Notch Quotes

I pull an arrow, whip the notch into place, and am about to let it fly when I'm stopped by the sight of Finnick kissing Peeta. And it's so bizarre, even for Finnick.

If only you could talk to girls in equations.” There was a long silence, and then, eyes trained on the notch they’d created in the link, Wylan said, “Just girls?” Jesper restrained a grin. “No. Not just girls.

Ash is going to kick your ass, Daemon." Daemon's grin went up a notch. "Nah, she likes my ass too much for that.

Life sometimes gets so bogged down in the details, you forget you are living it. There is always another appointment to be met, another bill to pay, another symptom presenting, another uneventful day to be notched onto the wooden wall. We have synchronized our watches, studied our calendars, existed in minutes, and completely forgotten to step back and see what we've accomplished.

Your self esteem is like a notch below Kafka's.

The simple things come back to us. They rest for a moment by our ribcages then suddenly reach in and twist our hearts a notch backward.

What do you like?" "Music. Numbers. Equations. They're not like words. They ... they don't get mixed up." "If only you could talk to girls in equations." There was a long silence, and then, eyes trained on the notch they'd created in the link, Wylan said, "Just girls?" Jesper restrained a grin. "No. Not just girls." It really was a shame they were all probably going to die tonight.

The tension between us kicked up a notch, and I realized that along with our bodies being nearer, so were our lips.

What do you like?' 'Music. Numbers. Equations. They're not like words. They...they don't get mixed up.' 'If only you could talk to girls in equations.' There was a long silence, and then, eyes trained on the notch they'd created in the link, Wylan said, 'Just girls?' Jesper restrained a grin. 'No, not just girls.

The secret of being a top-notch con man is being able to know what the mark wants, and how to make him think he's getting it.

A good compilation tape, like breaking up, is hard to do. You've got to kick off with a corker, to hold the attention (I started with 'Got To Get You Off My Mind', but then realised that she might not get any further than track one, side one if I delivered what she wanted straight away, so I buried it in the middle of side two), and then you've got to up it a notch, and you can't have white music and black music together, unless the white music sounds like black music, and you can't have two tracks by the same artist side by side, unless you've done the whole thing in pairs, and ... oh there are loads of rules.

In any weather, at any hour of the day or night, I have been anxious to improve the nick of time, and notch it on my stick too; to stand on the meeting of two eternities, the past and the future, which is precisely the present moment; to toe that line. You will pardon some obscurities, for there are more secrets in my trade than in most men's, and yet not voluntarily kept, but inseparable from its very nature.

She had a passion for anyone who did something top-notch.

All those other girls are cake...I'm Crème brûlée...Tiramisu, if you will. Just a few notches above.

Back off, perv! I have a black belt in taekwondo and I will fuck you up if you take another step toward me.” Chase raised his hands in surrender, trying really, really hard to keep his eyes on hers. “Whoa, there, crouching tiger. Let’s just take this down a notch.

If someone called me chubby, it would no longer be something that kept me up late at night. Being called fat is not like being called stupid or unfunny, which is the worst thing you could ever say to me. Do I envy Jennifer Hudson for being able to lose all that weight and look smokin’ hot? Of course, yes. Do I sometimes look at Gisele Bundchen and wonder how awesome life would be if I never had to wear Spanx? Duh, of course. That’s kind of the point of Gisele Bundchen. And maybe I will, once or twice, for a very short period of time. But on the list of things I want to do in my lifetime, that’s not near the top. I mean, it’s not near the bottom either. I’d say it’s right above “Learn to drive a vespa,” but several notches below “film a chase scene for a movie.

You want me to list characteristics of a … ?” “Potential mate, yes, that would be helpful..." Without meaning to, I looked sideways at Patch. He was eased back in his seat, one notch above a slouch, studying me with satisfaction. He flashed his pirate smile and mouthed, We’re waiting. I stacked my hands on the table, hoping I lookedmore composed than I felt. “I’ve never thought about it before.” “Well, think fast.” “Could you call on someone else first?” Coach gestured impatiently to my left. “You’re up, Patch.” Unlike me, Patch spoke with confidence. He had himself positioned so his body was angled slightly toward mine, our knees mere inches apart. “Intelligent. Attractive. Vulnerable

Jamie," I panted. He pushed his kilt out of the way and pressed my hand against him. "Bloody Christ," I said, impressed despite myself. My sense of propriety slipped another notch. "Fighting gives ye a terrible cockstand, after. Ye want me, do ye no?

Helen was beautiful in the way a supercomputer was beautiful: sleek with elegant but utilitarian styling, full of top-notch technological know-how, far too expensive for most people to possess.

He smirks and cranks his glorious smile up another notch so it’s in full HD IMAX.

I don't like the idea of killing people, either. I don't even like chemistry." "What do you like?" "Music. Numbers. Equations. They're not like words. They ... they don't get mixed up." "If only you could talk to girls in equations." There was a long silence, and then, eyes trained on the notch they'd created in the link, Wylan said, "Just girls?" Jesper restrained a grin. "No. Not just girls." It really was a shame they were all probably going to die tonight.

I wanted to tell them that, in Kabul, we snapped a tree branch and used it as a credit card. Hassan and I would take the wooden stick to the bread maker. He'd carve notches on our stick with his knife, one notch for each loaf of naan he'd pull for us from the tandoor's roaring flames. At the end of the month, my father paid him for the number of notches on the stick. That was it. No questions. No ID.

What a company I ended up with,’ Geralt continued, shaking his head. ‘Brothers in arms! A team of heroes! What have I done to deserve it? A poetaster with a lute. A wild and lippy half-dryad, half-woman. A vampire, who’s about to notch up his fifth century. And a bloody Nilfgaardian who insists he isn’t a Nilfgaardian.

Scarlet cocked her head. “Are you sure you don’t want me to go? It’s going to require some precise manuvering to attach to the docking clamp, and from what Cinder told me about your flying skills…” “What do you mean? What did Cinder say about my flying skills?” Scarlet and Cinder shared a look. “Naturally, she told me that you’re a fantastic pilot,” said Scarlet, “Absolutely top-notch.” “I think she was practicing her sarcasm,” said Iko. Thorne glared, but Cinder only shrugged.

As the clockwork of the millennia moved a notch in front of their eyes, it had taken their thoughts from small things and reminded them of how vulnerable they were to time.

I hope one of those books is a primer on etiquette. You seriously need a refresher.” “You’re not queen yet, Eadlyn. Take it down a notch.” He walked away, and I was furious with myself for not getting the last word.

we left about midnight and walked down the hill in silence. the night was muggy, and all around me i felt the same pressure, a sense of time rushing by while it seemed to be standing still. whenever i thought of time in puerto rico, i was reminded of those old magnetic clocks that hung on the walls of my classrooms in high school. every now and then a hand would not move for several minutes -- and if i watched it long enough, wondering if it had finally broken down, the sudden click of the hand jumping three for four notches would startle me when it came.

Oh, hell, no. I saw you with the rifle.” He glanced over at her, and his voice went a notch deeper. “It was fucking hot. I love a badass female.

Our bodies are not toys for you to play with. They are not pieces in a game for you to manipulate and trick. We are not notches on your bedposts.

Insight: if a guy I had sex with ever carved a notch into his bedpost, I’d tell him to carve one into mine too—and then to go make me a fucking sammich.

The notches go all the way to the buckle,” I point out. “I’m flattered, but my waist isn’t that small.” Noah leans in, whispering, “But your wrists are.

You are innocent? Man, you really have a twisted view of this world. Tell you what? You are no saint either. You too are guilty. And you too are a sinner. Just like me. We both are going to Hell. But my place there will be a notch above yours.

Did you really just invite Adrian to your room later?" asked Lissa. Avery shrugged. "I don't know. Maybe. Sometimes we hang out once you guys are all tucked into bed. You aren't going to get jealous, are you?" "No," laughed Lissa. "Just curious. Adrian's a good guy." "Oh?" asked Christian. "Define 'good'." Avery held up her hand and began ticking items off with each finger. "He's devastatingly handsome, funny, rich, related to the queen..." "You got your wedding colors picked out?" asked Lissa, still laughing. "Not yet," said Avery. "I'm still testing the waters. I figured he'd be an easy notch on the Avery Lazar belt, but he's kind of hard to read." "I really don't want to be hearing this," Christian said.

I’m crazy about this City. Daylight slants like a razor cutting the buildings in half. In the top half I see looking faces and it’s not easy to tell which are people, which the work of stonemasons. Below is shadow where any blasé thing takes place: clarinets and lovemaking, fists and the voices of sorrowful women. A city like this one makes me dream tall and feel in on things. Hep. It’s the bright steel rocking above the shade below that does it. When I look over strips of green grass lining the river, at church steeples and into the cream-and-copper halls of apartment buildings, I’m strong. Alone, yes, but top-notch and indestructible-like the City in 1926 when all the wars are over and there will never be another one. The people down there in the shadow are happy about that. At last, at last, everything’s ahead. The smart ones say so and people listening to them and reading what they write down agree: Here comes the new. Look out.

Ben sighed loudly. “Can you help Tory or not?” Jason’s cool slipped a notch. “If you don’t need anything, why are you here?” “I’m studying jerkoffs in the wild,” Ben answered dryly. “This seemed like a good chance to observe one up close.

It's the ballads I like best, and I'm not talking about the clichéd ones where a diva hits her highest note or a rock band tones it down a couple of notches for the ladies. I mean a true ballad. Dictionary definition: a song that tells a story in short stanzas and simple words, with repetition, refrain, etc. My definition: the punk rocker or the country crooner telling the story of his life in three minutes, reminding us of the numerous ways to screw up.

Well, I appreciate your help, Hunter. But let’s get some things straight right now. I don’t party, I don’t use illicit drugs, and I won’t be a notch in anyone’s headboard.” He choked and sputtered before smiling widely. “Wow. You’ve been reading the daily rumor mill, haven’t you? You’ve already decided what kind of guy I am.

Do you think music has the power to change people? Like you listen to a piece and go through some major change inside?” Oshima nodded.“Sure, that can happen. We have an experience—like a chemical reaction—that transforms something inside us. When we examine ourselves later on, we discover that all the standards we’ve lived by have shot up another notch and the world’s opened up in unexpected ways. Yes, I’ve had that experience. Not often, but it has happened. It’s like falling in love.

He smiled directly into my face for the first time, his dimples notched his cheeks like a pair of speech marks.

You'd been petting a stuffed dog?' she said 'A dead one?' 'It was a really well stuffed dog' I clarified. 'I have seen some bad taxidermy. This was top-notch work. It would have fooled anyone.

Ruthlessness, charm, focus, mental toughness, fearlessness, mindfulness (living in the moment), and action. Who wouldn't, at certain points in their lives, benefit from kicking one or two of them up a notch? What was important was being able to turn them back down.

Why am I doing this, Brynne?” he demanded. “I don’t know, Ethan.” I could barely speak." “Yes you do. Say it, Brynne!” I tensed as an orgasm started to rule me but he immediately reduced the pace, taking it down a notch with slow pulls in and out of my spread sex. “Say what?” I cried, frustrated. “Say the words I have to hear. Say the truth and I’ll let you come.” He speared into me slower and nipped at my bare shoulder with his teeth. “What is the truth?” I was starting to sob now, completely at his mercy. “The truth is,” he grunted the rest on three, hard, punctuating thrusts, “You. Are. Mine!” I inhaled on a cry at the final thrust. He sped up again, fucking faster. “Say it!” he growled. “I’m yours, Ethan!

I feel my face flush with anger. Day in, day out, men are admired for their sexual prowess, for the “conquests” notched upon their bedposts. Whereas women, who dare to do the same, are derided, and, most often, it is other women dishing out the derision.

If you slip far enough out of your life, time picks up. Passes in waves instead of notches. One month rolling by, then another.

Listen, Kitten, we only have room for one drama queen, and that’s me, thank you very much. So take it down a notch, will ya?

To get it all done I have to dim my brain, turn it down by notches like the flat-turn knob on a gas lantern, leaving only a nub of flame.

Nobody is going to open their mouth about it." Realizing my tone was bordering on angry, I brought it down a notch and tried again. "Not the team, Coach, or anyone else. I won't let them." She blinked her confusion. "You won't let them?" "That's right," I confirmed with a nod. "I won't let them." "You promise?" she whispered, a tiny smile pulling at her swollen lips. "Yeah," I replied gruffly, feeling like I would promise all the fucking promises in the world just to make this girl feel better. "I've got your back.

I spent hours putting that cassette together. To me, making a tape is like writing a letter - there's a lot of erasing and rethinking and starting again, and I wanted it to be a good one. . . A good compilation tape, like breaking up, is hard to do. You've got to kick off with a corker, to hold the attention, and then you've got to up it a notch, or cool it a notch. . . oh, there are loads of rules. (pg. 88-9)

I wished God were like He used to be, a few notches lower. I wanted Him to be lofty enough to help me but not so uncontrollable. I longed for His warm presence, times when He seemed more… safe.

As soon as you are born, you're given a name, a religion, a nationality and a race. You spend the rest of your life defining and defending a fictional identity.

If you don't know the whole story, shut up and listen.

My people eat yours,” Larry informed the cat. Medea kneaded his thighs lightly and kicked her purr up a few notches. He gave in and started to pet her.

I would have made her a part of me. If I could, I would have had a notch cut in my already aging side and a slip of her, my young rose, inserted there and lashed to me with twine.

(My greatest human flaw and strength, not surprisingly, is that I can always imagine anything--a marriage, a conversation, a government--as being different from how it is, a trait that might make one a top-notch trial lawyer or novelist or realtor, but that also seems to produce a somewhat less than reliable and morally feasible human being.)

Let me be brutally honest. Being an insider, I know exactly how these MBA guys think. And because I know who they really are, I have nothing but utter contempt for these professionals. Now you might think I am stereotyping and generalizing. Yes, I am, indeed. But get this thing straight. Only highly competitive people prepare for these entrance exams to these top-notch B-schools. Only those who have excessive cupidity for money, power and status, only such people enter these highly reputed management colleges. These people don’t have friends, instead, they have connections. It’s all about Moolah. It’s all about usefulness. You scratch my back, and I will scratch yours. You be my ladder, and I will be yours.

Nobody can defeat me.” “Maybe they can’t,” said a voice, “but I can.” Notch had arrived at last.

The gears of life had moved ahead a notch with a loud ker-chunk, and Junpei knew that they would never turn back again.

The secret of being a top-notch con man is being able to know what the mark wants, and how to make him think he’s getting it. I

I think I'm in love with her.” I hear Rhys tell Bennett, but his voice doesn’t lower even a notch. “And she won’t let me in.

Everyone who’s ever been jealous because it’s my face in the magazines and not theirs. Every person who can’t believe or accept that someone can reach my level of success without being a total prick. Trust me, it’s not the lies that hurt people. It’s the willingness of everyone else to believe them. And then there are those who come out of the woodwork to back your accuser because it gives them the spotlight for three seconds. They can’t stand the fact that you’ve risen above your past and that they have no excuse for never rising above theirs. In their minds, you need to be taken down a notch and they need to be raised a few, off the lies they tell about you. Because in the end, they know you, they’ve seen the real you, and by backing your accusers, they make other people think that maybe they were close to you – at least that’s what they claim. It’s a sick world and I’m disgusted with it. (Aiden)

Love was like notches on a speaker that could be cranked up and down, the decibels of desire, the frequencies of feeling. Sometimes she thought that she might have cranked it all the way up and broken the dial before the music had even started.

Time compresses the older you get. Days turn to weeks turn to months turn to seasons turn to years, until your life resides in just one moment expanding forever, where each step and breath folds wrinkles into your face, carving minute, irreversible wounds between your joints. Pressing down the notches between your spine, driving your ankles and knees to ruin. I feel it now and it’ll only be worse in the future.

After conscientiously tasting fritters every day for a month Lola had put on two pounds! Her little belt bore witness to the disaster, she found herself obliged to move on to the next notch. She burst into tears.

Jon hung a quiver from his belt and pulled an arrow. The shaft was black, the fletching grey. As he notched it to his string, he remembered something that Theon Greyjoy had once said after a hunt. "The boar can keep his tusks and the bear his claws," he had declared, smiling that way he did. "There's nothing half so mortal as a grey goose feather.

Driving around town, I found myself staring down older teenagers and college-aged boys and young men. Any sign or signal less than mindful obedience to the law, to orderly conduct and my rage ticked up one notch higher.

A warm flow of pain was gradually replacing the ice and wood of the anaesthetic in his thawing, still half-dead, abominably martyred mouth. After that, during a few days he was in mourning for an intimate part of himself. It surprised him to realize how fond he had been of his teeth. His tongue, a fat sleek seal, used to flop and slide so happily among the familiar rocks, checking the contours of a battered but still secure kingdom, plunging from cave to cove, climbing this jag, nuzzling that notch, finding a shred of sweet seaweed in the same old cleft; but now not a landmark remained, and all there existed was a great dark wound, a terra incognita of gums which dread and disgust forbade one to investigate. And when the plates were thrust in, it was like a poor fossil skull being fitted with the grinning jaws of a perfect stranger.

Let’s say you have an ax. Just a cheap one, from Home Depot. On one bitter winter day, you use said ax to behead a man. Don’t worry, the man was already dead. Or maybe you should worry, because you’re the one who shot him. He had been a big, twitchy guy with veiny skin stretched over swollen biceps, a tattoo of a swastika on his tongue. Teeth filed into razor-sharp fangs-you know the type. And you’re chopping off his head because, even with eight bullet holes in him, you’re pretty sure he’s about to spring back to his feet and eat the look of terror right off your face. On the follow-through of the last swing, though, the handle of the ax snaps in a spray of splinters. You now have a broken ax. So, after a long night of looking for a place to dump the man and his head, you take a trip into town with your ax. You go to the hardware store, explaining away the dark reddish stains on the broken handle as barbecue sauce. You walk out with a brand-new handle for your ax. The repaired ax sits undisturbed in your garage until the spring when, on one rainy morning, you find in your kitchen a creature that appears to be a foot-long slug with a bulging egg sac on its tail. Its jaws bite one of your forks in half with what seems like very little effort. You grab your trusty ax and chop the thing into several pieces. On the last blow, however, the ax strikes a metal leg of the overturned kitchen table and chips out a notch right in the middle of the blade. Of course, a chipped head means yet another trip to the hardware store. They sell you a brand-new head for your ax. As soon as you get home, you meet the reanimated body of the guy you beheaded earlier. He’s also got a new head, stitched on with what looks like plastic weed-trimmer line, and it’s wearing that unique expression of “you’re the man who killed me last winter” resentment that one so rarely encounters in everyday life. You brandish your ax. The guy takes a long look at the weapon with his squishy, rotting eyes and in a gargly voice he screams, “That’s the same ax that beheaded me!” IS HE RIGHT?

You never cut notches into your boot," he sats his voice back to even and his eyes back to calm. "No,' I agree. "Why?" "No one needs to know," I say. "To know what? How long you've lasted?" Vick asks. "To know anything about me," I say.

To get better at wintering, we need to address our very notion of time. We tend to imagine that our lives are linear, but they are in fact cyclical. I would not, of course, seek to deny that we gradually grow older, but while doing so, we pass through phases of good health and ill, of optimism and deep doubt, of freedom and constraint. There are times when everything seems easy, and times when it all seems impossibly hard. To make that manageable, we just have to remember that our present will one day become a past, and our future will be our present. We know that because it’s happened before. The things we put behind us will often come around again. The things that trouble us now will often come around again. Each time we endure the cycle, we ratchet up a notch. We learn from the last time around, and we do a few things better this time; we develop tricks of the mind to see us through. This is how progress is made. In the meantime, we can deal only with what’s in front of us at this moment in time. We take the next necessary action, and the next. At some point along the line, that next action will feel joyful again.

My entire mind-set about the deed was evolving. Insight: if a guy I had sex with ever carved a notch into his bedpost, I’d tell him to carve one into mine too—and then to go make me a fucking sammich.

For John Dillinger In hope he is still alive Thanksgiving Day, November 28, 1986 In hope he is still alive Thanks for the wild turkey and the Passenger Pigeons, destined to be shit out through wholesome American guts; thanks for a Continent to despoil and poison; thanks for Indians to provide a modicum of challenge and danger; thanks for vast herds of bison to kill and skin, leaving the carcass to rot; thanks for bounties on wolves and coyotes; thanks for the American Dream to vulgarize and falsify until the bare lies shine through; thanks for the KKK; for nigger-killing lawmen feeling their notches; for decent church-going women with their mean, pinched, bitter, evil faces; thanks for Kill a Queer for Christ stickers; thanks for laboratory AIDS; thanks for Prohibition and the War Against Drugs; thanks for a country where nobody is allowed to mind his own business; thanks for a nation of finks—yes, thanks for all the memories all right, lets see your arms; you always were a headache and you always were a bore; thanks for the last and greatest betrayal of the last and greatest of human dreams.

One night I dreamed I was locked in my Father's watch With Ptolemy and twenty-one ruby stars Mounted on spheres and the Primum Mobile Coiled and gleaming to the end of space And the notched spheres eating each other's rinds To the last tooth of time, and the case closed.

Take a look at the scaly witches round your local shopping center, many of them with children. Grim enough with their clothes on. Imagine them naked! Snatches that yo-yo between their knees, breasts so flaccid you could tie them in a knot. One would have to be literally galvanized on Spanish Fly even to consider it. Yet it gets done somehow. Look at the kids. — The teenager may be more spontaneous, doglike, etc., but it’s generally only another name on the list, only another notch on the cock.

Somehow Geryon made it to adolescence. Then he met Herakles and the kingdoms of his life all shifted down a few notches. ... Geryon was going into the Bus Depot one Friday night about three a.m. to get change to call home. Herakles stepped oof the bus from New Mexico and Geryon came fast around the corner of the platform and there it was one of those moments that is the opposite of blindness. The world poured back and forth between their eyes once or twice.

He's laughing me into a stupor, she thought. I could heckle, I suppose, I could throw a bread roll at him, but he's eaten them all. She glanced at the other diners, all of them going into their act, and thought is this what it all boils down to? Romantic love, is this all it is, a talent show? Eat a meal, go to bed, fall in love with me and I promise you years and years of top notch material like this?

He was stoutly opposed to the idea of marrying anyone; but if, as happens to the best of us, he ever were compelled to perform the wedding glide, he had always hoped it would be with some lady golf champion who would help him with his putting, and thus, by bringing his handicap down a notch or two, enable him to save something from the wreck, so to speak.

Motivation gets you started, and inspiration keeps you going.

Just when you think humanity has found the limits of stupid, they go and ratchet up the standard by another notch.

There's always one more notch and four more aces Billy, and you're playin' all alone.

It’s just another notch in the good ol’ fucked up, modern America belt.

Notch

Yes, feelings. People like you leave a trail of broken hearts behind. I don’t want to be one of them, another notch in your damaged bedpost.

Yeah? How's this?" Claire, in one smooth, fast motion, pulled an arrow from the bag on her shoulder, slotted it home on the string, and pulled the compound bow back to full extension. She was aiming the arrow straight at Morley's crossed hands, over his heart. He laughed. "You aren't serious--" She fired. The arrow went through both of Morley's hands, pinning them to his chest with the fletching at the end. He stared down in shock at the wood piercing his chest, stumbled, and went down to his knees. Then just down, face forward. The arrow stuck up out of his back, like an exclamation point. "I will," Claire said softly, and let the bow rock forward as she reached one-handed for another arrow and notched it home. "I'm not a really good shot, but this is a really small room, so let me make this very clear: the first vampire who tries to lay a hand on either of my friends gets a new piercing, just like Morley. Now, if you need food, I will figure it out. But you don't get to use my friends like vending machines. Are we clear?" Around the room, vampires nodded, casting disbelieving looks at Morley. Even Oliver was staring at her as if he'd never really seen her before. She didn't know why; he'd known she could do it--hadn't he? Or was she different, somehow?

I come from a long line of body snatchers, probably the top-notch body snatchers in America. No make that the world. Some people might think it's gross digging up bones or corpses, but who asked them? It's no big deal, but then I've been doing it since I got out of diapers.

Curiouser and curiouser." Startled,I glanced at him. "I say that sometimes." Even with his face tight with worry, Dad managed to look a little amused. "It's from Alice in Wonderland. Appropriate, don't you think?" Yeah,except that our rabbit hole was a heck of a lot darker,I thought. I pretended to study the bookcase in the far corner. I'd expected boring books about Prodigium history or shifter economy, and there were a few of those, but I also noticed some recent fiction, as well as several Roald Dahl books. Dad went up in my estimation another notch.

I love you, Lauren Lindsay. I want to kiss you more than I want to breathe, but I don’t want you to think you’re just another notch in my belt. You’re not. You’re it for me. I want you to have everything and I want to make sure I’m good enough for you. You deserve more than who I was.

you need to check that tone, boy. Remember, I used to kill people for a living, and I ain't been up long enough to have much tolerance right about now. knock it down a notch before I forget I'm supposed to actually like you.

In pain with you, and yet I could not go. I stayed since nothing better came along. I loved you by default or just for show, My life a whistled flat unechoed song. I groped for notches in our dun abyss, And looked for more in lonely only less. I shunned the path adorned with signs to bliss, And stood the loyal ground of wait or guess. It took the tender you to shift the scene, Bold arsonist beneath our tinder stage! I then in friendly fire to earth careen And from our props and ashes disengage. I begged you long with such a silent ache In fear of, wish for mercy for my sake. What Love Feels Like

And my mama drowned the dumb ones. I hear everything you’re saying. There’s a group of Buffys thinking we’re the bad guys. Ain’t my first rodeo, pup. It’s been happening so long, they were called Helsings long before your daddy was a gleam in your granddaddy’s eyes. Thank you, Hollywood and Stoker for that. Not like being undead didn’t suck before. They just made it worse for us by cluing the rest of the world in that we exist. Now every goth with a thirst for immortality is cruising for us, begging us to bite them, and turn them. Did I ever tell you about that time when–” – Sundown “Sundown! I–” – Andy “You need to check that tone, boy. Remember, I used to kill people for a living, and I ain’t been up long enough to have much tolerance right about now. Knock it down a notch before I forget that I’m supposed to actually like you.” – Sundown

But I won't keep a count of people I have killed as though it were a trophy record or a disgusting business like notches in a gun, he told himself. I have a right to not keep count and I have a right to forget them. No, himself said. You have no right to forget anything. You have no right to shut your eyes to any of it nor any right to forget any of it nor to soften it nor to change it.

No, what numbed these fields, peopled with bad dreams was not the oppressive grip of a plague but rather an ailing retreat, a sort of sad widowhood. Man had started to subdue these vacant expanses, then had grown weary of eating into it, and now even the desire to preserve what had been claimed had perished. He had established everywhere an ebb, a sorrowful withdrawal. His cuttings into the forest, which were seen at long intervals, had lost their hard edges, their distinct notches: now a thick brushwood had driven its sabbath into the broad daylight of the glades, hiding the naked trunks as high as their lowest branches.

We don’t even survive in the memories of the living. Science has destroyed that myth. Whenever we remember something, what we’re doing is remembering the last time we remembered it; our memory doesn’t go back to the original notch, the first one was cut, but to the last one. Human memory is virtual, like that of a computer. When we open a file we’re not opening it as it was when we first created it, but as it was the last time we used it. It is called hypercathexis and is our brain’s most sophisticated recourse when it comes to confronting pain.

And with every massive success you notch up, you ask for and get more money, not because you want it to buy things with but because it’s the only reliable way in this business of keeping score. If you’re getting x every night but your best friend and deadliest rival is getting x+1, it’s enough to break your heart. So you try harder, and harder still.

Tally sticks were quite explicitly IOUs: both parties to a transaction would take a hazelwood twig, notch it to indicate the amount owed, and then split it in half. The creditor would keep one half, called "the stock" (hence the origin of the term "stock holder") and the debtor kept the other, called "the stub" (hence the origin of the term "ticket stub.)

As far as I could tell, my history teacher had three passions in life: quoting Shakespeare, identifying historical inaccuracies in cable TV shows, and berating Ryan Washburn. “Eighteen sixty-three, Mr. Washburn. Is that so hard to remember? Abraham Lincoln signed the Emancipation Proclamation in eighteen sixty-three.” Ryan was a big guy: a little on the quiet side, a little shy. I had no idea what it was about him that had convinced Mr. Simpson he needed to be taken down a notch—or seven. But more and more, this was how history class went: Simpson called on Ryan, repeatedly, until he made a mistake. And then it began.

One day at a time, one round at a time, one step at time.

I certainly found most of the Marines and soldiers I worked with to be top-notch. You had your exceptions—but then you have your exceptions in the Navy, too.

Life as we know it is merely a dream within dreams.

I get it, you know. I'm operating on privilege too. It may be a number of notches down from yours but it's every bit as unearned. I think the trick is to never forget it.

Fairy Princessfuckingrella is kicking her slutting up a notch. He saw Livia tense out of the corner of his eye. Shit. Kyle’s going to ruin their night together.

Elena notched a bolt into her crossbow. “Let’s go kill that murderous bitch.

We are all dead, just not yet buried.

The second I laid eyes on River Whitmore, my pulse kicked up a notch and a little thrill zipped down my spine. Like a tiny reminder of what it meant to be alive.

What I have are people—not really good friends, but a notch up from acquaintances.

They will learn and grow and love and struggle and create, and lift life up one little notch, perhaps, before they die. And when they pass they will cheat death with their children, with parental care that will make their children a little finer than themselves. Life wins.

[I]f the public wants the military to perform better, give more prudent advice to its civilian leadership, and spend taxpayer money more wisely, it must elect a Congress that will dial down a few notches its habitual and childish 'we support the troops!' mantra and start asking skeptical questions - and not accepting bland evasions or appeals to patriotism as a response.

What a company I ended up with,’ Geralt continued, shaking his head. ‘Brothers in arms! A team of heroes! What have I done to deserve it? A poetaster with a lute. A wild and lippy half-dryad, half-woman. A vampire, who’s about to notch up his fifth century. And a bloody Nilfgaardian who insists he isn’t a Nilfgaardian.’ ‘And leading the party is the Witcher, who suffers from pangs of conscience, impotence and the inability to take decisions,’ Regis finished calmly. ‘I suggest we travel incognito, to avoid arousing suspicion.’ ‘Or raising a laugh,’ Milva added.

When takers win, there’s usually someone else who loses. Research shows that people tend to envy successful takers and look for ways to knock them down a notch. In contrast, when givers like David Hornik win, people are rooting for them and supporting them, rather than gunning for them. Givers succeed in a way that creates a ripple effect, enhancing the success of people around them.

You’re asking me what I want for breakfast and I’m telling you about how when the worst thing happened, I didn’t even cry. You’re handing me a receipt from the laundromat down the street and I’m passing you a bundle of letters that I wrote to God when I was fourteen and scared. You’re passing me the milk after you drip it into your coffee and I’m half laughing about the psychiatrist’s office and how there’s actually a couch and it’s made of blue tweed. You’re trying to do the normal things and I am throwing up dull pieces of truth onto our kitchen table. I can’t lie anymore. These are the things I’ve done and they’re mostly sad. These are the places I’ve been and they’re mostly awful. This life has woven itself into the notches of my spine and I hear it creak every time I stand.

Apparently some of the Hawks had even been trained by the CIA, who didn’t want commies in Latin America and were assisting the Mexican government, which meant that Elvis received a top-notch education.

If you put sexual attraction on a scale of one to ten, where ten equals "you can't keep your hands off each other,"five equals "you can take it or leave it," and one equals "repulsed," to support a vibrant relationship, it should be at least a seven, preferably an eight, nine, or ten. With work, you might raise the attraction one notch, but because there is so much biochemistry involved in sexual attraction, it's hard to do much more than that. So if a sexual attraction doesn't evolve, remember, it's not anyone's fault and it's just the what is of your pairing, and you might make better friends than lovers. Sexual attraction doesn't have to be instantaneous on first meeting, but it must eventually flower because it provides a basic glue for successful conjugal union. If we're not sexually alive to our beloved, it often leads to a subdued relationship, loneliness, affairs, or lots of fantasies.

Clear night, thumb-top of a moon, a back-lit sky. Moon-fingers lay down their same routine On the side deck and the threshold, the white keys and the black keys. Bird hush and bird song. A cassia flower falls. I want to be bruised by God. I want to be strung up in a strong light and singled out. I want to be stretched, like music wrung from a dropped seed. I want to be entered and picked clean. And the wind says “What?” to me. And the castor beans, with their little earrings of death, say “What?” to me. And the stars start out on their cold slide through the dark. And the gears notch and the engines wheel.

Brindled, patches of hair gone, one ear folded over ad the other standing straight and notched from fighting. He didn't seem to be any particular breed. Just big and rangy, right on the edge of ugly, though I would come to think of him as beautiful. He was Airedale crossed with hound crossed with alligator.

Do you know what Aunt Marmoset told me once? She compared you to a spice drop. Overpowering and hard at first, but all sweetness at the center. I’ll admit, I’ve been desperate to try an experiment.” She gave him a teasing look. “How many times do you suppose I could lick you before you crack?” His every muscle tightened. Smiling, she tucked her face into the curve of his neck and ran her tongue seductively over his skin. “There’s one.” “Katie.” The word was a low, throaty warning. It made her toes curl. She nuzzled at the notch of his open shirt, pushing the fabric aside. The familiar musk of his skin stirred her in deep places. With a teasing swirl of her tongue, she tasted the notch at the base of his throat. “Two . . .” “Finn,” he called in a booming voice, lifting his head. “Send for the vicar.” She pulled back, shocked. “Two? That’s all, truly? Two? I’m not sure whether to feel proud or disappointed.

For each of us has a perch on the tree. After we are gone, that perch is marked by a notch, permanent, yes, but with its edges muting over time, assuming the tree is ever growing. Years from now someone can see that you were here, or there, and although you had little conception or care for the wider branching, in the next life there might be a sigh of wonder at how quietly flourishing it all was, if never majestic.

Those of us who have been violated or around violence or cruelty—and really those of us who have simply grown up in a racist, sexist, homophobic world—knew how far we could go, how loud we could get, how big we could become, how much space or attention we could occupy. We learned the price we had to pay for our bigness, our desire, and our ambition. We were practiced at the dance. We cherished the walls of our confines because they gave definition to our lives, boundaries. We wrongly believed this was safety, protection. We made sure someone was assigned to bring us down a notch, remind us who we really are, hold the truth of our badness.

I pushed Ezra back for a second. He had taken the make out session up a notch upon Logan’s arrival. I knew what he was doing, it was ticking me off. I wasn’t just some territory he could mark. "Hike a leg and pee on me, why don’t you?" Logan snorted and practically choked on his coffee. - RUHK'S RISING; Phoenix Elite Book 2

Everyone is familiar with the phenomenon of feeling more or less alive on different days. Everyone knows on any given day that there are energies slumbering in him which the incitements of that day do not call forth, but which he might display if these were greater. Most of us feel as if a sort of cloud weighed upon us, keeping us below our highest notch of clearness in discernment, sureness in reasoning, or firmness in deciding. Compared with what we ought to be, we are only half awake. Our fires are damped, our drafts are checked. We are making use of only a small part of our possible mental and physical resources. In some persons this sense of being cut off from their rightful resources is extreme, and we then get the formidable neurasthenic and psychasthenic conditions, with life grown into one tissue of impossibilities, that so many medical books describe. Stating the thing broadly, the human individual thus lives far within his limits; he possesses powers of various sorts which he habitually fails to use. He energizes below his maximum, and he behaves below his optimum. In elementary faculty, in co-ordination, in power of inhibition and co ntro l, in every conceivable way, his life is contracted like the field of vision of an hysteric subject — but with less excuse, for the poor hysteric is diseased, while in the rest of us, it is only an inveterate habit — the habit of inferiority to our full self — that is bad.

Everyone is familiar with the phenomenon of feeling more or less alive on different days. Everyone knows on any given day that there are energies slumbering in him which the incitements of that day do not call forth, but which he might display if these were greater. Most of us feel as if a sort of cloud weighed upon us, keeping us below our highest notch of clearness in discernment, sureness in reasoning, or firmness in deciding. Compared with what we ought to be, we are only half awake. Our fires are damped, our drafts are checked. We are making use of only a small part of our possible mental and physical resources. Stating the thing broadly, the human individual thus lives far within his limits; he possesses powers of various sorts which he habitually fails to use.

She kissed her like she’d been stranded on an island, notching each stranded day onto a fallen coconut, slowly losing her mind. She filled Michelle like weather, worked her mouth like a cherry stem being tongued into a knot.

Were she to decide fully to live here in Black Cove unto death, she believed she would erect towers on the ridge marking the south and north points of the sun's annual swing. It would be a great pleasure year after year to watch with anticipation as the sun drew nigh to the notch and then on a specified day fell into it and then rose out of it and retraced its path. Over time, watching that happen again and again might make the years seem not such an awful linear progress but instead a looping and a return. Keeping track of such a thing would place a person, would be a way of saying, You are here, in this one station, now. It would be an answer to the question, Where am I?

I must learn to let go, let it all go, center myself and open my mind. The ideals, concepts and ideas of the self being separate from the whole of all consciousness must change. We are one large family, you are I, and I am you.

The next thing Juliana knew, he had her braced against the back wall of the shower, one hand under her bottom, the other tangled in the back of her wet hair, holding her in place as he took her mouth with what seemed to be an urgent, desperate craving, and claimed her body in the same way. His c#ck found her soft notch, his first thick thrust so hard and deep it shoved the air up out of her lungs, her thoughts fracturing beneath the violent surge of sensation.

Sometimes the hardest battle only exists within yourself, our mind fighting amongst the demons of thought within your own head.

He thanked God for rogue wooden tusks the entire way.

To everything, in other words, there is a season, and McCarthy’s hubris hastened the end of his hour upon the stage. “I was fully aware of McCarthy’s faults, which were neither few nor minor,” Cohn recalled. “He was impatient, overly aggressive, overly dramatic. He acted on impulse. He tended to sensationalize the evidence he had—in order to draw attention to the rock-bottom seriousness of the situation. He would neglect to do important homework and consequently would, on occasion, make challengeable statements.” The urge to overstate, to overdramatize, to dominate the news, could be costly, and so it proved to be for McCarthy. The Wisconsin senator, Cohn said, was essentially a salesman. “He was selling the story of America’s peril,” Cohn recalled. “He knew that he could never hope to convince anybody by delivering a dry, general-accounting-office type of presentation. In consequence, he stepped up circumstances a notch or two”—and in so doing he opened himself to attacks that proved fatal. He oversold, and the customers—the public—tired of the pitch, and the pitchman.

Take a bar of metal and put a single notch in it. The two lengths thus defined have a relationship that can be expressed as the ratio between them. In theory, therefore, any rational number can be expressed with a single mark on a bar of metal. Using a simple alphabetic code, a mark that calculated to a ratio of .1215225 could be read as 12-15-22-5, or “l-o-v-e.” The complete plays of Shakespeare could be written in a single mark, if it were possible to measure accurately enough.

Behind him she saw something which by contrast with the alien incalculable figure before her, was close and real. It was something which she understood, something which she could never do without, or be without, for it seemed as though it were her own self, her own body, at which she gazed and which lay so intimately upon the skyline. Gormenghast. The long, notched outline of her home. It was now his background. It was a screen of walls and towers pocked with windows. He stood against it, an intruder, imposing himself so vividly, so solidly, against her world, his head overtopping the loftiest of its towers.

Take Charge and Move Out (TACAMO) planes would quickly get off the ground, climb steeply, and send an emergency war order on a very-low-frequency radio, using an antenna five miles long. SAC began to develop a Post Attack Command and Control System. It would rely on airborne command posts, a command post on a train, a command post at the bottom of an abandoned gold mine in Cripple Creek, Colorado, and a command post, known as The Notch, inside Bare Mountain, near Amherst, Massachusetts. The

in flow, the relationship between what a person had to do and what he could do was perfect. The challenge wasn't too easy. Nor was it too difficult. It was a notch or two beyond his current abilities, which stretched the body and mind in a way that made the effort itself the most delicious reward. That balance produced a degree of focus and satisfaction that easily surpassed other, more quotidian, experiences. In flow, people lived so deeply in the moment, and felt so utterly in control, that their sense of time, place, and even self melted away. They were autonomous, of course. But more than that, they were engaged.

They all seem infected with a vivaciousness that isn't common in our compound, and there are more smiles on their faces than I've ever seen at once. And yet as I watch them, I feel more intensely than ever the knowledge that I'm not one of them. For these moral humans, birthdays are a kind of countdown to the end, the ticking clock of a dwindling life. For me, birthdays are notches on an infinite timeline. Will I grow tired of parties one day? Will my birthday become meaningless? I imagine myself centuries from now, maybe at my three-hundredth birthday, looking all the way back to my seventeenth. How will I possibly be happy, remembering the light in my mother's eyes? The swiftness of Uncle Antonio's steps as he dances? The way my father stands on edge of the courtyard, smiling in that vague, absent way of his? The scene shifts and blues in my imagination. As if brushed away by some invisible broom, these people whom I've known my entire life disappear. The courtyard is empty, bare, covered in decaying leaves. I imagine Little Cam deserted, with everyone dead and gone and only me left in the shadows. Forever.

She turned to look at Althea with eyes the color if brandy in firelight. "Can't you feel it?" she asked her in a whisper. "Look around you. We are on the cusp. We are a coin spinning in the toss, a card fluttering in the flip, a rune chip floating in stirred water. Possibilities swarm like bees. In this day, in a moment, in a breath, the future of the world will shift course by a notch, One way or another, the coin will land ringing, the card will settle to the table, the chip will bob to the surface, The face that shows uppermost will set our days, and children to come will say, "That is just the way it has always been.

He knocked again and his smile broadened. “Knock, knock,” he added, at once giving himself away. He was pleased to hear that her heartbeat kicked up another notch. “Let me in?” he requested softly. Then, in a slightly deeper tone filled with amusement, he added, “I won’t bite.” It was what he had said to her outside of her apartment several days ago. It held a lot more meaning now

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Focus,” Mary muttered, chastising herself and her wandering mind. From her stereo came the soothing sounds of monks, vocalizing an ancient hymn meant to bring one closer to enlightenment. Credit where it was due, they were pretty good. Mary couldn’t remember ever hearing a bad singing monk, though. Was it just a byproduct of monkhood that one gained a great singing voice? Or maybe they had auditions before one got in. “Great, great, you want enlightenment, but I’ll need to hear you belt out some show tunes before we let you in.” Were there scouts out there scouring the vocal talents of a new generation and recruiting them to top-notch monasteries?

It must be the top drawer," he reflected. "So she carries the keys in a pocket on the right. All in one bunch on a steel ring… . And there's one key there, three times as big as all the others, with deep notches; that can't be the key of the chest of drawers … then there must be some other chest or strong-box … that's worth knowing. Strong-boxes always have keys like that … but how degrading it all is.

My mommy said my daddy fights bad men and wins. She says he likes to fish and he knows how to play really cool games." Her chin lifted a notch in a surfeit of pride. "She said my daddy will love me more than a kid loves ice cream. My mommy doesn't lie to me, so you lied to her when you told her you were my daddy. You are not my daddy! She screamed the final declaration to him, dry-eyed and filled with childish fury.

When the soul adores Him Who guides it through mortal life, when it distinguishes His sign at every turn of the trail, painted on the boulder and notched in the fir trunk, when every page in the book of one’s personal fate bears His watermark, how can one doubt that He will also preserve us through all eternity? So what can stop one from effecting the transition? What can help us to resist the intolerable temptation? What can prevent us from yielding to the burning desire for merging in God? We who burrow in filth every day may be forgiven perhaps the one sin that ends all sins.

How about from now on, anytime I feel my ego getting out of control, I come see you?” He lowered his voice. “Let you take me down a few notches.” Fighting the trance I was sure he was trying to put me in, I licked my suddenly dry lips. His gaze flicked down to watch. “I, uhh, I don’t think that’s a good idea,” I said, my voice breathy. His eyes locked back with mine. “Why not?” “I don’t have the availability for that kind of time commitment.

I don’t know if it’s the bed or the knowledge that Andrew’s wards are top-notch or what, but when I finally do manage to get to sleep, I don’t wake up until morning. If I’m having nightmares, they’re polite enough to disperse before I can remember them. It’s amazing. Sleep is amazing. I recommend it. Five stars.

The heart of Stepping on the Sword, something used principally in the martial arts, is that even with bows and firearms, you must act quickly while they are being discharged: if you charge quickly, it will be difficult to notch another arrow to a bow or discharge a firearm. In all things, when your opponent sets up a tactic, respond to it immediately according to its own principles and, stepping on his actions, defeat him...This is, therefore, the mind of taking the initiative in everything. It does not mean attacking at the same time as your opponent. Stepping on the Sword is taking your action immediately upon your opponent's action.

Every one is familiar with the phenomenon of feeling more or less alive on different days. Every one knows on any given day that there are energies slumbering in him which the incitements of that day do not call forth, but which he might display if these were greater. Most of us feel as if we lived habitually with a sort of cloud weighing on us, below our highest notch of clearness in discernment, sureness in reasoning, or firmness in deciding. Compared with what we ought to be, we are only half awake.

I think she’s with Emil.” He arched a brow as he led me down the walkway. “Something’s going on between them, isn’t there?” “You’re just now realizing that?” He snorted. “Better question is, has Kieran figured that out?” “I think he was just beginning to when we left Oak Ambler.” His grin kicked up a notch. “Thoughts and prayers for Emil.” “More like thoughts and prayers for Kieran if he tries to intervene. Vonetta likes Emil. I don’t think she’ll take all that kindly to Kieran not minding his business.” “True.

Everything smelled like sex, and coffee, and Christmas, and I didn't want it to end.

She stood in profile across the green, her back straight, her stance that of some long ago warrior maiden. As he walked toward her, Miss Greaves drew back her bow briskly, aiming a tad high to account for the wind, and let her arrow fly. Before it had hit the target, she’d notched another and shot it. A third followed just as rapidly. He glanced to the target. All three of her arrows were clustered together at the center of the red circle. Miss Greaves, who “did not shoot,” was a better shot than all the other ladies—and probably the men as well. He glanced from the target to her and saw that she stared back, proud and unsmiling. Artemis. She was named for the goddess of the hunt—a goddess who had slain without remorse her only admirer.

Life sometimes gets so bogged down in the details, you forget you are living it. There is always another appointment to be met, another bill to pay, another symptom presenting, another uneventful day to be notched onto the wooden wall. We have synchronized our watches, studied our calendars, existed in minutes, and completely forgotten to step back and see what we’ve accomplished.

(Sadie)"I'm not judging you, Dylan. I love vampire movies. If I looked surprised it was only because it's so different from your TV work, that's all." His shoulders relaxed a notch. "Sorry. Olly gives me a lot of shit for selling out. He doesn't get that no one is ever going to make his movie about two old men on a fishing trip. Or, even if they do, no one is every going to go see it.

The whole of the day should not be daytime, nor of the night night-time, but some portion be rescued from time to oversee time in. All our hours must not be current; all our time must not lapse. There must be one hour at least which the day did not bring forth—of ancient parentage and long established nobility—which will be a serene and lofty platform overlooking the rest. We should make our notch every day on our characters, as Robinson Crusoe on his stick. We must be at the helm at least once a day; we must feel the tiller-rope in our hands, and know that if we sail, we steer.

His hand came under her chin, and he lifted her face to his. Then he kissed her so tenderly it nearly brought tears to her eyes. She stroked the side of his face, tracing the edges of his jaw, looking into his fathomless blue eyes, and feeling as though she could fly. Rediscovering her passion was wonderful. Discovering someone could desire her the way Theo did? For that, she had no words.

We’d never miss Alex’s retirement. No matter how you feel about us being here.” Pompous prick. That was the exact reason Reese bounced his fist off Hayes’s face all those years ago. He flexed his hand with the temptation to do it now too. Smarmy dickweed. “Alex is a good man.” Merina stroked Reese’s arm, bringing his temper down a notch. “I’m sure he can see exactly what you are trying to accomplish by being here. If you’ll excuse us.” In a stage whisper, she added, “I’m going to sneak out of here for a moment with Reese. You remember how hard it was to keep your hands off him, I’m sure.

Why shouldn't Mom trust me, Dad" Why are you so determined to make me out to be the bad guy all the time?" I stared at the side of his face, willing him to make eye contact. He didn't. "I've been doing really good late and you don't even care." "Yet you still managed to get into trouble tonight," he said. "You have no idea what happened tonight," I said, my voice ratcheting up a notch. "All you know is that, because I was involved, I'm somehow guilty of something. You could at least pretend to care, you know. You could at least try to understand." Dad gave a sardonic little laugh. "I'll tell you what I understand," he said. "I understand that when you're left to your own devices you get into trouble, that's what I understand. I understand I was trying to have a happy, restful evening with Briley and once again you screwed it up.

an took one step closer to Hart. Though he kept his eyes averted, there was no mistaking the anger in his stance and his voice. “She is my wife, under my protection. The only way I will let you do anything against this marriage is if you declare me a lunatic again.” Hart flushed dull red. “Ian, listen to me—” “I want her as my wife, and she stays my wife.” Ian softened his voice a notch. “She is a Mackenzie now. Treat her as one.

If I’d told the librarian the truth, which was that I thought her idea stunk up the joint because when I grew up I was going to keep being exactly what I already was—an eavesdropper, liar, shoplifter, cat burglar, poison-pen writer extraordinaire, and top-notch blackmailer—because she goes to Mass at St. Catherine’s Church, the same way most everybody around here does, I’m pretty sure that’d get around the neighborhood in nothing flat. “Yes.

Things to Do in the Belly of the Whale” Measure the walls. Count the ribs. Notch the long days. Look up for blue sky through the spout. Make small fires with the broken hulls of fishing boats. Practice smoke signals. Call old friends, and listen for echoes of distant voices. Organize your calendar. Dream of the beach. Look each way for the dim glow of light. Work on your reports. Review each of your life’s ten million choices. Endure moments of self-loathing. Find the evidence of those before you. Destroy it. Try to be very quiet, and listen for the sound of gears and moving water. Listen for the sound of your heart. Be thankful that you are here, swallowed with all hope, where you can rest and wait. Be nostalgic. Think of all the things you did and could have done. Remember treading water in the center of the still night sea, your toes pointing again and again down, down into the black depths.

But still, you feel no remorse for the dead. You do whatever you can to forget them. You abandoned your family without a word. You can't control yourself. Hald the time you run away from leadership, and the other half you act like some untouchable martyr, crowned in guilt, the only person who's really giving herself to the cause. Look around you, Mare Barrow. Shade's not the only one who died in Corros. You are not the only one to make sacrifices. Farley betrayed her father. You forced Cameron to join us against her will, you chose to ignore everything but Julian's list, and now you want to abandon the kids back at the Notch. For what? To step on the Colonel's neck? To take a throne? To kill anyone who looks at you the wrong way?

Do you think music has the power to change people? Like you listen to a piece and go through some major change inside?" Oshima nodded. "Sure, that can happen. We have an experience--like a chemical reaction--that transforms something inside us. When we examine ourselves later on, we discover that all the standards we've lived by have shot up another notch and the world's opened up in unexpected ways. Yes, I've had that experience. Not often, but it has happened. It's like falling in love.

You are a bright light, Elli.’ His own breath hitches, a sound that I cannot quite grasp. His eyes are darkening, his lips tightening. His hands grasp me tighter and he moves closer, his mouth inches from mine, I can almost taste the sweetness and saltiness of his scent, the rich coffee beans and sugar, the vague spearmint. I say nothing, I’m not even sure I’m breathing. ‘You shouldn’t have to see such pain, such blackness. You are too pure.’ His lips do not collide with mine, his skin does not brush against me, only his voice sends a shiver down every notch in my spine, trailing goose bumps over my skin. He tilts his head to the side, his lips gently brushing against my ear. And that is all. I’m not good enough for him. I’m not. That’s why… that’s why… ‘Too pure…

Gadflies are necessary. But it’s well to look at the new rascals before you turn your present rascals out. Democracy is a poor system; the only thing that can be said for it is that it’s eight times as good as any other method. Its worst fault is that its leaders reflect their constituents—a low level, but what can you expect? So look at Douglas and ponder that, in his ignorance, stupidity, and self-seeking, he resembles his fellow Americans but is a notch or two above average. Then look at the man who will replace him if his government topples.

That’s when I notice Cheryl and Mickey cuddled up on the couch. She’s leaning on his shoulder, his arm around her, her leg across his lap. Cheryl throws glances at Kerry that say, “Look at me!” while Kerry shoots a “You go, girl!” smirk right back. I think of CK, how he and I often sat like that. Not because we were seconds from making out or wanted to look like a couple, but just out of a deep, platonic connection. My heart hits a higher notch on the ache-o-meter, my teeth sear into my bottom lip, and then something inside me snaps as cleanly as a crayon.

Maybe love is just hormones or endorphins—not some great force all around us. Maybe that’s just nonsense. It’s always seemed to me that love is about being found—the way you might find your missing cat because you knew he had a notch on his left ear and came to the sound of knew he had a notch on his left ear and came to the sound of pebbles rattling in a can. But maybe that isn’t the way things work. Maybe you can only be “found” for a little while. Just like Joseph and Isuza LaRonge discovered, “forever” isn’t really forever. Everything ends. Everything is lost eventually.

Five people and a bank holiday weekend. What could possibly go wrong? Marc, he has the perfect life so why does he want to go and ruin it? Paul, the guy who has blackouts if he drinks too much. Chloe, the bulimic loner who just wants to be at peace. Lindsey, the forty-four-year-old who still lives at home with her controlling mum. And Rich, all he thinks about is money and notches on the bed post. Five people working for the same company, but not really knowing each other. They all start the long weekend, but how many will finish it and arrive back at work on the right side of the law and still alive?

Kel ran. He raced over the uneven ground at top speed, desperate to catch up to the others. He plunged down the ancient stairs as bright pinpoints of light exploded in the darkness all around him. Something whistled through the air, past Kel’s ear; it hurtled into the trunk of a dwarf pine tree, where it blazed like a miniature star “What’s going on?” Merren yelled as Kel caught up to him; Jerrod and Ji-An were there as well, just ahead. Kel shoved the amulet into his pocket, almost tripping as his boot landed in a tide pool with a splash. “People are shooting flaming arrows at us!” Kel shouted back. His boots were skidding on the wet stone. He twisted to the side, trying to right his center of gravity. Ji-An had an arrow in her hand and was struggling to notch it to her bow as she ran. “I know that!” Merren yelled. “It was a rhetorical question!” “Shut up, the both of you!” called Ji-An, and let an arrow fly.

Insane’ probably means to have an innate mental problem, something that calls for professional treatment, while ‘lunatic’ means to have your sanity temporarily seized by the luna, which is ‘moon’ in Latin. In nineteenth-century England, if you were a certified lunatic and you committed a crime, the severity of the crime would be reduced a notch. The idea was that the crime was not so much the responsibility of the person himself as that he was led astray by the moonlight. Believe it or not, laws like that actually existed. In other words, the fact that the moon can drive people crazy was actually recognized in law.

Jubal, are you saying I ought not to criticize the administration?” “Nope. Gadflies are necessary. But it’s well to look at the new rascals before you turn your present rascals out. Democracy is a poor system; the only thing that can be said for it is that it’s eight times as good as any other method. Its worst fault is that its leaders reflect their constituents—a low level, but what can you expect? So look at Douglas and ponder that, in his ignorance, stupidity, and self-seeking, he resembles his fellow Americans but is a notch or two above average. Then look at the man who will replace him if his government topples.

He unfixes the metal notch and slips his hand around the body of the bird. Feels its heat, its small heart beating. He stares at the bird's bright orange eyes. Like the color of the bird's wings in the painting. Or the small touch of lichen on the rock by the Japanese woman's foot. Natalia did not truly see the painting. Is it excitement of the unknown that pulled her away, or despair? He know the answer. He returns the bird to its cage, pulls out a piece of paper from his pocket, and writes, Paris Will lose, but there is a woman who will fight without fear because she believes she has already lost everything. [pp. 1722-173]

The hell with all of you, you cooperative fellowship of idiots, united by a common goal which none of you understand. And the hell with me too.’ This time the others, following Cahir’s example, also remained tactfully silent. Dandelion, Maria Barring, also known as Milva, and Emiel Regis Rohellec Terzieff-Godefroy. ‘What a company I ended up with,’ Geralt continued, shaking his head. ‘Brothers in arms! A team of heroes! What have I done to deserve it? A poetaster with a lute. A wild and lippy half-dryad, half-woman. A vampire, who’s about to notch up his fifth century. And a bloody Nilfgaardian who insists he isn’t a Nilfgaardian.’ ‘And

But calm is precisely what is absent from love’s classroom. There is simply too much on the line. The “student” isn’t merely a passing responsibility; he or she is a lifelong commitment. Failure will ruin existence. No wonder we may be prone to lose control and deliver cack-handed, hasty speeches which bear no faith in the legitimacy or even the nobility of the act of imparting advice. And no wonder, too, if we end up achieving the very opposite of our goals, because increasing levels of humiliation, anger, and threat have seldom hastened anyone’s development. Few of us ever grow more reasonable or more insightful about our own characters for having had our self-esteem taken down a notch, our pride wounded, and our ego subjected to a succession of pointed insults. We simply grow defensive and brittle in the face of suggestions which sound like mean-minded and senseless assaults on our nature rather than caring attempts to address troublesome aspects of our personality. Had

I just wasn't able to say it before now.' He blinked. 'You needed to knee a man in the groin before you could tell me you loved me?' 'No!' Then she thought about his words. 'Well, yes, in a way. I've always been so fearful that you would run my life. But I've learned that having you with me doesn't mean that I can't take care of myself as well.' 'You certainly made short work of Eversleigh.' Her chin lifted a notch and she allowed herself a satisfied smile. 'Yes, I did, didn't I? And do you know, but I think I couldn't have done it without you.' 'Victoria, you did this all on your own. I wasn't even present.' 'Yes, you were.' She picked up his hand and placed it over her heart.

Matteo didn't lick a woman's pussy because he felt obligated, or at the very least not mine. I might have argued he enjoyed it more than I did if he wasn't so damn good at it. That talented tongue explored every part of me, thrusting in and out until I whimpered. When he turned his attention to my clit, it was so he could slide a finger inside me. I clenched around him on a cry, feeling the way he moaned in response vibrate through me. He withdrew that finger, only to add a second and curl them to stroke that spot inside me that made me quiver. "Teo," I whimpered, and the sound of his name seemed to push him over the edge. He wrapped his lips around the bundle of nerves at the apex of my thigh, sucking gently. My legs tightened around his head; my hand buried in his hair to hold him exactly where I wanted him as I shattered in a blinding orgasm that stole my ability to function. I laid there, panting and trying to regain my ability to move. When I opened my eyes, it was to Matteo shoving his own underwear down his legs and kicking them off. He pulled his fingers free of me and spread my legs wide from where they'd wrapped around his head. Sliding up my body, his hips lined up with mine so he could grind his length against my wet core. His lips found mine in a bruising, claiming kiss that seemed even more primal because he tasted like me. He reached down, sliding himself through my wet and notching his head at my entrance. Pulling away from my lips, he groaned, "Tell me you're mine." Still recovering from my orgasm, I nodded in a daze. "Words, Angel. Give me the words." "Yours," I murmured, cupping his cheek with a delirious smile and tugging him down to kiss him again. He slid inside me slowly, filling me until there wasn't a single inch that couldn't feel him. "Fuck," he groaned against my mouth. He reached down, wrapping my legs around his hips. Our foreheads pressed together; our mouths not quite touching as he started to move inside me. Even without his lips on mine, I could taste him, taste me in his breath on my face. One of his hands grabbed mine, our fingers intertwining while he wrapped his other under my shoulder to hold me where he wanted me. He slid in and out in slow, hard thrusts.

I'm jittery.It's like the animatronic band from Chuck E. Cheese is throwing a jamboree in my stomach. I've always hated Chuck E. Cheese. Why am I thinking about Chuck E. Cheese? I don't know why I'm nervous.I'm just seeing my mom again. And Seany.And Bridge! Bridge said she'd come. St. Clair's connecting flight to San Francisco doesn't leave for another three hours,so we board the train that runs between terminals,and he walks me to the arrivals area.We've been quiet since we got off the plane. I guess we're tired. We reach the security checkpoint,and he can't go any farther. Stupid TSA regulations.I wish I could introduce him to my family.The Chuck E. Cheese band kicks it up a notch,which is weird, because I'm not nervous about leaving him. I'll see him again in two weeks. "All right,Banana.Suppose this is goodbye." He grips the straps of his backpack,and I do the same. This is the moment we're supposed to hug. For some reason,I can't do it. "Tell your mom hi for me. I mean, I know I don't know her. She just sounds really nice. And I hope she's okay." He smiles softly. "Thanks.I'll tell her." "Call me?" "Yeah,whatever. You'll be so busy with Bridge and what's-his-name that you'll forget all about your English mate, St. Clair." "Ha! So you are English!" I poke him in the stomach. He grabs my hand and we wrestle, laughing. "I claim....no...nationality." I break free. "Whatever,I totally caught you. Ow!" A gray-haired man in sunglasses bumps his red plaid suitcase into my legs. "Hey,you! Apologize!" St. Clair says,but the guy is already too far away to hear. I rub my shins. "It's okay, we're in the way. I should go." Time to hug again. Why can't we do it? Finally, I step forward and put my arms around him. He's stiff,and it's awkward, especially with our backpacks in the way.I smell his hair again. Oh heavens. We pull apart. "Have fun at the show tonight" he says. "I will.Have a good flight." "Thanks." He bites his thumbnail,and then I'm through security and riding down the escalator. I look back one last time. St. Clair jumps up and down, waving at me.I burst into laughter, and his face lights up.The escalator slides down. He's lost from view. I swallow hard and turn around.And then-there they are.Mom has a gigantic smile, and Seany is jumping and waving, just like St. Clair.

CEO Gil Amelio stumbled. Ellison may have been baffled when Jobs insisted that he was not motivated by money, but it was partly true. He had neither Ellison’s conspicuous consumption needs nor Gates’s philanthropic impulses nor the competitive urge to see how high on the Forbes list he could get. Instead his ego needs and personal drives led him to seek fulfillment by creating a legacy that would awe people. A dual legacy, actually: building innovative products and building a lasting company. He wanted to be in the pantheon with, indeed a notch above, people like Edwin Land, Bill Hewlett, and David Packard. And the best way to achieve all this was to return to Apple and reclaim his kingdom. And yet when the cup of power neared his lips, he became strangely hesitant, reluctant, perhaps coy. He returned to Apple officially in January 1997 as a part-time advisor, as he had told Amelio he would. He began to assert himself in some personnel areas, especially in protecting his people who had made the transition from NeXT. But in most other ways he was unusually passive. The decision not to ask him to join the board offended him, and he felt demeaned

Somewhere the help don’t quit as soon as the boss walks out the door. I’m gonna need a dozen clean pens.” The lambing barn had four rows of pens against the long walls and back-to-back in the middle. At any one time the pens could hold eighty ewes and their lambs. When things went well, a ewe came into the barn on Monday and left on Thursday, and after her apartment was renovated the shepherd could install a newcomer. When a ewe had trouble – mastitis, milk fever, pneumonia, blue bag – the pens filled with sick sheep and the sheep housing stock shrank. Penny spent a couple hours examining the ewes in the barn, medicating those that needed it, turning others with their lambs out into the sunshine. She slipped bands on lambs’ tails, checked new mothers for milk supply, milked out ewes for their colostrum, ear notched bad mothers so they could be culled.

I have never thought you weren't good enough for me. The fear I always had, deep down in my heart, is that I'm not good enough for you." Murmurs of astonishment rippled through the room but he didn't seem to notice. "You see, I was never the one who could make you laugh." He glanced at Lawrence, then back at her. "I was never the one who made coronets of rosebuds for your hair and told you that you were pretty." He swallowed hard, and his chin lifted a notch, telling her as clearly as any word how difficult it was for him to reveal himself this way. "I always wanted to say those things, do those things, but I couldn't, for a gentleman is not supposed to behave that way. A gentleman is not supposed to fall in love with the chef's daughter. But right now, today, I don't give a damn what gentlemen do. I'm just a man, and the only thing I care about is you.

When this all started, when the US of A got into this war and the Supreme Court decided what the hell, let's send women to, everyone wondered what effect it would have. Could women fight my girl Rio has a shiny Silver Star, A fistful of Purple Hearts, and a notched M1 that say yes. Could the men fight alongside women, or would the simple creatures be too distracted by feminine curves? Well, I won't spend a long night in a hole with Luther gear, who has never been a gentleman but he is a good soldier and he never made a pass at me. Possibly he was distracted by the artillery garage coming down on our heads. Possibly was that I hadn't showered in ... God only knows how long you have to ask my fleas. We were not a man and a woman in that hole we were too scared little babies screaming and cursing and so we could be grateful for the warmth of our own piss running down our legs. It was not a romantic evening.

Guthrie sat in silence for a moment, mulling over Barbara Berlingieri's purposely degrading offer and letting his mind wander a bit: What if he had stepped aside and let the surgeon at the hospital sew up her face instead of doing it himself? And what if the head surgeon, who had never performed plastic surgery before, had tightened the stitching of the muscles in her cheek a bit too much and left her wit ha sneer instead of her natural smile? What if he had sewn the vermilion border straight across, without first making a notch, so that it had a permanent pucker? No. It was better that Bob Guthrie had stepped into the breach. Because now and for the rest of her life, Barbara Berlingieri would look into her mirror upon rising, check her reflection as she passed shop windows, peer into her compact while refreshing her makeup, and in these and a dozen other ways every day confront her image and be reminded of Bob Guthrie's genius and of her own towering ingratitude.

I find it simpler to envision shedding tears over a matter than picturing myself genuinely prepared for change. Understanding my emotions proves intricate. It commences with a yearning to refine my thought processes, a longing to evolve into a superior version of myself, and an acknowledgment of the knowledge and superiority of others beyond my current perception. On rare occasions, this contemplation lingers within me, day after day, gradually evolving from a fleeting thought into an intrinsic facet of my identity. The aforementioned notion holds promise for instigating positive change within me, yet it often necessitates a significant passage of time before I yearn for it, and the resultant impact is distressing. I come to terms with the notion that my heart is astray, preyed upon by untamed beasts. I can anticipate your reassurance: "Don't worry, no one is perfect." Nonetheless, I acknowledge that I stand just a notch above the beasts and several steps below the angels.

Mountains, a moment’s earth-waves rising and hollowing; the earth too’s an ephemerid; the stars— Short-lived as grass the stars quicken in the nebula and dry in their summer, they spiral Blind up space, scattered black seeds of a future; nothing lives long, the whole sky’s Recurrences tick the seconds of the hours of the ages of the gulf before birth, and the gulf After death is like dated: to labor eighty years in a notch of eternity is nothing too tiresome, Enormous repose after, enormous repose before, the flash of activity. Surely you never have dreamed the incredible depths were prologue and epilogue merely To the surface play in the sun, the instant of life, what is called life? I fancy That silence is the thing, this noise a found word for it; interjection, a jump of the breath at that silence; Stars burn, grass grows, men breathe: as a man finding treasure says “Ah!” but the treasure’s the essence: Before the man spoke it was there, and after he has spoken he gathers it, inexhaustible treasure.

Danger cups us under its hand, and we can do nothing but stand witness to the turning of the world. Here we walk on the balancing line between futures. Humanity always believes it decides the fate of the whole world, and so it does, but never in the moment that it thinks it does. The future of thousands ripples like a serpent through the water, and the destiny of a ship becomes the destination of the world.’ She turned to look at Althea with eyes the colour of brandy in firelight. ‘Can’t you feel it?’ she asked in a whisper. ‘We are on the cusp. We are a coin spinning in the toss, a card fluttering in the flip, a rune chip floating in stirred water. Possibilities swarm like bees. In this day, in a moment, in a breath, the future of the world will shift course by a notch. One way or another, the coin will land ringing, the card will settle to the table, the chip will bob to the surface. The face that shows uppermost will set our days, and children to come will say, “That is just the way it has always been.

It was astonishing how loudly one laughed at tales of gruesome things, of war’s brutality-I with the rest of them. I think at the bottom of it was a sense of the ironical contrast between the normal ways of civilian life and this hark-back to the caveman code. It made all our old philosophy of life monstrously ridiculous. It played the “hat trick” with the gentility of modern manners. Men who had been brought up to Christian virtues, who had prattled their little prayers at mothers’ knees, who had grown up to a love of poetry, painting, music, the gentle arts, over-sensitized to the subtleties of half-tones, delicate scales of emotion, fastidious in their choice of words, in their sense of beauty, found themselves compelled to live and act like ape-men; and it was abominably funny. They laughed at the most frightful episodes, which revealed this contrast between civilized ethics and the old beast law. The more revolting it was the more, sometimes, they shouted with laughter, especially in reminiscence, when the tale was told in the gilded salon of a French chateau, or at a mess-table. It was, I think, the laughter of mortals at the trick which had been played on them by an ironical fate. They had been taught to believe that the whole object of life was to reach out to beauty and love, and that mankind, in its progress to perfection, had killed the beast instinct, cruelty, blood-lust, the primitive, savage law of survival by tooth and claw and club and ax. All poetry, all art, all religion had preached this gospel and this promise. Now that ideal had broken like a china vase dashed to hard ground. The contrast between That and This was devastating. It was, in an enormous world-shaking way, like a highly dignified man in a silk hat, morning coat, creased trousers, spats, and patent boots suddenly slipping on a piece of orange-peel and sitting, all of a heap, with silk hat flying, in a filthy gutter. The war-time humor of the soul roared with mirth at the sight of all that dignity and elegance despoiled. So we laughed merrily, I remember, when a military chaplain (Eton, Christ Church, and Christian service) described how an English sergeant stood round the traverse of a German trench, in a night raid, and as the Germans came his way, thinking to escape, he cleft one skull after another with a steel-studded bludgeon a weapon which he had made with loving craftsmanship on the model of Blunderbore’s club in the pictures of a fairy-tale. So we laughed at the adventures of a young barrister (a brilliant fellow in the Oxford “Union”) whose pleasure it was to creep out o’ nights into No Man’s Land and lie doggo in a shell-hole close to the enemy’s barbed wire, until presently, after an hour’s waiting or two, a German soldier would crawl out to fetch in a corpse. The English barrister lay with his rifle ready. Where there had been one corpse there were two. Each night he made a notch on his rifle three notches one night to check the number of his victims. Then he came back to breakfast in his dugout with a hearty appetite.

It was only when it came time for bathing that he left again. He could touch her forehead, auscultate her lungs, he could bear the weight of her breast against his hand as he listened to her heart. But bathe her as she had bathed the soldiers? When he had once touched the rim of his canteen just to feel where she had pressed her lips? No: once in her ravings, her shirt had lifted to reveal her navel, her iliac crest, a little curl of hair above the symphysis, and Lucius had frozen, unable to look away. No, the thoughts of undressing her, the complex mix of fear and yearning, were too much for him to bear. But she was burning up. Better Zmudowski, uxorious philatelist, responsible paterfamilias. Lucius stood outside the door and watched the sparrows, listening to the slosh of water, the squish of sponge. Day three: the fever broke. The wound looked better, less purulent, its color less exuberant. He felt himself buoyed, only to touch her head two hours later and sink. The mercury reached the highest notches on the glass. This was worse, he thought—it meant the infection was within, unseen, a witch’s hex.

In 2010, computer games were sold to the tune of $46.7 billion. That’s more than double the total amount of music sold, $16.4 billion. If you believe the industry’s own statistics, the consumer demographics are a far cry from the usual picture of gamers as mainly young men and boys. Four out of ten players in the United States are women. Three out of ten are over fifty years old, and only one out of ten is a boy under seventeen years old. Today, gaming is one of the world’s largest, most appreciated, and most demographically widespread forms of entertainment.

In every potential sponsor’s eyes, I was a nobody. And soon I had notched up more rejection letters than is healthy for any one man to receive. I tried to think of an entrepreneur and adventurer that I admired, and I kept coming back to Sir Richard Branson, the founder of Virgin. I wrote to him once, then I wrote once more. In all, I sent twenty-three letters. No response. Right, I thought, I’ll find out where he lives and take my proposal there myself. So I did precisely that, and at 8:00 P.M. one cold evening, I rang his very large doorbell. A voice answered the intercom, and I mumbled my pitch into the speakerphone. A housekeeper’s voice told me to leave the proposal--and get lost. It’s not clear quite what happened next: I assume that whoever had answered the intercom meant just to switch it off, but instead they pressed the switch that opened the front door. The buzzing sound seemed to last forever--but it was probably only a second or two. In that time I didn’t have time to think, I just reacted…and instinctively nudged the door open. Suddenly I found myself standing in the middle of Sir Richard Branson’s substantial, marble-floored entrance hall. “Uh, hello!” I hollered into the empty hall. “Sorry, but you seem to have buzzed the door open,” I apologized to the emptiness. The next thing I knew, the housekeeper came flying down the stairs, shouting at me to leave. I duly dropped the proposal and scarpered. The next day, I sent around some flowers, apologizing for the intrusion and asking the great man to take a look at my proposal. I added that I was sure, in his own early days, he would probably have done the same thing. I never got a reply to that one, either.

I had the most ridiculous dream.” I point at my brother. “You were there.” I point at Simon beside him. “And you.” Then Franny, all of them huddled on the floor around me. “And you too. You . . . abdicated the throne, Nicholas. And they all wanted to make me king.” A maniacal laugh passes my lips . . . until I turn to the right and see dark blue eyes, sweet lips. and black, swirling hair. Then I scream like a girl. “Ahhhh!” It’s Olivia. My brother’s wife. His very American wife. I turn back to Nicholas. “It wasn’t a dream, was it?” “No, Henry.” I lie back down on the floor. “Fuuuuuck.” Then I feel sort of bad. “Sorry, Olive. You know I think you’re top-notch.” She smiles kindly. “It’s okay, Henry. I’m sorry you’re having a hard time.” I scrub my hand over my face, trying to think clearly. “It’s all right. This is a better, new plan—I won’t have to live under the stage now.” “You were going to live under the stage?” Nicholas asks. I wave my hand. “Forget it. It was Potter’s stupid idea. Boy Wonder Wizard, my arse.” And now my brother looks really worried. I gesture to him. “But you’re here now. You can take me with you back to the States.” “Henry . . .” “Give me your tired, poor, huddled masses yearning to be free—that describes me perfectly! I’m a huddled mass, Nicholas!” He squeezes my arms, shaking just a bit. “Henry. You can’t move to America.” I grasp his shirt. And my voice morphs into an eight-year-old boy’s, confessing he sees dead people. “But she’s so mean, Nicholas. She’s. So. Mean.” He taps my back. “I know.” Nicholas and Simon drag me up, holding on so that I stay on my feet. “But we’ll figure it out,” Nicholas says. “It’s going to be all right.” I shake my head. “You keep saying that. I’m starting to think you don’t know what the hell you’re talking about.

at the moment—and looking for other boats. Kelly advanced the port throttle a notch farther as he turned the wheel, allowing Springer to pivot all the more quickly in the narrow channel, and then he was pointed straight out. He advanced the starboard throttle next, bringing his cruiser to a mannerly five knots as he headed past the ranks of motor and sail yachts. Pam was looking around at the boats, too, mainly aft, and her eyes fixed on the parking lot for a long couple of seconds before she looked forward again, her body relaxing more as she did so. “You know anything about boats?” Kelly asked. “Not much,” she admitted, and for the first time he noticed her accent. “Where you from?” “Texas. How about you?” “Indianapolis, originally, but it’s been a while.” “What’s this?” she asked. Her hands reached out to touch the tattoo on his forearm. “It’s from one of the places I’ve been,” he said. “Not a very nice place.” “Oh, over there.” She understood. “That’s the place.” Kelly nodded matter-of-factly. They were out of the yacht basin now, and he advanced the throttles yet again. “What did you do there?” “Nothing to talk to a lady about,” Kelly replied, looking around from a half-standing position. “What makes you think I’m a lady?” she asked. It caught him short, but he was getting used to it by now. He’d also found that talking to a girl, no matter what the subject, was something that he needed to do. For the first time he answered her smile with one of his own. “Well, it wouldn’t be very nice of me if I assumed that you weren’t.” “I wondered how long it would be before you smiled.” You have a very nice smile, her tone told him. How’s six months grab you? he almost said. Instead he laughed, mainly at himself. That was something else he needed to do. “I’m sorry. Guess I haven’t been very good company.” He turned to look at her again and saw understanding in her eyes. Just a quiet look, very human and feminine, but it shook Kelly. He could feel it happen, and ignored the part of his consciousness that told him that it was something he’d needed badly for months. That was something he didn’t need to hear, especially from himself. Loneliness was bad enough without reflection on its misery. Her hand reached out yet again, ostensibly to stroke the tattoo, but that wasn’t what it was all about. It was amazing how warm her touch was, even under a hot afternoon sun. Perhaps it was a measure of just how cold his life had become. But he had a boat to navigate. There was

When I went to prison and came out, it was like another stripe being added to my shoulder—another notch of respect on my belt. On the streets, you cannot get a name until you do something. You have to prove who you are by doing something outrageous, like shooting someone from a rival gang. It allowed others to see what type of person you were, and established the fact that you were ready for anything. Back in the day, what we were looking for was for someone to have our backs. So every time I did something and was recognized for what I did, it gave me more nerves to continue. After the deed was all said and done, and we were hanging on the blocks, everyone is praising you and talking about what you did. You all should have been there. You should have seen how Taco rushed up on that fella and dealt with him. Those praises were like drugs that eventually poison the mind, and gave you more inspiration to do things to have more people talking about you. People recognizing you as one who isn’t scared, one who is ready to do whatever is needed. No one ever wants to go to prison. I never wanted to go to prison. I just wanted to be recognized as one willing and ready for a battle anytime. Troit Lynes, former death row inmate of Her Majesty Prison in the Bahamas

Cecily let her cheek fall to Leta’s shoulder and hugged her back. It felt so nice to be loved by someone in the world. Since her mother’s death, she’d had no one of her own. It was a lonely life, despite the excitement and adventure her work held for her. She wasn’t openly affectionate at all, except with Leta. “For God’s sake, next you’ll be rocking her to sleep at night!” came a deep, disgusted voice at Cecily’s back, and Cecily stiffened because she recognized it immediately. “She’s my baby girl,” Leta told her tall, handsome son with a grin. “Shut up.” Cecily turned a little awkwardly. She hadn’t expected this. Tate Winthrop towered over both of them. His jet-black hair was loose as he never wore it in the city, falling thick and straight almost to his waist. He was wearing a breastplate with buckskin leggings and high-topped mocassins. There were two feathers straight up in his hair with notches that had meaning among his people, marks of bravery. Cecily tried not to stare at him. He was the most beautiful man she’d ever known. Since her seventeenth birthday, Tate had been her world. Fortunately he didn’t realize that her mad flirting hid a true emotion. In fact, he treated her exactly as he had when she came to him for comfort after her mother had died suddenly; as he had when she came to him again with bruises all over her thin, young body from her drunken stepfather’s violent attack. Although she dated, she’d never had a serious boyfriend. She had secret terrors of intimacy that had never really gone away, except when she thought of Tate that way. She loved him… “Why aren’t you dressed properly?” Tate asked, scowling at her skirt and blouse. “I bought you buckskins for your birthday, didn’t I?” “Three years ago,” she said without meeting his probing eyes. She didn’t like remembering that he’d forgotten her birthday this year. “I gained weight since then.” “Oh. Well, find something you like here…” She held up a hand. “I don’t want you to buy me anything else,” she said flatly, and didn’t back down from the sudden menace in his dark eyes. “I’m not dressing up like a Lakota woman. In case you haven’t noticed, I’m blond. I don’t want to be mistaken for some sort of overstimulated Native American groupie buying up artificial artifacts and enthusing over citified Native American flute music, trying to act like a member of the tribe.” “You belong to it,” he returned. “We adopted you years ago.” “So you did,” she said. That was how he thought of her-a sister. That wasn’t the way she wanted him to think of her. She smiled faintly. “But I won’t pass for a Lakota, whatever I wear.” “You could take your hair down,” he continued thoughtfully. She shook her head. She only let her hair loose at night, when she went to bed. Perhaps she kept it tightly coiled for pure spite, because he loved long hair and she knew it. “How old are you?” he asked, trying to remember. “Twenty, isn’t it?” “I was, give years ago,” she said, exasperated. “You used to work for the CIA. I seem to remember that you went to college, too, and got a law degree. Didn’t they teach you how to count?” He looked surprised. Where had the years gone? She hadn’t aged, not visibly.

Would we get on well together, do you think?” she asked dubiously, daring to play with the knot of his necktie, loosening the gray watered-silk fabric with her fingertips. “We’re opposites in nearly every regard.” Inclining his head, Marcus nuzzled the tender inside of her wrist, his lips brushing the blue-tinted veins that lay like fine lacework beneath the skin. “I am coming to believe that taking a wife who is exactly like myself would be the worst conceivable decision I could make.” “Perhaps you’re right,” Lillian mused, letting her fingertips curl into the gleaming close-cut hair at the side of his head. “You need a wife who won’t let you have your way all the time. One who…” She paused with a little shiver as his tongue touched a delicate spot near her inner elbow. “Who,” she continued, struggling to gather her thoughts, “would be willing to take you down a notch when you become too pompous…” “I am never pompous,” Marcus said, drawing the edge of her gown away from the vulnerable curve of her throat. Her breath hitched as he began to kiss the wing of her collarbone. “What would you call it when you carry on as if you always know best, and anyone who disagrees with you is an idiot?” “Most of the time, the people who disagree with me do happen to be idiots. I can’t help that.

Out beyond and way back and further past that still. And such was it since. But after all appearances and some afternoons misspent it came to pass not all was done and over with. No, no. None shally shally on that here hill. Ah, but that was idle then and change was not an old hand. No, no. None shilly shilly on that here first rung. So, much girded and with new multitudes, a sun came purple and the hail turned in a year or two. And that was not all. No, no. None ganny ganny on that here moon loose. Turns were taken and time put in, so much heft and grimace, there, with callouses, all along the diagonal. Like no other time and the time taken back, that too like none other that can be compared to a bovine heap raising steam, or the eye-cast of a flailing comet. Back and forth, examining the egg spill and the cord fray and the clowning barnacle. And all day with no break to unwrap or unscrew or squint and flex or soak the brush. No, no. None flim flim on that here cavorting mainstay. From tree to tree and the pond there deepening and some small holes appearing and any number of cornstalks twisting into a thing far from corn. That being the case there was some wretched plotting, turned to stone, holding nothing. No, no. None rubby rubby on that here yardstick. Came then from the region of silt and aster, all along the horse trammel and fire velvet, first these sounds and then their makers. When passed betwixt and entered fully, pails were swung and notches considered. There was no light. No, none. None wzm wzm on that here piss crater. And it being the day, still considered. Oh, all things considered and not one mentioned, since all names had turned in and handed back. Knowing this the hounds disbanded and knowing that the ground muddled headstones and milestones and gallows and the almond-shaped buds of freshest honeysuckle. And among this chafing tumult fates were scrambled and mortality made untidy and pithy vows took themselves a breather. This being the way and irreversible homewards now was a lifted skeletal thing of the past, without due application or undue meaning. No, no. None shap shap on that here domicile shank. From right foot to left, first by the firs, then by the river, hung and loitered, and the blaze there slow to come. All night waking with no benefit of sleeping and the breath cranking and the heart-place levering and the kerosene pervading but failing to jerk a flame from out any one thing. No, none. None whoosh whoosh on that here burnished cunt. Oh, the earth, the earth and the women there, inside the simpering huts, stamped and spiritless, blowing on the coals. Not far away, but beyond the way of return.

Her problem was that she thought too much- “toxic thinking” and so forth- so she tried to stop, but a physical sensation of exertion remained. Was it her fault that her husband made more money? That it made more sense for her to quit her job than for him to quit his? Was it her fault that he was always gone, rendering her a de facto single mom for the majority of the week? Was it her fault that she found playing trains really, really boring? That she longed for even the smallest bit of mental stimulation, for a return to her piles of books, to her long-abandoned closet of half-formed projects, to one entire afternoon of solitude and silence? Was it her fault that, though she longed for mental stimulation, she still found herself unable to concoct a single, original thought or opinion? She did not actually care about anything anymore. Politics, art, philosophy, film: all boring. She craved gossip and reality TV. Was it her fault that she hated herself for her preference for reality TV? Was it her fault that she had bought into the popular societal myth that if a young woman merely secured a top-notch education she could then free herself from the historical constraints of motherhood, that if she simply had a career she could easily return to work after having a baby and sidestep the drudgery of previous generations, even though having a baby did not, in any way, represent a departure from work to which a woman might, theoretically, one day return. It actually, instead, marked an immersion in work, and unimaginable weight of work, a multiplication of work exponential in its scope, staggering, so staggering, both physically and psychically (especially psychically), that even the most mentally well person might be brought to her knees beneath such a load, a load that pitted ambition against biology, careerism against instinct, that bade the modern mother be less of an animal in order to be happy, because- come on, now- we’re evolved and civilized, and, really, what is your problem? Pull it together. This is embarrassing.

The hot crown of his cock notched against my sex, and we both stopped, our gazes clashing. "Em." I knew what he meant. This felt different. This felt more like than sex. He didn't look away as he slowly pushed into me, all that hot girth making itself at home. I moaned and spread my legs wider, working with him. He was big. And there. And it felt so good I could barely breathe through it all. Lucian dipped his head, trembling with effort to go slow. "God. God. You feel..." He broke off with a tortured groan and a hard thrust, filling me completely. I closed my eyes, my hands smoothing over his damp back. "So good, Lucian. So good." That was all he needed. Moving like liquid, he rocked into me, kissing my mouth, whispering how much he wanted me. I grew incandescent with it, heat licking through me in waves. Lucian fucked like he did most everything, with perfect finesse and fierce determination. With swagger. Soon we were both panting, moving faster, reaching for that peak yet wanting to prolong it. "I don't want it to end," he said against my mouth. But then he canted his hips, hitting that spot that lit me up and made me scream. There was no more finesse, no more drawing it out. Just basic rutting, fucking each other like we might die and not get another chance. And when he came, I stared up at him, at those muscles straining, his wintergreen eyes gleaming in lust and surprise, as though he couldn't quite believe how good it was. Neither could I. Because it had never been like this.

Who’s Josie?” Alex asked, confused. “Uh . . .” I looked over at Deacon. “You want to do the honors? I know how much you love awkward conversations.” A wide smile broke out across his face. “Of course, especially when I’m not the center of the awkwardness.” Luke snorted. “So!” Deacon clapped his hands together as he faced Alex and Aiden. “Did you guys happen to notice a certain girl out on the quad when you did your magic doorway thing?” Aiden glanced at Alex. She raised a shoulder. “There were a lot of people out there that I hadn’t seen before.” She paused. “I noticed Boobs, though.” I slowly shook my head. “Um, that’s not who I’m talking about. Anyway,” Deacon said, his gray eyes light. “She’s pretty tall. Well, taller than you and everyone is practically taller than you, Alex. Has long blondish-brown hair. Kind of weird hair.” “Awesome hair,” Luke added. Alexander frowned silently. “She does. It’s like an array of colors. One moment it looks completely blonde. The next it’s long brown and then it changes again. It’s very cool,” Deacon continued, and I had to agree with him on that. “And when you see her, you’re going to think, wow, this girl looks familiar. You won’t be able to put a finger on it at first, but it’s going to nag at you and then, when it hits you, you’ll—” “Deacon,” Aiden warned. “Who is Josie?” His brother pouted for a second and then sighed. “Fine. She’s a demigod. Like, a born demigod. Powers unlocked and all, and she’s super-cool and really nice.” His gaze slid over to where I stood and his expression turned sly. “Isn’t that right, Seth?” I eyed him. “Right.” “You’re forgetting the best part.” Solos walked past the couch, sending me a long look. “Which god she came from.” Aiden seemed to get what wasn’t being said first. His eyes closed as he rubbed his fingers along his brow. “Gods.” “What?” Alex looked at him and then at me. “Whose kid is she?” “Apollo’s,” Deacon answered, his smile going up a notch when Alex’s gaze flew to him. “Yep. Josie is Apollo’s daughter.” Her mouth dropped open. “And that kind of makes you and her cousins? I guess?” Luke frowned. “I don’t know what exactly, but it does make you two related. Somehow. I don’t know how, but she does have some of your mannerisms. It gets really weird sometimes.

They got to the classroom she and Jay shared this period, but it wasn’t Grady’s class. Instead of walking on, Grady paused. “Violet, can I talk to you for a minute?” His deep voice surprised her again. “Yeah, okay,” Violet agreed, curious about what he might have to say to her. Jay stopped and waited too, but when Grady didn’t say anything, it became clear that he’d meant he wanted to talk to her . . . alone. Jay suddenly seemed uncomfortable and tried to excuse himself as casually as he could. “I’ll see you inside,” he finally said to Violet. She nodded to him as he left. Violet was a little worried that the bell was going to ring and she’d be tardy again, but her curiosity had kicked up a notch when she realized that Grady didn’t want Jay to hear what he had to say, and that far outweighed her concern for late slips. When they were alone, and Grady didn’t start talking right away, Violet prompted him. “What’s going on?” She watched him swallow, and his Adam’s apple bobbed up and down along the length of his throat. It was strange to see her old guy friends in this new light. He’d always been a good-looking kid, but now he looked like a man . . . even though he still acted like a boy. He shifted back and forth, and if she had taken the time to think about it, she would have realized that he was nervous. But she misread his discomfort altogether. She thought that, like her, he was worried about being late. “Do you want to talk after school? I could meet you in the parking lot.” “No. No. Now’s good.” He ran his hand through his hair in a discouraged gesture. He took a deep breath, but his voice was still shaking when he spoke. “I . . . I was wondering . . .” He looked Violet right in the eye now, and suddenly she felt very nervous about where this might be going. She was desperately wishing she hadn’t let Jay leave her here alone. “I was wondering if you’re planning to go to Homecoming,” Grady finally blurted out. She stood there, looking at him, feeling trapped by the question and not sure what she was going to say. The bell rang, and both of them jumped. Violet was grateful for the excuse, and she clung to it like a life preserver. Her eyes were wide, and she pointed to the door behind her. “I gotta . . . can we . . .” She pointed again, and she knew she looked and sounded like an idiot, incapable of coherent speech. “Can we talk after school?” Grady seemed relieved to have been let off the hook for the moment. “Sure. Yeah. I’ll talk to you after school.” He left without saying good-bye, and Violet, thankful herself, tried to slip into her classroom unnoticed. But she had no such luck. The teacher marked her tardy, and everyone in class watched as she made her way to her seat beside Jay’s. Her face felt flushed and hot. “What was that all about?” Jay asked in a loud whisper. She still felt like her head was reeling. She had no idea what she was going to say to Grady when school was out. “I think Grady just asked me to Homecoming,” she announced to Jay. He looked at her suspiciously. “The game?” Violet cocked her head to the side and gave him a look that told him to be serious. “No, I’m pretty sure he meant the dance,” Violet clarified, exasperated by the obtuse question. Jay frowned at her. “What did you say?” “I didn’t say anything. The bell rang and I told him we’d have to talk later.” The teacher glanced their way, and they pretended not to be talking to each other.

Letter You can see it already: chalks and ochers; Country crossed with a thousand furrow-lines; Ground-level rooftops hidden by the shrubbery; Sporadic haystacks standing on the grass; Smoky old rooftops tarnishing the landscape; A river (not Cayster or Ganges, though: A feeble Norman salt-infested watercourse); On the right, to the north, bizarre terrain All angular--you'd think a shovel did it. So that's the foreground. An old chapel adds Its antique spire, and gathers alongside it A few gnarled elms with grumpy silhouettes; Seemingly tired of all the frisky breezes, They carp at every gust that stirs them up. At one side of my house a big wheelbarrow Is rusting; and before me lies the vast Horizon, all its notches filled with ocean blue; Cocks and hens spread their gildings, and converse Beneath my window; and the rooftop attics, Now and then, toss me songs in dialect. In my lane dwells a patriarchal rope-maker; The old man makes his wheel run loud, and goes Retrograde, hemp wreathed tightly round the midriff. I like these waters where the wild gale scuds; All day the country tempts me to go strolling; The little village urchins, book in hand, Envy me, at the schoolmaster's (my lodging), As a big schoolboy sneaking a day off. The air is pure, the sky smiles; there's a constant Soft noise of children spelling things aloud. The waters flow; a linnet flies; and I say: "Thank you! Thank you, Almighty God!"--So, then, I live: Peacefully, hour by hour, with little fuss, I shed My days, and think of you, my lady fair! I hear the children chattering; and I see, at times, Sailing across the high seas in its pride, Over the gables of the tranquil village, Some winged ship which is traveling far away, Flying across the ocean, hounded by all the winds. Lately it slept in port beside the quay. Nothing has kept it from the jealous sea-surge: No tears of relatives, nor fears of wives, Nor reefs dimly reflected in the waters, Nor importunity of sinister birds.

Treating Abuse Today 3(4) pp. 26-33 Freyd: The term "multiple personality" itself assumes that there is "single personality" and there is evidence that no one ever displays a single personality. TAT: The issue here is the extent of dissociation and amnesia and the extent to which these fragmentary aspects of personality can take executive control and control function. Sure, you and I have different parts to our mind, there's no doubt about that, but I don't lose time to mine they can't come out in the middle of a lecture and start acting 7 years old. I'm very much in the camp that says that we all are multi-minds, but the difference between you and me and a multiple is pretty tangible. Freyd: Those are clearly interesting questions, but that area and the clinical aspects of dissociation and multiple personalities is beyond anything the Foundation is actively... TAT: That's a real problem. Let me tell you why that's a problem. Many of the people that have been alleged to have "false memory syndrome" have diagnosed dissociative disorders. It seems to me the fact that you don't talk about dissociative disorders is a little dishonest, since many people whose lives have been impacted by this movement are MPD or have a dissociative disorder. To say, "Well, we ONLY know about repression but not about dissociation or multiple personalities" seems irresponsible. Freyd: Be that as it may, some of the scientific issues with memory are clear. So if we can just stick with some things for a moment; one is that memories are reconstructed and reinterpreted no matter how long ago or recent. TAT: You weigh the recollected testimony of an alleged perpetrator more than the alleged victim's. You're saying, basically, if the parents deny it, that's another notch for disbelief. Freyd: If it's denied, certainly one would want to check things. It would have to be one of many factors that are weighed -- and that's the problem with these issues -- they are not black and white, they're very complicated issues.

Pointsman is the only one here maintaining his calm. He appears unruffled and strong. His lab coats have even begun lately to take on a Savile Row serenity, suppressed waist, flaring vents, finer material, rather rakishly notched lapels. In this parched and fallow time, he gushes affluence. After the baying has quieted down at last, he speaks, soothing: “There’s no danger.” “No danger?” screams Aaron Throwster, and the lot of them are off again muttering and growling. “Slothrop’s knocked out Dodson-Truck and the girl in one day!” “The whole thing’s falling apart, Pointsman!” “Since Sir Stephen came back, Fitzmaurice House has dropped out of our scheme, and there’ve been embarrassing inquires down from Duncan Sandys—“ “That’s the P.M.’s son-in-law, Pointsman, not good, not good!” “We’ve already begun to run into a deficit—“ “Funding,” IF you can keep your head, “is available, and will be coming in before long… certainly before we run into any serious trouble. Sir Stephen, far from being ‘knocked out,’ is quite happily at work at Fitzmaurice House, and is At Home there should any of you wish to confirm. Miss Borgesius is still active in the program, and Mr. Duncan Sandys is having all his questions answered. But best of all, we are budgeted well into fiscal ’46 before anything like a deficit begins to rear its head.” “Your Interested Parties again?” sez Rollo Groast. “Ah, I noticed Clive Mossmoon from Imperial Chemicals closeted with you day before yesterday,” Edwin Treacle mentions now. “Clive Mossmoon and I took an organic chemistry course or two together back at Manchester. Is ICI one of our, ah, sponsors, Pointsman?” “No,” smoothly, “Mossmoon, actually, is working out of Malet Street these days. I’m afraid we were up to nothing more sinister than a bit of routine coordination over the Schwarzkommando business.” “The hell you were. I happen to know Clive’s at ICI, managing some sort of polymer research.” They stare at each other. One is lying, or bluffing, or both are, or all of the above. But whatever it is Pointsman has a slight advantage. By facing squarely the extinction of his program, he has gained a great of bit of Wisdom: that if there is a life force operating in Nature, still there is nothing so analogous in a bureaucracy. Nothing so mystical. It all comes down, as it must, to the desires of men. Oh, and women too of course, bless their empty little heads. But survival depends on having strong enough desires—on knowing the System better than the other chap, and how to use it. It’s work, that’s all it is, and there’s no room for any extrahuman anxieties—they only weaken, effeminize the will: a man either indulges them, or fights to win, und so weiter. “I do wish ICI would finance part of this,” Pointsman smiles. “Lame, lame,” mutters the younger Dr. Groast. “What’s it matter?” cries Aaron Throwster. “If the old man gets moody at the wrong time this whole show can prang.” “Brigadier Pudding will not go back on any of his commitments,” Pointsman very steady, calm, “we have made arrangements with him. The details aren’t important.” They never are, in these meetings of his.

HERE ARE MY TEN BEEF NOODLE SOUP COMMANDMENTS: 1. Throw out the first: always flash-boil your bones and beef to get the “musk” out. I’ve gone back and forth on this a lot. I would sometimes brown the meat as opposed to boil, but decided in the end that for this soup, you gotta boil. If you brown, it’s overpowering. The lesson that beef noodle soup teaches you is restraint. Sometimes less is more if you want all the flavors in the dish to speak to you. 2. Make sure the oil is medium-high when the aromatics go down and get a slight caramelization. It’s a fine line. Too much caramelization and it becomes too heavy, but no caramelization and your stock is weak. 3. Rice wine can be tricky. Most people like to vaporize it so that all the alcohol is cooked off. I like to leave a little of the alcohol flavor ’cause it tends to cut through the grease a bit. 4. Absolutely no butter, lard, or duck fat. I’ve seen people in America try to “kick it up a notch” with animal fats and it ruins the soup. Peanut oil or die. 5. Don’t burn the chilis and peppercorns, not even a little bit. You want the spice and the numbness, but not the smokiness. 6. After sautéing the chilis/peppercorns, turn off the heat and let them sit in the oil to steep. This is another reason you want to turn the heat off early. 7. Strain your chilis/peppercorns out of the oil, put them in a muslin bag, and set them aside. Then add ginger/garlic/scallions to the oil in that order. Stage them. 8. I use tomatoes in my beef noodle soup, but I add them after the soup is finished and everything is strained. I let them hang out in the soup as it sits on the stove over the course of the day. I cut the tomatoes thin so they give off flavor without having to cook too long and so you can serve them still intact. 9. Always use either shank or chuck flap. Brisket is too tough. If you want to make it interesting, add pig’s foot or oxtail. 10. Do you. I don’t give you measurements with this because I gave you all the ingredients and the technique. The best part about beef noodle soup is that there are no rules. It just has to have beef, noodle, and soup. There are people that do clear broth beef noodle soup. Beef noodle soup with dairy. Beef noodle soup with pig’s blood. It would suck if you looked at my recipe and never made your own, ’cause everyone has a beef noodle soup in them. Show it to me.

In the world of mental health, the lowest-functioning clients and the highest-functioning clients receive the worst care. The lowest-functioning clients typically struggle with serious mental illnesses that are maintained more than cured. And, because of downward drift that draws a disproportionate number of such patients into the lower income brackets, these clients often do not have access to top-notch care. The highest-functioning clients, on the other hand, usually have a lot going for them, including family or schools that connect them with private therapists when needed. These high-functioning clients are what therapists call YAVIS—young, attractive, verbal, intelligent, and successful—and these qualities bestow all sorts of social and psychological advantages. Being young means, as a colleague once put it, “that you haven’t completely screwed up your life yet.” Being verbal allows you to easily exchange a common currency with friends and bosses as you parlay being talkative into social status. Intelligence aids achievement and problem-solving, and even leadership. Successful people are generally brimming with confidence. And, as Aristotle said, “beauty is a greater recommendation than any letter of introduction.” So, YAVIS clients are well received nearly everywhere they go, and many therapists light up when one comes walking in the door. Still, there are two paths to being smart and charming when you are young: Life has been good or life has been bad. When life has been good, maybe someone goes to see a therapist for a while because some isolated thing is not currently going well. Most likely, the difficulty will be resolved quickly and the client will be on his way. When life has been bad, someone goes to see a therapist because even though things look pretty on the outside the person feels horrible on the inside, and this is a discrepancy that even many therapists cannot hold. Sometimes it is just too jarring to imagine that someone who seems so perfect has lived a life that has been so imperfect. What results is a therapy where the client’s image gets in the way of the help that he or she needs. The client has come to focus on what has not gone well, but the therapist is blinded by what has. Too often, being successful when you are young is about survival. Some people are good at hiding their troubles. They are good at “falling up.

Fresh Pasta Dough Recipe INGREDIENTS: 1 ½ cups flour ½ cup semolina flour (pasta flour) 2 whole eggs, at room temperature 3 egg yolks, at room temperature DIRECTIONS: In a large bowl, whisk together the flour and the semolina. Create a well in the center and add the eggs and egg yolks. Using a fork, break up the eggs then gradually start to draw flour from the edges of the well into the mixture. If the dough gets too firm to mix with the fork switch to mixing with your hands. Continue to work in flour until the dough no longer sticks to your hands; you may not need to incorporate all of the flour. (I used a bit more than what the recipe called for.) Transfer the dough to a lightly floured surface and knead the dough for 8 to 10 minutes or until it is smooth and pliable. Wrap the dough tightly in plastic wrap and allow to rest for at least 30 minutes. If using a pasta roller: Divide the dough into 4 pieces. Starting with the machine set to the widest setting, pass the dough through the rollers. Fold the dough into thirds and pass it through again 2 more times. Continue passing the pasta through the machine, reducing the setting a few notches each time. You may need to dust a bit with flour if the dough sticks to the rollers at all. Once you reach your desired thickness, use the cutting attachment to cut the pasta sheet into fettuccine. Dust the cut pasta with more flour to prevent sticking and repeat with the remaining dough. If using a rolling pin: Divide the dough in half. Dust your surface with flour and sprinkle generously on your rolling pin. *Roll out the dough as thin and as evenly possible, adding flour as needed to prevent sticking. Use a paring knife (a pizza cutter works great!) to cut your dough into even ribbons, then set aside, dusting the cut pasta with more flour. Repeat with the remaining dough. (At this point, the pasta can be transferred to a sealable plastic bag and frozen for up to 3 months; do not defrost before cooking.) Cook the pasta in a large pot of generously salted boiling water, checking for doneness after just 1 minute; fresh pasta cooks very quickly. As soon as it is al dente, no more than 3 or 4 minutes, drain, reserving some of the cooking water if desired for saucing the pasta. Toss with your sauce, loosen with some of the reserved cooking water as needed and serve immediately. *Note:  You must get the dough as thin as possible and cut them into small strips, otherwise, it will be too thick and end up having the texture of dumplings.

Her feet now safely planted on level flooring, Willow nervously smoothed her skirts before lifting her head. Turquoise eyes met deep brown. Willow's mouth dropped open in shock. "Lieutenant Numbskull?" Rider stiffened, but recovered quickly. "Freckles?" he pretended surprise. Backing up a step, his appreciative gaze raked her from head to toe. "My God! It is you!" Willow's cheecks burned beneath his conspicuous appraisal. The lieutenant's pleased grin fueled her simmering anger at Miriam's unwelcome matchmaking venture. "What are you doing here?" she huffed. Rider arched a dark brow in ironic amusement. "Is that any way to greet an old friend...Freckles?" "You two know each other?" Miriam interjected, astonished. "You might say that." Rider chuckled. Willow didn't know who she wanted to murder most, Miriam or the lieutenant. But standing here in all her ladylike spendor, she remembered his hurtful maligning of her femininity. For some inexplicable reason she felt compelled to prove that she could be every bit as feminine as any other woman. Despite her stormy emotions, her next words dripped off her lips like warm honey. "Unfortunately, Miriam"-she caressed Rider's coat sleeve and flapped her lashes outrageously-"we were never formally introduced." Rider eyed Willow's hand where it petted his arm, expecting claws to spring from her fingertips at any moment. Then he lifted his gaze to twin pools of mischief. One corner of his mouth crved in a wry grin. "What are you up to, Freckles?" His devastating smile was unnerving. Suddenly all too aware of her ineptitude at coquetry. Willow's confidence slipped a notch. Nevertheless, she was determined not to let him intimidate her. Casting him what she hoped would pass for a coy smile, she answered his question with an innocent shrug. Miriam blinked, agog at Willow s antics. "Well,ah...let me properly introduce you two. Mr. Sinclair, this is Miss Willow Vaughn. Willow, this is Mr. Rider Sinclair." Willow inclined her head with forced politeness. Rider tossed her a sly wink. Befuddled by the stratified undercurrents, Miriam sputtered. "I...ah...I'm sorry to hurry the introductions, but we really are late. My carriage is waiting out front for us. Shall we go?" "But of course." Rider held the door open, indicating they should proceed him. "Ladies..." Willow waited while he closed the door, then draped herself over his proferred arm. Miriam took his other arm and cast a warning glance at the younger woman. The girl smiled back angelically, deciding Miriam deserved to worry-just a little.

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