Plaid Quotes

Once you can accept the universe as matter expanding into nothing that is something, wearing stripes with plaid comes easy.

Peeta, you said at the interview you’d had a crush on me forever. When did forever start? Oh, let’s see. I guess the first day of school. We were five. You had on a red plaid dress and your hair...it was in two braids instead of one. My father pointed you out when we were waiting to line up." Your father? Why?" He said, ‘See that little girl? I wanted to marry her mother, but she ran off with a coal miner.'" What? You’re making that up!" No, true story. And I said, 'A coal miner? Why did she want a coal miner if she could’ve had you?' And he said, 'Because when he sings...even the birds stop to listen.

You wake up one morning and there it is, sitting in an old plaid bathrobe in your kitchen, unpleasant and unshaved. You look at it, heart sinking. Madness is a rotten guest.

When I was young and bold and strong, The right was right, the wrong was wrong. With plume on high and flag unfurled, I rode away to right the world. But now I’m old - and good and bad, Are woven in a crazy plaid. I sit and say the world is so, And wise is s/he who lets it go.

I tugged at the hem of my brand-new Hecate Hall issue blue plaid skirt (Kilt? Some sort of bizarre skirt/kilt hybrid? A skilt?)

Man is the Reasoning Animal. Such is the claim. I think it is open to dispute. Indeed, my experiments have proven to me that he is the Unreasoning Animal... In truth, man is incurably foolish. Simple things which other animals easily learn, he is incapable of learning. Among my experiments was this. In an hour I taught a cat and a dog to be friends. I put them in a cage. In another hour I taught them to be friends with a rabbit. In the course of two days I was able to add a fox, a goose, a squirrel and some doves. Finally a monkey. They lived together in peace; even affectionately. Next, in another cage I confined an Irish Catholic from Tipperary, and as soon as he seemed tame I added a Scotch Presbyterian from Aberdeen. Next a Turk from Constantinople; a Greek Christian from Crete; an Armenian; a Methodist from the wilds of Arkansas; a Buddhist from China; a Brahman from Benares. Finally, a Salvation Army Colonel from Wapping. Then I stayed away for two whole days. When I came back to note results, the cage of Higher Animals was all right, but in the other there was but a chaos of gory odds and ends of turbans and fezzes and plaids and bones and flesh--not a specimen left alive. These Reasoning Animals had disagreed on a theological detail and carried the matter to a Higher Court.

The shirt seemed heavy until he saw there was another shirt inside it, the sleeves carefully worked down inside Jack’s sleeves. It was his own plaid shirt, lost, he’d thought, long ago in some damn laundry, his dirty shirt, the pocket ripped, buttons missing, stolen by Jack and hidden here inside Jack’s own shirt, the pair like two skins, one inside the other, two in one.

When I pictured myself, it was always like just an outline in a coloring book, with the inside not yet completed. All the standard features were there. but the colors, the zigzags and plaids, the bits and pieces that made up me, Halley, weren't yet in place. Scarlett's vibrant reds and golds helped some, but I was still waiting.

We were five. You had a plaid dress and your hair...it was in two braids instead of one. My father pointed you out while we were waiting to line up. He said, 'See that little girl? I wanted to marry her mother, but she ran off with a coal miner.' And I said, 'A coal miner? Why did she want a coal miner if she could've had you?' And he said, 'Because when he sings...even the birds stop to listen.' So that day, in music assembly, the teacher asked who knew the valley song. Your hand shot right up in the air. She put you up on a stool and had you sing it for us. And I swear, ever bird outside the windows fell silent. And right when your song ended, I knew -just like your mother- I was a goner.

Peeta,” I say lightly. “You said at the interview you’d had a crush on me forever. When did forever start?” “Oh, let’s see. I guess the first day of school. We were five. You had on a red plaid dress and your hair... it was in two braids instead of one. My father pointed you out when we were waiting to line up,” Peeta says. “Your father? Why?” I ask. “He said, ‘See that little girl? I wanted to marry her mother, but she ran off with a coal miner,’” Peeta says. “What? You’re making that up!” I exclaim. “No, true story,” Peeta says. “And I said, ‘A coal miner? Why did she want a coal miner if she could’ve had you?’ And he said, ‘Because when he sings... even the birds stop to listen.’” “That’s true. They do. I mean, they did,” I say. I’m stunned and surprisingly moved, thinking of the baker telling this to Peeta. It strikes me that my own reluctance to sing, my own dismissal of music might not really be that I think it’s a waste of time. It might be because it reminds me too much of my father. “So that day, in music assembly, the teacher asked who knew the valley song. Your hand shot right up in the air. She stood you up on a stool and had you sing it for us. And I swear, every bird outside the windows fell silent,” Peeta says. “Oh, please,” I say, laughing. “No, it happened. And right when your song ended, I knew—just like your mother—I was a goner,” Peeta says. “Then for the next eleven years, I tried to work up the nerve to talk to you.” “Without success,” I add. “Without success. So, in a way, my name being drawn in the reaping was a real piece of luck,” says Peeta. For a moment, I’m almost foolishly happy and then confusion sweeps over me. Because we’re supposed to be making up this stuff, playing at being in love not actually being in love. But Peeta’s story has a ring of truth to it. That part about my father and the birds. And I did sing the first day of school, although I don’t remember the song. And that red plaid dress... there was one, a hand-me-down to Prim that got washed to rags after my father’s death. It would explain another thing, too. Why Peeta took a beating to give me the bread on that awful hollow day. So, if those details are true... could it all be true? “You have a... remarkable memory,” I say haltingly. “I remember everything about you,” says Peeta, tucking a loose strand of hair behind my ear. “You’re the one who wasn’t paying attention.” “I am now,” I say. “Well, I don’t have much competition here,” he says. I want to draw away, to close those shutters again, but I know I can’t. It’s as if I can hear Haymitch whispering in my ear, “Say it! Say it!” I swallow hard and get the words out. “You don’t have much competition anywhere.” And this time, it’s me who leans in.

The birds fly south for the winter not because it’s cold, but because they have wings. Similarly, love has the ultimate flight pattern, and that pattern is plaid.

For a long moment, I can feel him lying there besides me. If I turn my head to look, I’d see him with his arms tucked behind his head, wearing his plaid shirt, his eyes opened wide at the sky, his beautiful dark hair, that handsome smile on his face. But I don’t dare to look, because I’m scared no one will be there. So I just stare straight up at the stars, and allow myself to keep pretending.

As I examine my life through this book, I can't help but wonder if my mother was right. Maybe I really was what I ate. And maybe if she'd let me eat a little more sugar, I'd have come out sweeter.

Tie me up, please..." Chantal said. They looked above at some vines and roots hanging down from the grassy area above the depression in the canal they were standing in. She was in his hands—he had to comply. A little bit of kink was one of the most delicious of erotic pleasures. Catholic school girls were often the horniest—Brett could hardly contain his elation.

For the record? I have never been her baby. In fact, I reject the notion of coming out of her body. I prefer to believe I was hatched, or perhaps purchased.

When you’re embarrassed, you turn red. When I blush, I turn plaid. I network at kilt conventions, so even if I say something awkward I still look cool.

I tugged at the hem of my brand-new Hecate Hall-issue blue plaid skirt(Kilt? Some sort of bizarre skirt/kilt hybrid? A skilt?) and wondered why a school in the middle of the Deep South would have wool uniforms.

That night, before bed, he goes first to Willem's side of the closet, which he has still not emptied. Here are Willem's shirts on their hangers, and his sweaters on their shelves, and his shoes lined up beneath. He takes down the shirt he needs, a burgundy plaid woven through with threads of yellow, which Willem used to wear around the house in the springtime, and shrugs it on over his head. But instead of putting his arms through its sleeves, he ties the sleeves in front of him, which makes the shirt look like a straitjacket, but which he can pretend—if he concentrates—are Willem's arms in an embrace around him. He climbs into bed. This ritual embarrasses and shames him, but he only does it when he really needs it, and tonight he really needs it.

Who are you?" Violet asked. It is confusing to fall asleep in the daytime and wake up at night. "what are you doing with Uncle Monty's reptiles?" Klaus asked. It is also confusing to realize you have been sleeping on stairs, rather than in a bed or sleeping bag. "Dixnik?" Sunny asked. It is always confusing why anyone would choose to wear a plaid shirt.

I supposed images of an evil god who wanted to break free of his mythological prison and enslave the whole world weren't any scarier than a guy wearing big red shoes,yellow plaid pants,and white face paint.Clowns had always creeped me out. They were so not funny.

I keep my eyes on his bedspread—blue-and-white plaid, very male—and try to remember how Isla-of-the-past would have fainted if she could see Isla-of-the-present.

Point? Maybe you aren't a Carrie or a Samantha or a Charlotte or a Miranda. Maybe you're just you.

My stake is always, of course, in the unmentioned girl in the plaid silk dress. Remember what it was to be me: that is always the point.

Seriously, our nation is never going to be on the same page on issues like gun control, welfare, the economy, the environment, etc. I doubt we'll ever come to terms on tastes great or less filling and hybrids versus Hummers, and there will always be Yankees fans and Red Sox fans, and never the 'twain shall meet. Fortunately, all it takes for us to be of one mind is some buttercream frosting.

I was crying and laughing, snuffing tears and blood, bumping at him with my bound hands, trying awkwardly to thrust them at him so that he could cut the rope. He quit grappling, and clutched me so hard against him that I yelped in pain as my face was pressed against his plaid. He was saying something else, urgently, but I couldn’t manage to translate it. Energy pulsed through him, hot and violent, like the current in a live wire, and I vaguely realized that he was still almost berserk; he had no English.

He shrugged happily. “Let’s make plaid, canvas and compasses my absolute trademarks. Dustin McHugh. All plaid. All canvas. All the time. And I’m never lost. What say you, dork judge?

Gwen smiled. "Hardly. Bedraggled is being in the full throes of nicotine withdrawal, and after a week on a bus with a group of senior citizens, falling into a cave, and landing on a body." "And then getting tossed back a few centuries, with no idea of what's going on," Chloe agreed. "Naked, too, weren't you?" Gwen nodded wryly. Gabby blinked. "I gave you my plaid," Drustan protested indignantly.

Wide brimmed and narrow, some tall, some not, some fancy, some colorful, some plaid, some plain. She doted on changing hats at every opportunity. When she met the Prince, she was wearing one hat, when he asked her for a stroll, she excused herself, shortly to return wearing another, equally flattering.

Orafoura paid me in pajamas, and I let him because the pajamas matched his plaid mustache.

Oh, sweet plaid knickerbockers of Zeus. We were doomed.

The speaker was stringy and angular, his blond hair pulled back in a ponytail, his plaid workman's shirtsleeves rolled up around his pale biceps. Journalism major, I guessed.

Careful!” I said. “Don’t twist like that, or your dressing will come off! What are you trying to do?” “Get my plaid loose to cover you,” he replied. “You’re shivering. But I canna do it one-handed. Can ye reach the clasp of my brooch for me?” With a good deal of tugging and awkward shifting, we got the plaid loosened. With a surprisingly dexterous swirl, he twirled the cloth out and let it settle, shawllike, around his shoulders. He then put the ends over my shoulders and tucked them neatly under the saddle edge, so that we were both warmly wrapped. “There!” he said. “We dinna want ye to freeze before we get there.” “Thank you,” I said, grateful for the shelter. “But where are we going?” I couldn’t see his face, behind and above me, but he paused a moment before answering. At last he laughed shortly. “Tell ye the truth, lassie, I don’t know. Reckon we’ll both find out when we get there, eh?

Behind the ticket counter stood a man as skinny as a soaked poodle. He sported a shirt of swatch-sized plaid and a blond ponytail that, unless destined for a chemotherapy patient, should have been immediately chopped off, buried in an unmarked grave, and never spoken of again. Hipsterdom's a tightrope strung across the canyon of douche-baggery. He clung by a finger.

To know a thing you have to trust what you know, and all that you know, and as far as you know in whatever direction your knowing drags you. I once had a pet pine squirrel named Omar who lived in the cotton secret and springy dark of our old green davenport; Omar knew that davenport; he knew from the Inside what I only sat on from the Out, and trusted his knowledge to keep from being squashed by my ignorance. He survived until a red plaid blanket--spread to camouflage the worn-out Outside--confused him so he lost his faith in his familiarity with the In. Instead of trying to incorporate a plaid exterior into the scheme of his world he moved to the rainspout at the back of the house and was drowned in the first fall shower, probably still blaming that blanket: damn this world that just won't hold still for us! Damn it anyway!

The glow dies down, and she's standing at the end of my bed--the one who's been following me around leaving feather messages. I take in the torn fishnets, plaid mini-kilt, shiny, riveted breastplate with leather straps at the sides and a worn Great Temolo decal near the left shoulder. Her wings are a crazy black-and-white-checkered pattern, like they've been spray-painted at a body shop to look like hipster sneakers.

I’m busy sorting through our new collection of rhinestone jewelry. Should anyone be in the market for sparkly accessories the size of a hubcap, this is the place to get them. Earlier today, a customer picked up one of the enormous chandelier-style offerings and asked, 'Do those be genuine rhimestones?' I couldn’t even begin to explain everything that was wrong with her sentence, so I simply replied, 'Yes. They do be genuine.

Aliens struck me as being rather goth. Luckily, in the daylight, there could be no more effective goth repellent than our home’s hideous furnishings. We had 1970s green and yellow linoleum floors. Neon orange and brown, scratchy, wool plaid furniture. And on the living room wall, a huge, earnest painting of two raccoons someone had made while serving a prison sentence.

THERE IS SOMETHING truly evil about plaid.

The crucial thing here is not to listen to your mind. Your mind has got its basic communication lines crossed. If you try to fly in this flak you will shoot down your own aircraft. Keep close to yourself...fly under your own radar. Let the anti-aircraft guns discharge their ammunition into the plaid sky. Steal home, undetected even by yourself. Whatever you do, in this state, don't think.

Out from behind the desk where he’d been sitting, hidden by the piles of books, appeared a bespectacled, green-eyed man in a green plaid suit. His thick white hair was shaggy and mussed, his nose was rather large and lumpy like a vegetable, and although it was clear he had recently shaved, he appeared to have done so without benefit of a mirror, for here and there upon his neck and chin were nicks from a razor, and occasional white whiskers that he’d missed altogether. This was Mr. Benedict.

He was a hand-holder; she'd gathered that much. Lovely quality in a man...

And Rex seems interested. He doesn’t seem to think I’m a total geek or a pretentious asshole. Or maybe he just feels sorry for the idiotic city boy who got himself marooned in Northern Michigan, almost killed a dog, and is currently drunk in a stranger’s sweatpants in a cabin made of plaid and flannel.

By the time she yanked on her old jeans and a battered plaid flannel shirt, she felt almost normal. Calm, as she plugged in the coffee pot. But the nightmare was still very much on her mind, because it wasn’t a dream… It was a memory.

Where is Sin’s plaid? (Lochlan) Plaid cloth is for people of true Scots blood, Lochlan. They are not for half-blooded Sassenachs. (Aisleen) (He had found Sin later that day, alone in their room. Sin had been sitting in the middle of the floor with his arm cut open while he let blood trail from the wound into a bowl.) What are you doing? (Lochlan) I’m trying to get rid of the English blood in me, but it doesn’t look any different than yours. How can I make it go away when I can’t find the difference? (Sin)

Being bad is not good, but too sad. And being good is not at all bad. This simple equation, It's the whole elation: Keen eye for batik patterns and plaid!

for you never deigned to believe that I could, without any specific designs, ever crave to bury my face in your plaid skirt, my darling!

Femme Fatale: Haven't I seen you somewhere before? Rigby Reardon: Maybe. I've been somewhere before. ~ "Dead Men Don't Wear Plaid

plaid is a harbinger of doom.

He’s wearing Seattle’s official flag, a plaid flannel shirt

Zoe was wearing a yello batik cotton dress, her typewriter keys bracelet, plaid sneakers, and glitter in her hair, in honor of meeting such a luminous personality as Bronwyn Gilwen.

Now that he was actually introducing Eleanor to his mom, he couldn’t help but see her the way his mom was going to. His mom was a beautician who sold Avon. She never left the house without touching up her mascara. When Patti Smith was on Saturday Night Live, his mom had gotten upset – "Why she want to look like man? It’s so sad." Eleanor, today, was wearing her sharkskin suit jacket and an old plaid cowboy shirt. She had more in common with his grandpa than his mom. And it wasn’t just the clothes. It was her. Eleanor wasn’t … nice. She was good. She was honorable. She was honest. She would definitely help an old lady across the street. But nobody – not even the old lady – would ever say, ‘Have you met that Eleanor Douglas? What a nice girl.’ Park’s mom liked nice. She loved nice. She liked smiling and small talk and eye contact … All things Eleanor sucked at. Also, his mom didn’t get sarcasm. And he was pretty sure it wasn’t a language thing. She just didn’t get it. She called David Letterman "the ugly, mean one on after Johnny.

- I like my shirts. - It's plaid. - There are no rules for shirts. Plaid is good. - Plaid is bad. Although, if you went with a Scottish plaid in wool, it might be okay. - I'm not dressing like some damned highlander, Mercedes. - And the lumberjack look is okay? - You don't like my shirt?

She drew herself up, squared her shoulders and gripped her plaid. “I am not weak because of my femininity. I do not look down upon you for not knowing how to birth a child or the right way to guide a woman through her first menses. Perhaps you should ask yourself why you feel the need to look down upon me.

What are you wearing?” I looked down at my soft flannel pajamas. I’d washed them so many times the plaid pattern had faded mostly to grays and whites. “What do you want me to be wearing?” Dan’s voice shifted a little. I imagined a smile. “Nothing.” Such a small thing, that little bit of flirting, but all at once I felt as if air had rushed into my lungs, and I hadn’t realized I’d been holding my breath. “Nothing but a smile.

Strong sun, that bleach The curtains of my room, can you not render Colourless this dress I wear?— This violent plaid Of purple angers and red shames; the yellow stripe Of thin but valid treacheries; the flashy green of kind deeds done Through indolence, high judgments given in haste; The recurring checker of the serious breach of taste?

It was a large, neatly kept cottage, with a well-tended yard full of chickens. Hollyhocks grew along the side, in shades of red and violet, unless magic had gotten into them again, in which case they had a tendency to go plaid. 

Sometimes... Come on, how often exactly, Bert? Can you recall four, five, more such occasions? Or would no human heart have survived two or three? Sometimes (I have nothing to say in reply to your question), while Lolita would be haphazardly preparing her homework, sucking a pencil, lolling sideways in an easy chair with both legs over its arm, I would shed all my pedagogic restraint, dismiss all our quarrels, forget all my masculine pride - and literally crawl on my knees to your chair, my Lolita! You would give me one look - a gray furry question mark of a look: "Oh no, not again" (incredulity, exasperation); for you never deigned to believe that I could, without any specific designs, ever crave to bury my face in your plaid skirt, my darling! The fragility of those bare arms of yours - how I longed to enfold them, all your four limpid lovely limbs, a folded colt, and take your head between my unworthy hands, and pull the temple-skin back on both sides, and kiss your chinesed eyes, and - "Please, leave me alone, will you," you would say, "for Christ's sake leave me alone." And I would get up from the floor while you looked on, your face deliberately twitching in imitation of my tic nerveux. But never mind, never mind, I am only a brute, never mind, let us go on with my miserable story.

Fortunately, all it takes for us to be of one mind is some buttercream frosting.

The irony being: I was steeped in irony. I was the one whose entire attendance at Granby felt ironic. I was the one whose clothes and posters were ironic. Whereas they (I believed) sailed through life sincerely, with their layered haircuts and North Face and plaid miniskirts. So when I replied with “Oh my God, you too,” even though the girl in question was wearing her lacrosse uniform, I enjoyed the look of confusion, then the unsubtle roll of eyes Beth would share with Rachel.

Proper mourning leaves one nothing to do but mourn, and I’ve concluded this isn’t a good thing. Grief crowds in closely enough without the rest of life being shoved aside to make way for it.

So yeah, you were part of the job. Don't get me wrong, Mercer, I like you. You're smart, fluent in sarcasm, and, Bad Dog incident aside, pretty kick-ass at magic. And it's not like you're hard to look at." "Be still my beating heart." "But to answer your question, no part of the Archer Cross you knew at Hecate exists. That day in the cellar, I kissed you back because it was my job to stay close to you. If that's where you wanted to take things, then that's where I was going to go. I kissed you because I had to. Not exactly the hardest assignment I've ever had, but an assignment nonetheless." I stood there absorbing his words like blows, my heart aching. But it wasn't what he said that made me feel like I'd been punched in the chest. It's that I knew he was lying. That speech came out way too quickly and way too smooth, almost like he'd been practicing it in his head. The same way I'd been practing what I'd say to him if I ever saw him again. I couldn't even begin to handle that right now, so instead I just said, "Okay,then. Yay for honesty. Now that we're done with the confessional part of the evening, why don't you tell me why we're here." There was another pause, then he started walking again. I followed, leaves crunching under my feet. "Like I said, Hacte Hall has always made The Eye nervous." "Why? Are they allergic to plaid?" I thought he might laugh, but instead, he said, "Think about it,Mercer.One place where Prodigium round up their most powerful members? Don't tell me that's not suspicious." That had never occurred to me. I'd always just thought of all us at Hecate as giant screwups, but in a way, Archer was right. We'd all been sentenced to Hex Hall because of spells that were powerful and dangerous. I thought of Cal saying I created "too big." Wasn't that what just about everyone at Hecate had done? Still, the idea that the place I'd called home for nearly a year was actually some evil farm for powerful Prodigium was unsettling to say the least.

He (Lafcadio) was sitting all alone in a compartment of the train which was carrying him away from Rome, & contemplating–not without satisfaction–his hands in their grey doeskin gloves, as they lay on the rich fawn-colored plaid, which, in spite of the heat, he had spread negligently over his knees. Through the soft woolen material of his traveling-suit he breathed ease and comfort at every pore; his neck was unconfined in its collar which without being low was unstarched, & from beneath which the narrow line of a bronze silk necktie ran, slender as a grass snake, over his pleated shirt. He was at ease in his skin, at ease in his shoes, which were cut out of the same doeskin as his gloves; his foot in its elastic prison could stretch, could bend, could feel itself alive. His beaver hat was pulled down over his eyes & kept out the landscape; he was smoking dried juniper, after the Algerian fashion, in a little clay pipe & letting his thoughts wander at their will …

Gate C22 At gate C22 in the Portland airport a man in a broad-band leather hat kissed a woman arriving from Orange County. They kissed and kissed and kissed. Long after the other passengers clicked the handles of their carry-ons and wheeled briskly toward short-term parking, the couple stood there, arms wrapped around each other like he’d just staggered off the boat at Ellis Island, like she’d been released at last from ICU, snapped out of a coma, survived bone cancer, made it down from Annapurna in only the clothes she was wearing. Neither of them was young. His beard was gray. She carried a few extra pounds you could imagine her saying she had to lose. But they kissed lavish kisses like the ocean in the early morning, the way it gathers and swells, sucking each rock under, swallowing it again and again. We were all watching– passengers waiting for the delayed flight to San Jose, the stewardesses, the pilots, the aproned woman icing Cinnabons, the man selling sunglasses. We couldn’t look away. We could taste the kisses crushed in our mouths. But the best part was his face. When he drew back and looked at her, his smile soft with wonder, almost as though he were a mother still open from giving birth, as your mother must have looked at you, no matter what happened after–if she beat you or left you or you’re lonely now–you once lay there, the vernix not yet wiped off, and someone gazed at you as if you were the first sunrise seen from the Earth. The whole wing of the airport hushed, all of us trying to slip into that woman’s middle-aged body, her plaid Bermuda shorts, sleeveless blouse, glasses, little gold hoop earrings, tilting our heads up.

Sunny laughed. "It's okay. You're right, Emma. My name is unusual, but I like to think of it as... special also." Special? Sam cocked his head as he studied Sunny. Almost all of her hair had escaped out of her ponytail now. She wore a baggy pink sweatshirt and had on the kind of drawstring plaid pants that would've set Bozo the Clown's heart pitter-pattering with envy. Her yellow tennis shoes were covered with dog hair. Yeah, special was one word for her.

God, you're broken," she said. "God, you're sick." His gaze fell to his plaid blanket. "You tore apart your puppet, didn't you?" said Alice. "And then you tried to fix it." His eyes searched hers. "You don't take good care of your toys, God," Alice said. "So I'm going to have to take the puppet away from you.

The streak of bleach in my hair is as obvious as ever. Am I really going out in public like this? I push my hair backward and forward a few times - but I can't hide it. Maybe I could walk along with my hand carelessly positioned at my head, as if I'm thinking hard. I attempt a few casual, pensive poses in the mirror. "Is your head all right?" I swivel round in shock to see Nathaniel at the open door, wearing a plaid shirt and jeans. "Er...fine," I say, my hand still glued to my head. "I was just..." Oh, there's no point. I bring my hand down from my hair and Nathaniel regards the streak for a moment. "It looks nice," he says. "Like a badger." "A badger?" I say, affronted. "I don't look like a badger." "Badgers are beautiful creatures," says Nathaniel with a shrug. "I'd rather look like a badger than a stoat.

We lived only to dance. What was the true characteristic of a queen, I wondered later on; and you could argue that forever. “What do we all have in common in this group?” I once asked a friend seriously, when it occurred to me how slender, how immaterial, how ephemeral the bond was that joined us; and he responded, “We all have lips.” Perhaps that is what we all had in common: no one was allowed to be serious, except about the importance of music, the glory of faces seen in the crowd. We had our songs, we had our faces! We had our web belts and painter’s jeans, our dyed tank tops and haircuts, the plaid shirts, bomber jackets, jungle fatigues, the all-important shoes.

Don't look at me like that, Augusta." He stood to pull his shirt over his head. "I don't deserve it. No mortal could deserve such an expression.

Joy. Casey groaned under her breath. Just what she needed to plunge her day completely into the toilet — being the object of the plaid polyester king’s desires.

You should see Nina’s clan tartan," she said, pouring herself more tea. "It’s white with orange, green, and royal blue. Horrendous." "We took to calling any obnoxious pattern Clan MacGarish," I said. "Or MacHideous," added Laurence. "MacUgly," I continued. "MacClash," he countered.

Every morning they show off their funny T-shirts, awesome sneakers, and fad accessories. Me? I wear the same dorky thing every day. White shirt. Blue pants. Penny loafers. And a plaid tie. Plaid: for when it's more important to hide stains than to look good. At least there is one good thing to come from wearing a tie. It proves I’m a boy. Obviously, eggs don’t wear ties. My

I was struck by the image of Daddy still dressed in that same plaid shirt and undershirt with the bloodstains below the neck, the one I had first seen him wearing in the jail the previous day.

Rimbaud held the keys to a mystical language that I devoured even as I could not fully decipher it. My unrequited love for him was as real to me as anything I had experienced. At the factory where I had labored with a hard-edged, illiterate group of women, I was harassed in his name. Suspecting me of being a Communist for reading a book in a foreign language, they threatened me in the john, prodding me to denounce him. It was within this atmosphere that I seethed. It was for him that I wrote and dreamed. He became my archangel, delivering me from the mundane horrors of factory life. His hands had chiseled a manual of heaven and I held them fast. The knowledge of him added swagger to my step and this could not be stripped away. I tossed my copy of Illuminations in a plaid suitcase. We would escape together.

Henry: How does it feel? How does it feel? Sometimes it feels as though your attention has wandered for just an instant. Then, with a start, you realize that the book you were holding, the red plaid cotton shirt with white buttons, the favorite black jeans and the maroon socks with an almost-hole in one heel, the living room, the about-to-whistle tea kettle in the kitchen: all of these have vanished. You are standing, naked as a jaybird, up to your ankles in ice water in a ditch along an unidentified rural route. You wait a minute to see if maybe you will just snap right back to your book, your apartment, et cetera. After about five minutes of swearing and shivering and hoping to hell you can just disappear, you start walking in any direction, which will eventually yield a farmhouse, where you have the option of stealing or explaining. Stealing will sometimes land you in jail, but explaining is more tedious and time consuming and involves lying anyway, and also sometimes results in being hauled off to jail, so what the hell.

We were girls in plaid skirts, loud and obnoxious, driving with the windows down. Capable students, nailing honor roll every year, despite our reputation. We were good kissers, decent dancers, fast with our hands. Desperate and dangerous. A little loose, sure. But desirable. Everyone knew. We were the girls who thought we were nothing if not this: a force, a flame, a million nerve ends electric with appetite and not afraid.

Somewhere along the line the American love affair with wilderness changed from the thoughtful, sensitive isolationism of Thoreau to the bully, manly, outdoorsman bravado of Teddy Roosevelt. It is not for me, as an outsider, either to bemoan or celebrate this fact, only to observe it. Deep in the male American psyche is a love affair with the backwoods, log-cabin, camping-out life. There is no living creature here that cannot, in its right season, be hunted or trapped. Deer, moose, bear, squirrel, partridge, beaver, otter, possum, raccoon, you name it, there's someone killing one right now. When I say hunted, I mean, of course, shot at with a high-velocity rifle. I have no particular brief for killing animals with dogs or falcons, but when I hear the word 'hunt' I think of something more than a man in a forage cap and tartan shirt armed with a powerful carbine. In America it is different. Hunting means 'man bonding with man, man bonding with son, man bonding with pickup truck, man bonding with wood cabin, man bonding with rifle, man bonding above all with plaid'.

This quick foray onto the toilet has been no different an endeavor than any other time I’ve used the restroom in my adult life. Try then to imagine my surprise when instead of the waste going down the u-bend like the thousands of times previous, the bowl’s contents go not gentle into that good night. Instead, they shoot directly up at me . . . at approximately 80 miles an hour. As I leap backward, slamming into the glass shower door, the only thought going through my now-banged head is, When did I eat corn?" Pretty in Plaid: A Life, a Witch, and a Wardrobe, or, the Wonder Years Before the Condescending, Egomanical, Self-Centered Smart-Ass Phase

The common room was messy, and this time it was not glamoured. His father had an overwhelming collection of things. There were piles of books, heaps of loose papers, waterlogged scrolls from another era set in haphazard stacks. Five pairs of fancy mainland boots with laces, hardly worn, and a jacket the color of fire, lined with plaid. Jars of golden pins, a jewelry box that held his mother’s abandoned pearls. A map of the realm pegged to the floor, because the walls were already crowded with drawings of musty tapestries and a chart of the northern constellations. All were possessions from Graeme’s former life, when he had been the ambassador to the mainland.

What are the people like? Do the women wear plaid skirts, cable-knit sweaters? Are the men in hacking jackets? What’s a hacking jacket?” “They’ve grown comfortable with their money,” I said. “They genuinely believe they’re entitled to it. This conviction gives them a kind of rude health. They glow a little.” “I have trouble imagining death at that income level,” she said. “Maybe there is no death as we know it. Just documents changing hands.

There was a sudden whoosh from above, followed immediately by a blur before my eyes and a dull thud. Captain Randall was on the ground at my feet, under a heaving mass that looked like a bundle of old plaid rags. A brown, rocklike fist rose out of the mass and descended with considerable force, meeting decisively with some bony protuberance, by the sound of the resultant crack. The Captain’s struggling legs, shiny in tall brown boots, relaxed quite suddenly. I

Wait here.” I ran back up to my room to grab his blue-and-black plaid flannel shirt, still in my possession. Back on the porch, I handed it over. “My shirt. I forgot you had it.” “It’s ‘my’ shirt. You need to go home tonight and sleep in it. I made the mistake of washing it and now it doesn’t smell like you anymore.” He turned the shirt over and over in his hand, laughing and shaking his head. “And I want it back first thing in the morning. You read me?

On bottom... Fellows studied the blue and green Mackenzie plaid kilt laid out across his bed. He'd worn it before, at Christmas at Kilmorgan, feeling strange with wool wrapping his hips, air circulating his thighs. Scotsmen had to be mad.

The Veteran When I was young and bold and strong, Oh, right was right, and wrong was wrong! My plume on high, my flag unfurled, I rode away to right the world. “Come out, you dogs, and fight!” said I, And wept there was but once to die. But I am old; and good and bad Are woven in a crazy plaid. I sit and say, “The world is so; And he is wise who lets it go. A battle lost, a battle won- The difference is small, my son.” Inertia rides and riddles me; The which is called Philosophy.

John?” came a small voice. There, standing in the doorway from the kitchen, was Chris with his favorite snuggly toy, the one with the blue-and-gray plaid flannel leg. “What’cha doing, John?” Preacher’s face melted into a soft smile and he went to the boy. He lifted him into his arms. “Huntin’,” he said. “Just a little huntin’.” “Where’s Mom?” Preacher kissed his pink cheek. “She’ll be back pretty soon. She’s off on errands. And you’re going to stay with Mel and Brie while we’re huntin’.” *

What are you doing?" she whispered, torn between hope and alarm. "Making the biggest mistake of my life," he said grimly, before dragging her into his arms and claiming her lips in a wild and desperate kiss that stole both her breath and heart away.

Fuori soffiava un vento forte e impetuoso, dentro all'appartamento però si stava bene. La stufa infatti emanava un calore ideale. Dai vetri leggermente appannati si vedevano i rami di un albero secco disegnare nell'aria delle fantasie elaborate. Il gusto dolce e quello amaro del tè si sposavano alla perfezione con quell'atmosfera. Io ero seduta sul divano e Rumi coricata su un enorme cuscino appoggiato sul pavimento. Sulle ginocchia aveva un plaid di maglia davvero bello.Erano mesi che non passavo dei momenti così rilassanti in compagnia di qualcuno.

At that moment, Ronin stepped back into the living room, clothed, thank God. Well, mostly. Kneeling on the floor before him, Devin watched him fascinated as he fastened the buttons of his plaid flannel shirt, thankfully covering that fucking beautiful chest. He left the top two buttons at his neck open. Frozen, she stared as his hands slipped down to tuck the shirt into his jeans before he fastened the fly and buckled his belt. Her fingers itched as she imagined the warmth and hardness of his hips, the deep contour of muscle low on his stomach. Ooooohhhhh!

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.

Good evening, Lady Maccon.” The vampire tipped his top hat with one hand, holding the door with the other. He occupied the entrance in an ominous, looming manner. “Ah, how do you do, Lord Ambrose?” “Tolerably well, tolerably well. It is a lovely night, don’t you find? And how is your”—he glanced at her engorged belly—“health?” “Exceedingly abundant,” Alexia replied with a self-effacing shrug, “although, I suspect, unlikely to remain so.” “Have you been eating figs?” Alexia was startled by this odd question. “Figs?” “Terribly beneficial in preventing biliousness in newborns, I understand.” Alexia had been in receipt of a good deal of unwanted pregnancy advice over the last several months, so she ignored this and got on to the business at hand. “If you don’t feel that it is forward of me to ask, are you here to kill me, Lord Ambrose?” She inched away from the carriage door, reaching for Ethel. The gun lay behind her on the coach seat. She had not had time to put it back into its reticule with the pineapple cut siding. The reticule was a perfect match to her gray plaid carriage dress with green lace trim. Lady Alexia Maccon was a woman who liked to see a thing done properly or not at all. The vampire tilted his head to one side in acknowledgment. “Sadly, yes. I do apologize for the inconvenience.” “Oh, really, must you? I’d much rather you didn’t.” “That’s what they all say.

Isaiah opens my car door and his warm silver eyes smile at me. “Hey.” I sweep my bangs from my eyes. “Hi.” He offers his hand and I accept. His fingers wrap around mine and heat surges up my arm, flushes my neck and settles into a blush on my face. He tugs gently and I slip out. I’m not sure if my body vibrates from the rumbling of the garage door closing or from the blood pounding in my veins. Our fingers lace together, and his other hand smoothly cups my hip. I suck in a breath, surprised that someone touches me so easily and with such care. “You look nice,” he says. “I’m in my school uniform.” White button-down blouse, maroon-and-black plaid skirt, and a pair of white Keds. Nothing spectacular. “I know.” The seductive slide in his voice causes the back of my neck to tickle.

Then Toraf opens the passenger side door…Wait. That’s not Toraf. I’ve never seen this man before, yet he’s eerily familiar. His silhouette sitting next to Galen was definitely classic Syrena male, but the glare from the sun had hidden his face. I’d naturally just assumed that where there’s a Galen, there’s a Toraf. Now that his face is in full view though, I see that this man looks like a slightly older version of Galen. Slightly older as in slightly more jaded. Other than that, he could be his twin brother. It may be because he’s wearing some of Galen’s clothes, a wrinkled brown polo shirt and plaid shorts. But he shares other things, too, besides clothes. He’s handsome like Galen, with the same strong jaw and the same eyebrow shape and the way he’s wearing the same expression on his face that Galen is-that he’s found what he’s been looking for. Only, the stranger’s expression clearly divulges that he’s been looking for a lot longer than Galen has-and this man is not looking at me. And that’s when I know just exactly who he is. That’s when I believe the look in Galen’s eyes. That he didn’t lie to me, that he loves me. Because this man has to be Grom. Mom confirms it with a half cry, half growl. “No. No. It can’t be.” Even if she weren’t handcuffed to Rachel right now, I’m not sure she’d actually be able to move. Disbelief has a special way of paralyzing you. With every step the man takes toward Rachel’s car, he shakes his head more vigorously. It’s like he’s deliberately taking his time, drinking in the moment, or maybe he just can’t believe this moment is actually happening. Yep, disbelief is a cruel hag.

The story was simple: a child named Amanda Pine, who enjoyed food in a way some therapists consider significant, was eating Madeline’s lunch. This was because Madeline’s lunch was not average. While all the other children gummed their peanut butter and jelly sandwiches, Madeline opened her lunch box to find a thick slice of leftover lasagna, a side helping of buttery zucchini, an exotic kiwi cut into quarters, five pearly round cherry tomatoes, a tiny Morton salt shaker, two still-warm chocolate chip cookies, and a red plaid thermos full of ice-cold milk. These contents were why everyone wanted Madeline’s lunch, Madeline included. But Madeline offered it to Amanda because friendship requires sacrifice, but also because Amanda was the only one in the entire school who didn’t make fun of the odd child Madeline already knew she was.

Mom! Look. This one is my favorite," Devin said, pulling out a faded pink dress with a red plaid sash. The crinoline petticoat underneath was so old and stiff it made snapping sounds, like beads or fire embers. She dropped the dress over her head, over her clothes. It brushed the floor. "When I'm old enough for it to fit me, I'm going to wear it with purple shoes," she said. "A bold choice," Kate said as Devin dove back into the trunk. The attic in Kate's mother's house had always fascinated Devin with its promise of hidden treasures. When Kate's mother had been alive, she had let Devin eat Baby Ruth candy bars and drink grape soda and play in this old trunk full of dresses that generations of Morris women had worn to try entice rich men to marry them. Most of the clothes had belonged to Kate's grandmother Marilee, a renowned beauty who, like all the rest, had fallen in love with a poor man instead.

Connor dipped his head and kissed from her neck to her collarbone, and down her arm as he slipped the sark off her shoulder revealing the satiny skin beneath. When he got to her fingers, he nipped her ring finger and Mackenzie gasped as he drew it into his mouth and sucked. He raised his eyes back to hers and trapped her gaze in his own. Connor slid her sark down her body and Mackenzie was helpless to do anything but stare into the dark blue pools of molten desire his eyes had become. It was a heady feeling to know that she was the reason his eyes were so dark; she had never before felt so powerful. He wanted her and this time she knew what to do. Mackenzie unwrapped his plaid from the chieftain brooch and pushed it off his shoulder. Connor held perfectly still and let it fall to the floor with Mackenzie’s pile of clothes. Next Mackenzie dragged his shirt over his head; it too joined the growing pile of clothing. Mackenzie couldn’t help but marvel at his hard body with all its scars hinting at the power and danger this man carried. She let her fingers trail down from his chest to the patch of hair on his stomach, and lower still. She could feel his muscles clench and his breath stop as she wrapped her fingers around his erection. She quickly found his rhythm and knelt down to press her lips to his lower abs. Trailing her mouth down to where her hand was, she gently licked the tip. She felt a thrill of satisfaction as his hands gripped her shoulders and as her mouth took him in, his fingers tightened. She used both her hand and her mouth to pleasure Connor. He molded a hand to the nape of her neck, holding her in place. She was becoming bolder with her free hand, exploring what made his muscles quiver and his breath hitch, when Connor pulled her roughly up and to him, crushing her lips with his. He pressed her back against the cold wall and lifted one of her long legs, hitching it around his hip. She was tall enough that he didn’t have to lift her. He slipped inside her and Mackenzie reveled in the groan wrenched from him. This was how she liked Connor; out of control. He pushed into her again and again until they were both panting, and Mackenzie was moaning with every breath. She couldn’t wait any longer. “Oh God Connor, I’m so close.” “Just let go, love.” With her back pressed against the cold wall and the heat from Connor’s body warming her, Mackenzie shuddered with the force of her orgasm and she melted into Connor’s arms as he spent himself in her.

Shh! She said. The waiter. He's about to take their order. She leaned back and to her left, closer,closer,closer,her body like a giraffe's neck, until her chair shot out from under her and she landed on the floor. The whole restaurant turned to look. I jumped up to help. She stood up, righted the chair, and started in again. Did you see the tattoo one of them has on the inside of his arm? It looked like a roll of tape. I took a gulp of margarita and settled into my fallback option, which was to wait her out. Know what one of the guys at the drive-through Starbucks has on his forearm? Bernadette said. A paper clip! It used to be so daring to get a tattoo. And now people are tattooing office supplies on their bodies. You know what I say? Of course this was rhetorical. I say, dare not to get a tattoo. She turned around again, and gasped. Oh My God. It's not just any roll of tape. It's literally Scotch tape, with the green-and-black plaid. This is too hilarious. If you're going to tattoo tape on your arm, at least make it a generic old-fashioned tape dispenser! What do you think happened? Did the Staples catalogue get delivered to the tattoo parlor that day?

What if my da is Breccan?” Frae kicked a pebble on the road, keeping her eyes on the ground. “Would you still want to walk me home?” Ella was quiet for a moment, but maybe only because the question had taken her by surprise. Frae snuck a glance at her. For the past several days, Ella had walked her home from school and the boys had not bothered her again. But there were still whispers and pointed glances. A few times during class, no one had wanted to partner up with Frae. “If your da is a Breccan,” Ella began to say, “then yes, I’d still walk you home, and I’d still be your friend, Frae. Do you want to know why?” Frae nodded, but she could feel her face flush, her relief knotted with shame that she even had to ask this question when no other children she knew did. “Because your heart is good and brave and kind,” Ella said. “You are thoughtful and smart. And those are the kind of people who I want to be friends with. Not the ones who think they are above everyone else. Who scowl and judge things they don’t understand and throw mud and have cowardly hearts.” Frae soaked in Ella’s words, which were warm and soft as a plaid, and she suddenly could walk faster, her chin held higher. “And,” Ella added with a mischievous smile, “you make the best berry pies.

Torin began to fold the plaid, in the same way he liked to fold his own. He brought it behind her, then across her chest before cinching it in place at her right shoulder. Yes, he thought. It was perfect on her. He stepped back to regard Mirin’s handiwork. Sidra glanced down at it, and she still appeared confused until Torin laid his palm over her chest, where the plaid now granted her protection. He could feel the enchantment within the pattern, holding firm, like steel. He touched the place she had been kicked, where her bruises had been slow to heal, as if her heart had shattered beneath her skin and bones. She understood now. She gasped and glanced up at him. Again, he wished that he could speak to her. Their last conversation still rattled in his mind, and he didn’t like the distance that had come between them. Let my secret guard your heart, he thought. “Thank you,” Sidra whispered, as if she had heard him. It renewed his hope, and he sat at the table before his knees gave out. His gaze snagged on a pie, whose center had been eaten away in a perfect circle, the spoon still in the dish. He pointed to the gaping hole, brow arched. Sidra smiled. “The middle is the best part.” No, the crust is. He shook his head, reaching for the spoon to eat the crisp places she had left behind. He was halfway done when there came a bark, followed by a knock on the open door.

What are ye doing, lass?” His voice was so soft and close in the darkness, it made her shiver. She forgot all about the hard floor. “I always imagined that once I got married, I’d finally know what it was like to spend the night in a man’s arms. Will you hold me, so I can feel what that’s like? I won’t ask for more than that. Just hold me.” He rolled to face her and touched her cheek. “Ah, lass,” he sighed. “How can I deny you when you ask so sweetly? If ’tis holding ye want, holding you shall get. But the floor is no place for you and your bairn. Up in the bed with you.” “It’s no place for a married man, either,” she said, smiling at her small victory. He sighed again, a sound heavy with sentiment she could only guess at. She climbed under the blankets and held them up for him, but he was taking his sweet time. “Are you coming?” “Aye, lass. Just donning my plaid.” She bit back a huff of frustration. She determined to enjoy what little affection he would give her and didn’t want to push her luck by asking for more. Her hormones would have to learn patience; this was going to be a painfully slow seduction. When Darcy slipped into bed, bare-chested, but wrapped in layers of wool from the waist down, she cuddled into his open arms. All her frustration drained away as he gathered her in and the heat of his chest turned her into a melty puddle of contentment. She nestled her nose into the tuft of hair between his mounded pectorals and inhaled his scent of saddle leather and faint, masculine musk. Beneath her closed eyelids, her eyes rolled back in her head with bliss.

My feeling then was of forlornness, of the desperate inadequacies of this human linguistic apparatus that we employ to forestall, a little longer, aloneness, and of how futile these fumblings so often are. In the next lurch of solitude I began trying to add to the list of things not to say to someone in your marriage: Don’t ever use a pen while lying on the bed; don’t ever forget to put the cap back on a pen after using the pen; don’t ever use a pen if it’s new; put items in the refrigerator at ninety-degree angles; do not throw things in the bathroom trash if there are already a lot of things in the trash; don’t ever lie on the bed, made or unmade, in your clothes; don’t get into the bed without having showered; don’t put your bag on the bed, don’t put your bag on the chair, don’t put your bag on the counter, don’t put your bag on the table; don’t ever do the laundry; don’t bite your nails; don’t put the toilet paper facing out; don’t put the toilet paper facing in; don’t accelerate quickly; don’t wear those colors together, don’t wear those colors together, don’t wear a stripe and a plaid, don’t wear that shirt, that looks bad on you, that looks bad on you, and that looks bad on you, and that looks bad on you, and that looks bad on you too, are you sure you want to wear that, that looks bad on you; please stay out of the house one night a week, please stay out of the house a couple of nights a week so I can have some privacy; don’t put that there; don’t put that there; that plastic cup was given to me by my grandmother; don’t use my towel; don’t use my bathroom; you don’t understand your own family; you don’t understand your own role in your own family; you don’t understand what people think of you; you don’t understand other people; you don’t understand me, you don’t understand yourself; I need money for clothes, I need money for credit cards, I need money for school; don’t cut your meat on the plate, that sound is awful, cut your meat on the cutting board before putting it on your plate; don’t touch me. And when I was done

Beside him Mr. Harris folded his morning newspaper and held it out to Claude. "Seen this yet?" "No." "Don't read it," Mr. Harris said, folding the paper once more and sliding it under his rear. "It will only upset you, son." "It's a wicked paper... " Claude agreed, but Mr. Harris was overspeaking him. "It's the big black words that do it. The little grey ones don't matter very much, they're just fill-ins they take everyday from the wires. They concentrate their poison in the big black words, where it will radiate. Of course if you read the little stories too you've got sure proof that every word they wrote above, themselves, was a fat black lie, but by then you've absorbed a thousand greyer ones, and where and how to check on those? This way the mind deteriorates. The best way you can save yourself is not to read it, son." "No, I... " "That's right, if you're not careful," Mr. Harris went on, blue-eyed, red-faced, "you find yourself pretty soon hating everyone but God, the Babe, and a few dead senators. That's no fun. Men aren't so bad as that." "No." "That's right, you begin to worry about anyone who opens his mouth except to say ho it looks like rain, let's bowl. Otherwise you wonder what the hell he's trying to prove, or undermine. If he asks what time it is, you wonder what terrible thing is scheduled to happen, where it will happen, when. You can't even stand to be asked how you feel today - he's probably looking at the bumps on you, they may have grown more noticeable overnight. Soon you feel you should apologize for standing there where he can watch you dying in front of him, he'd rather for you to carry your head around in a little plaid bag, like your bowling ball. There's no joy in that. Men aren't so very bad." Mr. Harris paused to remove his Panama hat. Water seeped from his knobby forehead, which he mopped with a damp handkerchief. "I've offended you, son," he said. "Not at all, I entirely agree with you." Mr. Harris replaced his hat, folded his handkerchief. "I shouldn't shoot off this way," he said. "I read too much." "No, no. You're right...