading to another. I start pulling on a single, seemingly trivial strand, only to discover it is attached to a longer strand; that one in turn is attached to an even bigger one. Sometimes, I find have tugged a whole, hidden tapestry of my past into view, one thread at a time.
”
”
Alice Bag
“
I wanted you to use me, you malign, double-crossing, corpse-obsessed bag of bones, you broken, used-up shithead! I wanted you to live and not die, you imaginary-girlfriend-having asshole! Fuck one flesh, one end, Harrow. I already gave mt flesh to you, and I already gave you my end. I gave you my sword. I gave you myself. I did it while knowing I'd do it all again, without hesitation, because all I ever wanted you to do was eat me.
”
”
Tamsyn Muir (Harrow the Ninth (The Locked Tomb, #2))
“
Yeah. Henry has an obsession with sitting on people’s heads. He thinks humans are his own personal bean bag, but he’d literally use her as his litter box.
”
”
Emma Hart (The Accidental Girlfriend)
“
Oh God, my chin. I have a cluster of five hairs on the left side of my chin. They’re coarse and wiry, like boar hair, and for the past couple of years, they’ve been my hideous secret and my sworn enemies. They sprout up every couple of days, and so I have to be vigilant. I keep my weapons—Revlon tweezers and a 10X magnifying mirror—at home, in my Sherpa bag, and in my desk drawer at work, so in theory, I can be anywhere, and if one of those evil little weeds pokes through the surface, I can yank it. I’ve been in meetings with CEOs, some of the most powerful men in the world, and could barely stay focused on what they were saying because I’d inadvertently touched my chin and become obsessed with the idea of destroying five microscopic hairs. I hate them, and I’m terrified of someone else noticing them before I do, but I have to admit, there is almost nothing more satisfying than pulling them out.I stroke my chin, expecting to feel my Little Pig beard, but touch only smooth skin. My leg feels like a farm animal, which suggests I haven’t shaved in at least a week, but my chin is bare, which would put me in this bed for less than two days. My body hair isn’t making any sense.
”
”
Lisa Genova (Left Neglected)
“
Believe me, I'd love to obsess about something other than the little bag of heroin in my bedroom closet right now--something normal like the good, kissing shape of Nolan Morrison's lips--but there's no thing as "mind over matter" when it comes to high-velocity poop smoothies.
”
”
Khristina Chess (Swallow the Rainbow)
“
9 October 1943
Regarding the Jewish question, he [Himmler] gives a very unadorned and frank picture. He is of the conviction that the Jewish question can be solved by the end of this year. He advocates the most radical and most severe solution, namely to exterminate Jewry, bag and baggage. Of course, if brutal, this is a consistent solution. Because we must take on the responsibility of entirely solving this question in our time. Subsequent generations will doubtlessly no longer dare address this problem with the courage and obsession as we are able to do today.
”
”
Joseph Goebbels (The Goebbels Diaries 1942-1943)
“
One day, years after we stop living together, I will embark on a Kyuri series. I know that with absolute certainty. I cannot start now, when I am in the midst of my Ruby series, nor while I am still living with Kyuri. I need time and distance between us. But this is why I relish living with Kyuri now. I am spoon-feeding the muse that lives in a well deep inside of my brain--hearing Kyuri's stories, watching her drink to oblivion every weekend, obsessing over her face and her body and her clothes and her bags. I take photos of her and her things whenever I can. I will need them to remember her by. The other girls too, I have glimmers of them lurking in the outer regions of my mind; Sujin's terrifying transformation, and dear, silent Ara and her antediluvian upbringing. I will take years, though, before I can commit them to paper or form.
As for Hanbin, I don't need Kyuri or Hanbin's mother to know that he will not be my salvation.
”
”
Frances Cha (If I Had Your Face)
“
I HAD TO GO to America for a while to give some talks. Going to America always does me good. It’s where I’m from, after all. There’s baseball on the TV, people are friendly and upbeat, they don’t obsess about the weather except when there is weather worth obsessing about, you can have all the ice cubes you want. Above all, visiting America gives me perspective. Consider two small experiences I had upon arriving at a hotel in downtown Austin, Texas. When I checked in, the clerk needed to record my details, naturally enough, and asked for my home address. Our house doesn’t have a street number, just a name, and I have found in the past that that is more deviance than an American computer can sometimes cope with, so I gave our London address. The girl typed in the building number and street name, then said: “City?” I replied: “London.” “Can you spell that please?” I looked at her and saw that she wasn’t joking. “L-O-N-D-O-N,” I said. “Country?” “England.” “Can you spell that?” I spelled England. She typed for a moment and said: “The computer won’t accept England. Is that a real country?” I assured her it was. “Try Britain,” I suggested. I spelled that, too—twice (we got the wrong number of T’s the first time)—and the computer wouldn’t take that either. So I suggested Great Britain, United Kingdom, UK, and GB, but those were all rejected, too. I couldn’t think of anything else to suggest. “It’ll take France,” the girl said after a minute. “I beg your pardon?” “You can have ‘London, France.’ ” “Seriously?” She nodded. “Well, why not?” So she typed “London, France,” and the system was happy. I finished the check-in process and went with my bag and plastic room key to a bank of elevators a few paces away. When the elevator arrived, a young woman was in it already, which I thought a little strange because the elevator had come from one of the upper floors and now we were going back up there again. About five seconds into the ascent, she said to me in a suddenly alert tone: “Excuse me, was that the lobby back there?” “That big room with a check-in desk and revolving doors to the street? Why, yes, it was.” “Shoot,” she said and looked chagrined. Now I am not for a moment suggesting that these incidents typify Austin, Texas, or America generally or anything like that. But it did get me to thinking that our problems are more serious than I had supposed. When functioning adults can’t identify London, England, or a hotel lobby, I think it is time to be concerned. This is clearly a global problem and it’s spreading. I am not at all sure how we should tackle such a crisis, but on the basis of what we know so far, I would suggest, as a start, quarantining Texas.
”
”
Bill Bryson (The Road to Little Dribbling: More Notes from a Small Island)
“
Except for my net, everything I have need of in the world is contained in that bag—including a second hat and a rather sizable jar of cold cream of roses. Do not tell me you couldn’t travel with as little. I have faith that men can be as reasonable and logical as women if they but try.” He shook his head. “I cannot seem to formulate a clear thought in the face of such original thinking, Miss Speedwell. You have a high opinion of your sex.” I pursed my lips. “Not all of it. We are, as a gender, undereducated and infantilized to the point of idiocy. But those of us who have been given the benefit of learning and useful occupation, well, we are proof that the traditional notions of feminine delicacy and helplessness are the purest poppycock.”
“You have large opinions for so small a person.”
“I daresay they would be large opinions even for someone your size,” I countered.
“And where did you form these opinions? Either your school was inordinately progressive or your governess was a Radical.”
“I never went to school, nor did I have a governess. Books were my tutors, Mr. Stoker. Anything I wished to learn I taught myself.”
“There are limits to an autodidactic education,” he pointed out.
“Few that I have found. I was spared the prejudices of formal educators."
“And neither were you inspired by them. A good teacher can change the course of a life,” he said thoughtfully.
“Perhaps. But I had complete intellectual freedom. I studied those subjects which interested me—to the point of obsession at times—and spent precious little time on things which did not.”
“Such as?”
“Music and needlework. I am astonishingly lacking in traditional feminine accomplishments.”
He cocked his head. “I am not entirely astonished.” But his tone was mild, and I accepted the statement as nothing like an insult. In fact, it felt akin to a compliment. “And I must confess that between Jane Austen and Fordyce’s Sermons, I have developed a general antipathy for clergymen. And their wives,” I added, thinking of Mrs. Clutterthorpe. “Well, in that we may be agreed. Tell me, do you find many people to share your views?”
“Shockingly few,” I admitted.
”
”
Deanna Raybourn (A Curious Beginning (Veronica Speedwell, #1))
“
Local Girl Missing, Feared Dead.
Beneath it was a photo of me-my most recent school photo.
“Oh, no.” My heart filling with dread, I took the paper from Mr. Smith’s hands. “Couldn’t they have found a better picture?”
Mr. Smith looked at me sharply. “Miss Oliviera,” he said, his gray eyebrows lowered. “I realize it’s all the rage with you young people today to toss off flippant one-liners so you can get your own reality television shows. But I highly doubt MTV will be coming down to Isla Huesos to film you in the Underworld. So that can’t be all you have to say about this.”
He was right, of course. Though I couldn’t say what I really wanted to, because John was in the room, and I didn’t want to make him feel worse than he already did.
But what I wanted to do was burst into tears.
“Is that about Pierce?” John looked uneasy. Outside, thunder rumbled again. This time, it sounded even closer than before.
“Yes, of course, it is, John,” Mr. Smith said. There was something strange about his voice. He sounded almost as if he were mad at John. Only why would he be? John had done the right thing. He’d explained about the Furies. “What did you expect? Have you gotten to the part about the reward your father is offering for information leading to your safe return, Miss Oliviera?”
My gaze flicked down the page. I wanted to throw up.
“One million dollars?” My dad’s company, one of the largest providers in the world of products and services to the oil, gas, and military industries, was valued at several hundred times that. “That cheapskate.”
This was all so very, very bad.
“One million dollars is a lot of money to most people.” Mr. Smith said, with a strong emphasis on most people. He still had that odd note in his voice. “Though I recognize that money may mean little to a resident of the Underworld. So I’d caution you to use judiciousness, wherever it is that you’re going, as there are many people on this island who’ll be more than willing to turn you in for only a small portion of that reward money. I don’t suppose I might ask where you’re going? Or suggest that you pay a call on your mother, who is beside herself with worry?”
“That’s a good idea,” I said. Why hadn’t I thought of it? I felt much better already. I could straighten out this whole thing with a single conversation. “I should call my mom-“
Both Mr. Smith’s cry of alarm and the fact that John grabbed me by the wrist as I was reaching into my book bag for my cell phone stopped me from making calls of any sort.
“You can’t use you phone,” Mr. Smith said. “The police-and your father-are surely waiting for you to do just that. They’ll triangulate on the signal from the closest cell tower, and find you.” When I stared at him for his use of the word triangulate, Mr. Smith shook his head and said, “My partner, Patrick, is obsessed with Law & Order reruns.
”
”
Meg Cabot (Underworld (Abandon, #2))
“
To the Finnish, being outdoors in nature isn't about paying homage to nature or to ourselves, the way it tends to be for Americans. We fetishize are life lists, catalog peaks bagged and capture pristine scenes of grand wilderness It is largely an individual experience. For the Finnish, though, nature is about expressing a close-knit identity. Nature is where they can exult in their nationalistic obsessions of berry-picking, mushrooming, fishing, lake swimming and Nordic skiing.
”
”
Florence Williams
“
Why do we bury our dead?” His nose was dented in at the bridge like a sphinx; the cause of which I could only imagine had been a freak archaeological accident.
I thought about my parents. They had requested in their will that they be buried side by side in a tiny cemetery a few miles from our house. “Because it’s respectful?”
He shook his head. “That’s true, but that’s not the reason we do it.”
But that was the reason we buried people, wasn’t it? After gazing at him in confusion, I raised my hand, determined to get the right answer. “Because leaving people out in the open is unsanitary.”
Mr. B. shook his head and scratched the stubble on his neck.
I glared at him, annoyed at his ignorance and certain that my responses were correct. “Because it’s the best way to dispose of a body?”
Mr. B. laughed. “Oh, but that’s not true. Think of all the creative ways mass murderers have dealt with body disposal. Surely eating someone would be more practical than the coffin, the ceremony, the tombstone.”
Eleanor grimaced at the morbid image, and the mention of mass murderers seemed to wake the rest of the class up. Still, no one had an answer. I’d heard Mr. B. was a quack, but this was just insulting. How dare he presume that I didn’t know what burials meant? I’d watched them bury my parents, hadn’t I? “Because that’s just what we do,” I blurted out. “We bury people when they die. Why does there have to be a reason for everything?”
“Exactly!” Mr. B. grabbed the pencil from behind his ear and began gesticulating with it. “We’ve forgotten why we bury people.
“Imagine you’re living in ancient times. Your father dies. Would you randomly decide to put him inside a six-sided wooden box, nail it shut, then bury it six feet below the earth? These decisions aren’t arbitrary, people. Why a six-sided box? And why six feet below the earth? And why a box in the first place? And why did every society throughout history create a specific, ritualistic way of disposing of their dead?”
No one answered.
But just as Mr. B. was about to continue, there was a knock on the door. Everyone turned to see Mrs. Lynch poke her head in. “Professor Bliss, the headmistress would like to see Brett Steyers in her office. As a matter of urgency.”
Professor Bliss nodded, and Brett grabbed his bag and stood up, his chair scraping against the floor as he left.
After the door closed, Mr. B. drew a terrible picture of a mummy on the board, which looked more like a hairy stick figure. “The Egyptians used to remove the brains of their dead before mummification. Now, why on earth would they do that?”
There was a vacant silence.
“Think, people! There must be a reason. Why the brain? What were they trying to preserve?”
When no one answered, he answered his own question.
“The mind!” he said, exasperated. “The soul!”
As much as I had planned on paying attention and participating in class, I spent the majority of the period passing notes with Eleanor. For all of his enthusiasm, Professor Bliss was repetitive and obsessed with death and immortality. When he faced the board to draw the hieroglyphic symbol for Ra, I read the note Eleanor had written me.
Who is cuter?
A. Professor Bliss
B. Brett Steyers
C. Dante Berlin
D. The mummy
I laughed. My hand wavered between B and C for the briefest moment. I wasn’t sure if you could really call Dante cute. Devastatingly handsome and mysterious would be the more appropriate description. Instead I circled option D. Next to it I wrote Obviously! and tossed it onto her desk when no one was looking.
”
”
Yvonne Woon (Dead Beautiful (Dead Beautiful, #1))
“
Most people think the Lego corporation assembled a crack team of world-class experts to engineer Mini-Florida on a computer, but I’m not buying it.” “You aren’t?” asked Coleman. “It’s way too good.” Serge pointed at a two-story building in Key West. “Examine the meticulous green shutters on Hemingway’s house. No, my money is on a lone-wolf manic type like the famous Latvian Edward Leedskalnin, who single-handedly built the Coral Castle back in the twenties. He operated in secret, moving multi-ton hewn boulders south of Miami, and nobody knows how he did it. Probably happened here as well: The Lego people conducting an exhaustive nationwide search among the obsessive-compulsive community. But they had to be selective and stay away from the ones whose entire houses are filled to the ceiling with garbage bags of their own hair. Then they most likely found some cult guru living in a remote Lego ashram south of Pueblo with nineteen wives, offered him unlimited plastic blocks and said, ‘Knock yourself out.
”
”
Tim Dorsey (Tiger Shrimp Tango (Serge Storms #17))
“
The Princess attitude to food isn’t about obsessively scraping the oil off your salad, saying no to crème brûlée and taking a little snack bag of spinach everywhere you go. I truly believe it’s more important to consciously choose what you’re going to eat and enjoy every bite – even if it’s a gooey chocolate cake with extra sugary sprinkles – than to make a healthy diet such a burden that your life stretches out in front of you as a joyless, never-ending round of wafer snack breads. (Let’s face it, chocolate is a divine gift to us all and should be appreciated for the mood-altering drug that it is.)
”
”
Rosie Blythe (The Princess Guide to Life)
“
When he was very young, Auberon had begun a collection of postmarks. On a trip with Doc to the post office in Meadowbrook, he had begun idly examining the wastebaskets, having nothing else to do, and had immediately come up with two treasures: envelopes from places that seemed fantastically distant to him, and looking remarkably crisp for having come so far.
It soon developed into a small passion, like Lily's for bird's nests. He insisted on accompanying whoever was traveling near a post office; he conned his friends' mail; he gloated over distant cities, far states whose names began with I, and, rarest of all, names from across the sea.
Then one day Joy Flowers, whose granddaughter had lived abroad for a year, gave him a fat brown bag full of envelopes sent her from every part of the world. He could hardly find on the map a place which had not stamped its name on one of these pieces of blue flimsy. Some of them came from places so distant they weren't even in the alphabet he knew. And at a stroke his collection was complete, and his pleasure in it over. No discovery he could make in Meadowbrook's post office could add to it. He never looked at it again.
”
”
John Crowley (Little, Big)
“
Having become—with the passage of time—the anthropologist of my own experience, I have no wish to disparage those obsessive souls who bring back crockery, artifacts, and utensils from distant lands and put them on display for us, the better to understand the lives of others and our own. Nevertheless, I would caution against paying too much attention to the objects and relics of “first love,” for these might distract the viewer from the depth of compassion and gratitude that now arose between us. So it is precisely to illustrate the solicitude in the caresses that my eighteen-year-old lover bestowed upon my thirty-year-old skin as we lay quietly in this room in each other’s arms, that I have chosen to exhibit this floral batiste handkerchief, which she had folded so carefully and put in her bag that day but never removed. Let this crystal inkwell and pen set belonging to my mother that Füsun toyed with that afternoon, noticing it on the table while she was smoking a cigarette, be a relic of the refinement and the fragile tenderness we felt for each other. Let this belt whose oversize buckles that I had seized and fastened with a masculine arrogance that I felt so guilty for afterwards bear witness to our melancholy as we covered our nakedness and cast our eyes about the filth of the world once again.
”
”
Orhan Pamuk (The Museum of Innocence)
“
Bring the mind back. Try again. Don’t look away. What do I spy now? Heavy bags under my eyes, saggy, slightly puffy, baggage from my dad. I first started noticing them in my late thirties and they horrified me. I didn’t want to look like my dad. Didn’t want to see his reproachful, drooping, disappointing gaze staring back at me every time I looked in the mirror. But there was nothing I could do about it. The bags were there. They were the most conspicuous part of my face. It’s possible no one else noticed them but I couldn’t look at my face and not see them. I think I started wearing thick-frame glasses around then. Twenty-four minutes, thirty-two seconds. Strange. I just realized I haven’t paid much attention to the bags for several years now. I mean, I see them when I look, but I don’t obsess about them anymore. What’s changed? Certainly not the bags themselves. If anything, they’ve only gotten worse. Have I just gotten used to them? Or is it that my feelings about my dad have changed? He’s been dead for more than fifteen years now. The grief and anguish I felt at his death have softened. And when I see his eyes in mine, I don’t see reproach or disappointment anymore. Instead of judgment, I see concern, watchfulness, maybe even a kind of compassionate discernment. So, this is better, an improvement. I don’t mind meeting him here in the mirror. It’s kinda nice. Hey, dad, how you doing?
”
”
Ruth Ozeki (Timecode of a Face)
“
There is no fault that can’t be corrected [in natural wine] with one powder or another; no feature that can’t be engineered from a bottle, box, or bag. Wine too tannic? Fine it with Ovo-Pure (powdered egg whites), isinglass (granulate from fish bladders), gelatin (often derived from cow bones and pigskins), or if it’s a white, strip out pesky proteins that cause haziness with Puri-Bent (bentonite clay, the ingredient in kitty litter). Not tannic enough? Replace $1,000 barrels with a bag of oak chips (small wood nuggets toasted for flavor), “tank planks” (long oak staves), oak dust (what it sounds like), or a few drops of liquid oak tannin (pick between “mocha” and “vanilla”). Or simulate the texture of barrel-aged wines with powdered tannin, then double what you charge. (““Typically, the $8 to $12 bottle can be brought up to $15 to $20 per bottle because it gives you more of a barrel quality. . . . You’re dressing it up,” a sales rep explained.)
Wine too thin? Build fullness in the mouth with gum arabic (an ingredient also found in frosting and watercolor paint). Too frothy? Add a few drops of antifoaming agent (food-grade silicone oil). Cut acidity with potassium carbonate (a white salt) or calcium carbonate (chalk). Crank it up again with a bag of tartaric acid (aka cream of tartar). Increase alcohol by mixing the pressed grape must with sugary grape concentrate, or just add sugar. Decrease alcohol with ConeTech’s spinning cone, or Vinovation’s reverse-osmosis machine, or water. Fake an aged Bordeaux with Lesaffre’s yeast and yeast derivative. Boost “fresh butter” and “honey” aromas by ordering the CY3079 designer yeast from a catalog, or go for “cherry-cola” with the Rhône 2226. Or just ask the “Yeast Whisperer,” a man with thick sideburns at the Lallemand stand, for the best yeast to meet your “stylistic goals.” (For a Sauvignon Blanc with citrus aromas, use the Uvaferm SVG. For pear and melon, do Lalvin Ba11. For passion fruit, add Vitilevure Elixir.) Kill off microbes with Velcorin (just be careful, because it’s toxic). And preserve the whole thing with sulfur dioxide.
When it’s all over, if you still don’t like the wine, just add a few drops of Mega Purple—thick grape-juice concentrate that’s been called a “magical potion.” It can plump up a wine, make it sweeter on the finish, add richer color, cover up greenness, mask the horsey stink of Brett, and make fruit flavors pop. No one will admit to using it, but it ends up in an estimated 25 million bottles of red each year. “Virtually everyone is using it,” the president of a Monterey County winery confided to Wines and Vines magazine. “In just about every wine up to $20 a bottle anyway, but maybe not as much over that.
”
”
Bianca Bosker (Cork Dork: A Wine-Fueled Adventure Among the Obsessive Sommeliers, Big Bottle Hunters, and Rogue Scientists Who Taught Me to Live for Taste)
“
Joan felt that she would always be haunted and would always suffer that pang for Kells. She would never lie down in the peace and quiet of her home, wherever that might be, without picturing Kells, dark and forbidding and burdened, pacing some lonely cabin or riding a lonely trail or lying with his brooding face upturned to the lonely stars. Sooner or later he would meet his doom. It was inevitable. She pictured over that sinister scene of the dangling forms; but no — Kells would never end that way. Terrible as he was, he had not been born to be hanged. He might be murdered in his sleep, by one of that band of traitors who were traitors because in the nature of evil they had to be. But more likely some gambling-hell, with gold and life at stake, would see his last fight. These bandits stole gold and gambled among themselves and fought. And that fight which finished Kells must necessarily be a terrible one. She seemed to see into a lonely cabin where a log fire burned low and lamps flickered and blue smoke floated in veils and men lay prone on the floor — Kells, stark and bloody, and the giant Gulden, dead at last and more terrible in death, and on the rude table bags of gold and dull, shining heaps of gold, and scattered on the floor, like streams of sand and useless as sand, dust of gold — the Destroyer.
ZANE GREY. THE BORDER LEGION (Kindle Locations 4367-4376).
”
”
Zane Grey (The Border Legion)
“
Here is your sign, your omen, Earthling!” said Ra.
He suddenly was holding a big clear bag full of golden coins. He turned it upside down and emptied it. The golden coins changed first to dust and then to nothing.
“You see, the subject of your obsession changed to dust. In the true reality, money means nothing.
”
”
Jozef Simkovic (How to Kiss the Universe: An Inspirational Spiritual and Metaphysical Narrative about Human Origin, Essence and Destiny)
“
That afternoon was the first time I felt... I don't know how to describe it exactly. My head was in Dad's lap and all the happiness that I'd missed was being compressed into that moment. I looked up at him and I was no longer me. I was Mom, but not as I knew her. This wasn't her forcing her darkness on me, like a bag over my head. No, this was something else. I'd become Mom from many years ago. Dad felt it too, I could tell. Maybe it would have lasted longer if not for Edie, talking and talking, pressing and pressing. She wanted to take me back to the other mother. The one in the mental hospital who needed me brought to her, tied and quartered, like a sacrifice.
”
”
Katya Apekina (The Deeper the Water the Uglier the Fish)
“
Kiss. It sounds like such a small word for what just happened. Sweet Zoey rubbed her body against mine and got off on it. She used me for her pleasure, and fuck if it wasn’t the hottest thing I’ve ever done in my life. Dry humping her against a wall is better than any sex I’ve ever had with other women, and all I can think about is how fucking good it’s going to be when I get inside her.
No.
I’ve got to distance myself. I can’t get clouded again. I don’t know if I can keep away from her. Which is probably why I should. She needs to be protected, and I obviously can’t do that while I’m with her.
''After you, cupcake.”
To my surprise, she reaches out and squeezes my ass as she walks by.
“Just wondering what it felt like. Okay, let’s go.”
Smiling and shaking my head, I grab her bags. This is going to be interesting, to say the least.
”
”
Alexa Riley (Guarding His Obsession)
“
He sat the medical bag next to him on the couch and placed his hands under my wrist and lifted them. He leveled my wrist and hands near our eye level. “Because of this shit. I promised you at least your well-being. Marks and bruises are going to happen, but I try to never break the skin and you didn’t ask for this.” My wrists were red and raw from being cuffed, but I was fine.
”
”
Keta Kendric (Twisted Obsession (Twisted Minds, #4))
“
Neurodivergent Checklist Time Blindness: Many neurodivergent people have trouble properly perceiving time as it passes. It either goes by too quickly or slowly. The perception of time depends on the level of stimulation the neurodivergent person is dealing with. It also can vary depending on what you’re focused on. If you’ve ever found yourself unable to account for time, you may be neurodivergent. Executive Dysfunction: This is what you experience when you want to accomplish a task, but despite how hard you try, you cannot see it through. Executive dysfunction happens for various reasons, depending on the type of neurodivergence in question. Still, the point is that this is a common occurrence in neurodivergent people. Task Multiplication: What is task multiplication? It happens when you set off to accomplish one thing but have to do a million other things, even though that wasn’t your original plan. For instance, you may want to sit down to finish some writing, only to notice water on the floor. You get up to grab a mop, and on the way, you notice the laundry you were supposed to drop off at the dry cleaners. Stooping to pick up the bag, you find yourself at eye level with your journal and remember you were supposed to make an entry the previous day, so you’re going to do that now. On and on it goes. Inconsistent Sleep Habits: This depends on what sort of neurodivergence you’re dealing with and if you’ve got comorbid disorders. Most importantly, neurodivergent people sleep more or less than “regular” people. You may also notice that your sleep habits fluctuate a lot. Sometimes you may sleep for eight hours at a stretch for a week, only to suddenly start running on just three hours of sleep. Emotional Dysregulation: With many neurodivergent people, it’s hard to keep emotions in check. Emotional dysregulation occurs in extreme emotions, sudden mood swings, or inappropriate emotional reactions (either not responding to the degree they should or overreacting). Hyperfixation: This also plays out differently depending on the brand of neurodivergence in question. Often, neurodivergent people get very involved in topics or hobbies to the point of what others may think of as obsession. Picking Up on Subtleties but Missing the Obvious: Neurodivergent people may struggle with picking up on things neurotypical people can see easily. At the same time, they are incredibly adept at noticing the subtle things everyone else misses. Sensory Sensitivities: If you’re neurodivergent, you may be unable to ignore your clothes tag scratching your back, have trouble hearing certain sounds, and can’t quite deal with certain textures of clothing, food, and so on. Rejection Sensitivity: Neurodivergent people are often more sensitive to rejection than others due to neurological differences and life experiences. For instance, children with ADHD get much more negative feedback than their peers without ADHD. Neurodivergent people are often rejected to the point where they notice rejection even when it’s not there.
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Instant Relief (Neurodivergent Friendly DBT Workbook: Coping Skills for Anger, Anxiety, Depression, Panic, Stress. Embrace Emotional Wellbeing to Thrive with Autism, ADHD, Dyslexia and Other Brain Differences)
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I was able to get the audiobook for I’ll Be Gone in the Dark through my library app, so I was kind of working. If not working, then growing spiritually at least, which was what always seemed to happen as I followed Michelle McNamara down her obsession with the Golden State Killer. Some people had Eat, Pray, Love. I had I’ll Be Gone in the Dark. I was right at the part where she revealed the origin of the title of the book—a bone-chillingly creepy moment, if ever there was one—and trying to carry two large garbage bags out of the house.
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Alicia Thompson (Love in the Time of Serial Killers)
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Show me your tits, Aspen, and I won’t piss on your backpack.” He points to the bag at his feet. “Clock’s ticking…
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S. Massery (Devious Obsession)
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When he returns with my bag, he holds it toward me. “You don’t have much in there.”
“Yeah, some asshole cut up most of my clothes.”
“Maybe it was an asshole who didn’t want you parading around like a whore.
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Lauren Biel (Driving My Obsession (Ride or Die Romances))
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Professor Peter Cohen, a friend of Bruce’s, writes that we should stop using the word “addiction” altogether and shift to a new word: “bonding.”28 Human beings need to bond. It is one of our most primal urges. So if we can’t bond with other people, we will find a behavior to bond with, whether it’s watching pornography or smoking crack or gambling. If the only bond you can find that gives you relief or meaning is with splayed women on a computer screen or bags of crystal or a roulette wheel, you will return to that bond obsessively. One recovering heroin and crack addict on the Downtown Eastside, Dean Wilson, put it to me simply. “Addiction,” he said, “is a disease of loneliness.
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Johann Hari (Chasing the Scream: The First and Last Days of the War on Drugs)
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Grilled Chicken Wings with Burnt-Scallion Barbeque Sauce ____________ Makes 12 pieces I am borderline obsessed with chicken wings. It’s the perfect food after a long work shift or on a chill day with your friends, crushin’ cheap American beers in the backyard. It’s food that allows you to let your guard down. After all, you’re eating food cooked on the bone with your hands and licking the sauce from your fingers in between chugs of ice-cold beer. Pure heaven. Note that the wings must be brined overnight. Brine 8 cups water ¼ cup kosher salt 1 tablespoon sorghum (see Resources) Wings 6 chicken wings, cut into tips and drumettes 3 tablespoons green peanut oil (see Resources) 1 tablespoon Husk BBQ Rub ¾ cup thinly sliced scallions (white and green in equal parts) ½ cup dry-roasted peanuts, preferably Virginia peanuts, chopped Sauce 10 scallions, trimmed 1 tablespoon peanut oil Kosher salt 1 cup Husk BBQ Sauce 1 tablespoon Bourbon Barrel Foods Bluegrass Soy Sauce (see Resources) 1 cup cilantro leaves Equipment 1 pound hickory chips Charcoal chimney starter 3 pounds hardwood charcoal Kettle grill For the brine: Combine the ingredients for the brine. I brine the wings using either a heavy-duty plastic bag that the wing tips can’t puncture or a Cryovac machine (you use a lot less brine this way). Place the wings in the brine and turn to cover well. Refrigerate overnight. Soak the wood chips in water for a minimum of 30 minutes but preferably overnight. For the sauce: Toss the scallions in the peanut oil and season with salt. Lay them out on the grill rack and heavily char them on one side, about 8 minutes (the charred side should be black). Remove them from the grill and cool for about 5 minutes. Clean the grill rack if necessary. Put the scallions and the remaining sauce ingredients in a blender and process until smooth, about 3 minutes. Set aside at room temperature. For the wings: Fill a chimney starter with 3 pounds hardwood charcoal, ignite the charcoal, and allow to burn until the coals are evenly lit and glowing. Distribute the coals in an even layer in the bottom of a kettle grill. Place the grill rack as close to the coals as possible. Drain the wings; discard the brine. Dry the wings with paper towels, toss in the peanut oil, and season with the BBQ rub. Place the wings in a single layer on the grill rack over the hot coals and grill until they don’t stick to the rack anymore, about 5 minutes. Turn the wings over and grill for 8 minutes more. Transfer the wings to a baking sheet. Drain the wood chips. Lift the rack from the grill and push the coals to one side. Place the wood chips on the coals and replace the rack. After about 2 minutes, place the wings in a single layer over the side of the grill where there are no coals. Place the lid on the grill, with the lid’s vents slightly open; the vents on the bottom of the grill should stay closed. Smoke the wings for 10 minutes. It’s important to monitor the airflow of the grill: keeping the lid’s vents slightly open allows a nice steady flow of subtle smoke. Remove the wings from the grill, toss them in the sauce, and place them on a platter or in a serving pan. Top with the chopped scallions and peanuts and serve.
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Sean Brock (Heritage)
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(Sherly Hutomo, lajang, 27 th. Karyawati swasta. Iphone - checked, veganisme early stages - checked, morning starbucks - checked, 5k run - checked, nike running shoes - checked, connoisseur - checked, urban culinary specialist - checked, gym membership - checked, workout obsessed - checked, supplement junkie - checked, socmed savvy - checked, eat healthy food - checked, zumba class - checked, avid traveller and hip resto pilgrim- checked, fancy bag - checked, edgy yet sophisticated - checked. casual drinker - checked.)
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Ayudhia Virga
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Since Paul wasn’t a big conversationalist—he was the anti-Mac, in other words, and today had been the longest she’d ever heard him speak in consecutive sentences—Jena watched the scenery for a while. Then she decided to study the inside of Paul’s truck to see what she could learn about him.
Technically, it was exactly like hers and Gentry’s. It had a black exterior with a blue light bar across the top and the Louisiana Department of Wildlife and Fisheries Enforcement Division logo on the doors.
It was tech heavy on the front dash, just like theirs, with LDWF, Terrebonne Parish Sheriff’s Office, and Louisiana State Police Troop C radios, a laptop, a GPS unit, and a weather unit.
In her truck and in Gentry’s, the cords and wires were a colorful tangle of plastic and metal, usually with extra plugs dangling around like vines. Paul’s cords were all black, and he had them woven in pairs and tucked underneath the dash, where they neatly disappeared.
She leaned over to see how he’d achieved such a thing, and noticed identical zip ties holding them in place.
“Sinclair, I hate to ask, but what are you doing?”
He sounded more bemused than annoyed, so she said, “I’m psychoanalyzing you based on the interior of your truck.”
He almost ran off the road. “Why?”
“Your scintillating conversation was putting me to sleep.”
His dark brows knit together but he seemed to have no answer to that.
She turned around in her seat, as much as the seat belt allowed, and continued her study. Paul had a 12-gauge shotgun and a .223 carbine mounted right behind the driver’s seat, same as in her own truck. The mounts had hidden release buttons so the agents could get the guns out one-handed and quickly.
But where her truck had a catch-all supply of stuff, from paper towels to zip ties to evidence bags to fast-food wrappers thrown in the back, Paul’s backseat was empty but for a zippered storage container normal people used for shoes. Each space held different things, all neatly arranged. Jena spotted evidence bags in one. Zip ties in another. Notebooks. Citation books. Paperwork. A spare uniform hung over one window, with a dry-cleaner’s tag dangling from the shirt’s top button.
Good Lord. She turned back around.
“What did you learn?” Paul finally asked.
“You’re an obsessive-compulsive neat freak,” she said. “Accent on freak.
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Susannah Sandlin (Black Diamond (Wilds of the Bayou, #2))
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I hate malls. Hundreds of repulsive people milling about with their dumb faces and their sick obsession with scoring a buyer’s high. They fill up their shopping bags with rubbish they don’t need all while emptying their already pathetically low bank accounts.
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Sarah Noffke (God's Little Monster (Ren #2))
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Pieter Breugel the Elder's engraving, The Battle of Money Bags and Strong Boxes depicts obsessive, destructive pernicious human greed. Prints of it by Volcxken Diercx's Four Winds Press in Antwerp were among Ophelia's favorites when she was the widow Diercx's house guest.
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Umberto Tosi (Ophelia Rising: "...we know what we are, but know not what we may be")
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And of course anyone who could see him here now, with his fever and his sleeping bags, his eyephones and his cellular data port and his bottle of cooling piss, would think he was crazy too. But he isn’t. He knows he isn’t, in spite of everything. He has the syndrome now, the thing that came after every test subject from that Gainesville orphanage, but he isn’t crazy. Just obsessed. And the obsession has its own shape in his head, its own texture, its own weight. He knows it from himself, can differentiate, so he goes back to it whenever he needs to and checks on it. Monitors it. Makes sure it still isn’t him. It reminds him of having a sore tooth, or the way he felt once when he was in love and didn’t want to be. How his tongue always found the tooth, or how he’d always find that ache, that absence in the shape of the beloved. But
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William Gibson (All Tomorrow's Parties (Bridge, #3))
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I’m never leaving you. You are my love. My fucking obsession. And the next time you leave me, we’ll go in body bags together. I fucking promise you.
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K.G. Reuss (Ashes (The Boys of Chapel Crest, #2))
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Dearly beloved, we’re gathered here today – um – I don’t actually know how that’s supposed to go. Let me start over.” I took a deep breath. “The life of a wild animal, even a little Tilikum squirrel, is hard and fraught with danger. Although this small creature met its end, we appreciate its role in nature. May it rest in a land of abundant nuts.” Josiah cracked a smile. I about died right there. I didn’t even care that he was smiling at an unintended nuts joke like a twelve-year-old boy. That smile could be my undoing. “Go ahead and put it in its final resting place.” He tossed the bag into the dumpster.
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Claire Kingsley (Obsession Falls (The Haven Brothers, #1))
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She climbs the pole and hangs on by her thighs as she reaches back and unclips her bra, exposing one of the worst boob jobs I’ve ever seen. Puckered skin surrounds two huge bags of saline.
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Lauren Biel (Driving My Obsession (Ride or Die Romances))
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When I was outside waiting for Mom and kicking the ball as hard as I could into the net, I wasn't thinking about being in Marjorie's room with everyone else including the new doctor. Instead, I obsessed over Father Wanderly's trouble comment. I imagined being at a playground and handing out little black bags to all the kids, not just the boys. They opened them and found little hard candies inside, each poisoned with trouble.
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Paul Tremblay (A Head Full of Ghosts)
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For iron and pep, I wanted to make a cold lentil salad with a zingy orange-ginger vinaigrette, handfuls of chopped herbs, and slices of white peach. (The purple-green Puy lentils, more common than the orange ones in France, just seemed too dark for a summer salad.) After unpacking half the kitchen while standing, against my better judgement, on a kitchen chair, I ended up not with orange lentils, but with a bag of yellow split peas. That would have to do.
The split peas had been hiding up there for a while--- I'm pretty sure I bought them after a trip to Puglia, where we were served warm split-pea puree drizzled with wonderful glass-green olive oil and a grind of fresh pepper. Still hankering after a cold salad, I tried cooking the dried peas al dente, as I would the lentils, but a half hour later, where the lentils would have been perfect, the split peas were a chalky, starchy mess. I decided to boil on past defeat and transform my salad into the silky puree I'd eaten with such gusto in Italy.
When the peas were sweet and tender and the liquid almost absorbed, I got out the power tools. I'm deeply attached to my hand blender--- the dainty equivalent of a serial killer's obsession with chain saws. The orange-ginger vinaigrette was already made, so I dumped it in. The recipe's necessary dose of olive oil would have some lively company.
The result was a warm, golden puree with just enough citrus to deviate from the classic. I toasted some pain Poilâne, slathered the bread with the puree, and chopped some dill. My tartines were still lacking a bit of sunshine, so I placed a slice of white peach on top.
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Elizabeth Bard (Picnic in Provence: A Memoir with Recipes)
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Is Israel really the biggest, baddest wolf on the block? Heck no. Even if you put every single one of Israel’s mistakes under a microscope, they still wouldn’t come close to those of many other countries around the world. In Saudi Arabia, Chop Square is literally a place for weekly public decapitations. In Dubai, the working class are literal slaves. In China, disappearances are normal and Muslims are being tracked and put into camps. In Turkey, journalists and activists are imprisoned and killed. In Iran, LGBTQ+ people are executed. In Syria, the government uses chemical weapons against its own people. In Russia, there is arbitrary detention, and worse. In Myanmar, the army is massacring the Rohingya Muslim population. In Brunei, Sharia law was just enacted. In North Korea—no description needed. All over the world, millions of people are dying because of tyrannical leaders, civil wars, and unimaginable atrocities. But you don’t see passionate picket lines against Dubai or Turkey or even Russia. The one country that’s consistently singled out is… Israel. The UN has stated values of human dignity, equal rights, and economic and social advancement that are indeed fantastic, and they are the values upon which Israel was established and is operating. The sting is it that countries that certainly do not adhere to some or any of these values are often the ones who criticize Israel while keeping a straight face. “Look over there!” those leaders say, so the world will not look at their backyards and see their own gross human rights violations. All this led to a disproportionate number of UN resolutions against the only Jewish state and the only democracy in the Middle East. Israel is an easy punching bag, but this obsession over one country only is being used to deflect time and energy away from any real discussion of human rights in the world’s actual murderous regimes. And Israelis aren’t the only ones who have noticed this disproportionate censorship. The United States uses its veto power to shut down almost every Security Council resolution against Israel, and it does this not because of “powerful lobbies” (sorry to burst your bubble). The reason the US shuts down most of these resolutions is because the US gets it. In a closed-door meeting of the Security Council in 2002, former US ambassador to the UN John Negroponte is said to have stated that the US will oppose every UN resolution against Israel that does not also include: condemnation of terrorism and incitement to terrorism, condemnation of various terrorist groups such as Hamas and the Islamic Jihad, and a demand for improvement of security for Israel as a condition for Israeli withdrawal from territories. If a resolution doesn’t include this basic and rational language, the US will veto it. And it did and it does, thank the good Lord, in what we know today as the Negroponte Doctrine.
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Noa Tishby (Israel: A Simple Guide to the Most Misunderstood Country on Earth)
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hearing Kyuri’s stories, watching her drink to oblivion every weekend, obsessing over her face and her body and her clothes and her bags. I take photos of her and her things whenever I can. I will need them to remember her by.
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Frances Cha (If I Had Your Face)
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am spoon-feeding the muse that lives in a well deep inside of my brain—hearing Kyuri’s stories, watching her drink to oblivion every weekend, obsessing over her face and her body and her clothes and her bags. I take photos of her and her things whenever I can. I will need them to remember her by.
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Frances Cha (If I Had Your Face)
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They might poke fun at them, like the batty socialite who brought her wine sloshing in a Ziploc bag to Jean-Georges, thinking no cork meant no corkage fee.
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Bianca Bosker (Cork Dork: A Wine-Fueled Adventure Among the Obsessive Sommeliers, Big Bottle Hunters, and Rogue Scientists Who Taught Me to Live for Taste)
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But being an obsessive knitter didn’t make someone a murderer, even if she did carry around a bag full of pointy sticks everywhere she went.
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Madeline Kirby (Not a Werewolf (Jake & Boo, #1))
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What is it with these people? They are more obsessed with me finding a girlfriend than I am.
"He's concentrating on his studies," says Mum proudly.
"Ah," says Mr Coles. "I should've done that, but at his age I was out on the town, living it up. Best days of my life, they were."
"Oh yes, mine too," says Mum with a weird twinkle in her eye.
I wonder how easy it is to kill two people with a screwdriver and a bag of half-frozen peas.
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J.A. Buckle (Half My Facebook Friends Are Ferrets)
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I wanted you to use me, you malign, double-crossing, corpse-obsessed bag of bones, you broken, used-up shithead! I wanted you to live and not die, you imaginary-girlfriend-having asshole! Fuck one flesh, one end, Harrow. I already gave my flesh to you, and I already gave you my end. I gave you my sword. I gave you myself. I did it while knowing I’d do it all again, without hesitation, because all I ever wanted you to do was eat me.
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Tamsyn Muir (Harrow the Ninth (The Locked Tomb, #2))
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(there’s something creepy about any repeating dream, I think, about knowing your subconscious is digging obsessively at some object that won’t be dislodged),
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Stephen King (Bag of Bones)