Quickly Recover Quotes

Does this mean you’re going to make love to me tonight, Christian?” Holy shit. Did I just say that? His mouth drops open slightly, but he recovers quickly. “No, Anastasia it doesn’t. Firstly, I don’t make love. I fuck… hard. Secondly, there’s a lot more paperwork to do, and thirdly, you don’t yet know what you’re in for. You could still run for the hills. Come, I want to show you my playroom.” My mouth drops open. Fuck hard! Holy shit, that sounds so… hot. But why are we looking at a playroom? I am mystified. “You want to play on your Xbox?” I ask. He laughs, loudly. “No, Anastasia, no Xbox, no Playstation. Come.”… Producing a key from his pocket, he unlocks yet another door and takes a deep breath. “You can leave anytime. The helicopter is on stand-by to take you whenever you want to go, you can stay the night and go home in the morning. It’s fine whatever you decide.” “Just open the damn door, Christian.” He opens the door and stands back to let me in. I gaze at him once more. I so want to know what’s in here. Taking a deep breath I walk in. And it feels like I’ve time-traveled back to the sixteenth century and the Spanish Inquisition. Holy fuck.

Does this mean you’re going to make love to me tonight, Christian?” Holy shit. Did I just say that? His mouth drops open slightly, but he recovers quickly. “No, Anastasia it doesn’t. Firstly, I don’t make love. I fuck… hard. Secondly, there’s a lot more paperwork to do, and thirdly, you don’t yet know what you’re in for. You could still run for the hills. Come, I want to show you my playroom.

To my dismay, he recovers quickly and smoothes his hair. "So you choose him?" That's all this ever was. Jealously. Rivalry. All so shadow could defeat the flame. I have to throw my head back and laugh, feeling the eyes of the brothers on me. "Cal betrayed me, and I betrayed him. And you betrayed both of us, in a thousand different ways." The words are heavy as stone but right. So right. "I choose no one.

the key to success is not dodging every bullet but being able to recover quickly.

If your mental health is sound, then when disturbances come, you will have some distress but quickly recover.

When you're young and healthy you can recover quickly from a defeat. But betrayal is different—it paralyzes you.

When was the last time you were kissed?" he went on easily. "And I'm not talking about the dry, noncommittal, meaningless kiss you forget about as soon as it's over." I scrambled out of my stupor long enough to quip, "Like last night's kiss?" He cocked an eyebrow. "That so? I wonder, then, why you moaned my name after you drifted to sleep." "I did not!" "If only I'd had a video recorder. When was the last time you were really kissed?" he repeated. "You seriously think I'm going to tell you?" "Your ex?" he guessed. "And if he was?" "Was it your ex who taught you to be ashamed and uncomfortable with intimacy? He took from you what he wanted, but never seemed to be around when you wanted something back, isn't that right? What do you want, Britt?" he asked me point-blank. "Do you really want to pretend like last night never happened?" "Whatever happened between me and Calvin isn't your business,” I fired back. "For your information, he was a really great boyfriend. I-I wish I was with him right now!" I exclaimed untruthfully. My careless comment made him flinch, but he recovered quickly. "Does he love you?" "What?" I said, flustered. "If you know him so well, it shouldn't be a hard question. Is he in love with you? Was he ever in love with you?" I tossed my head back haughtily. "I know what you're doing. You're trying to cut him down because you're-you're jealous of him!" "You're damn right I'm jealous,” he growled. "When I kiss a girl, I like to know she's thinking about me, not the fool who gave her up.

He recovered quickly, reaching out to touch a few outstretched hands, melting the front row of girls like one long stick of butter as he moved closer toward me.

When your meta-attention becomes strong, you will be able to recover a wandering attention quickly and often, and if you recover attention quickly and often enough, you create the effect of continuous attention, which is concentration.

On the way out, I give the man with the broken arm my condolences and say that I hope that he recovers quickly and painlessly. His smile makes me glad to have said it.

‎I did not understand how quickly one could fall in love, and I regarded almost as an affliction that one would eventually recover from. However, I now recognize that it is a force that reaches into every fiber of your body, and that it is something not to be resisted, but embraced.

Miss Rasputin, what a delight to finally meet you,” said the vamp, speaking with only the faintest hint of an accent. “Let’s hope you still feel that way in a few minutes, Mr. Delacroix.” “Pierre, please. And may I call you Evangaline?” Pierre smiled at her winsomely. “No, you may not. My name is Ms. Rasputin to you.” Her answer took the vamp aback, but he recovered quickly and smiled again showing off his small pointed canines. Pierre’s dark eyes flicked over to Ryker in his feline form and he raised an aristocratic brow. “My, what a big pussy you have.” “You know what they say, the bigger the better.

Angels can fly because they can take themselves lightly. This has been always the instinct of Christendom, and especially the instinct of Christian art. Remember how Fra Angelico represented all his angels, not only as birds, but almost as butterflies. Remember how the most earnest mediaeval art was full of light and fluttering draperies, of quick and capering feet. It was the one thing that the modern Pre-raphaelites could not imitate in the real Pre-raphaelites. Burne-Jones could never recover the deep levity of the Middle Ages. In the old Christian pictures the sky over every figure is like a blue or gold parachute. Every figure seems ready to fly up and float about in the heavens. The tattered cloak of the beggar will bear him up like the rayed plumes of the angels. But the kings in their heavy gold and the proud in their robes of purple will all of their nature sink downwards, for pride cannot rise to levity or levitation. Pride is the downward drag of all things into an easy solemnity. One "settles down" into a sort of selfish seriousness; but one has to rise to a gay self-forgetfulness. A man "falls" into a brown study; he reaches up at a blue sky. Seriousness is not a virtue. It would be a heresy, but a much more sensible heresy, to say that seriousness is a vice. It is really a natural trend or lapse into taking one's self gravely, because it is the easiest thing to do. It is much easier to write a good Times leading article than a good joke in Punch. For solemnity flows out of men naturally; but laughter is a leap. It is easy to be heavy: hard to be light. Satan fell by the force of gravity.

I didn’t disappear,” Landon shot back quickly. “I was recovering from a gunshot wound.” “That’s your excuse?” Aunt Tillie didn’t look impressed.

What are you running from?" That put a damper on the fluttering lashes. "Columbia House Music Club," I said, recovering my snarkiness quickly. "Oh, sure, they say they'll sell you six CDs for a penny, but they'll hunt you down like the hounds of hell if you miss the payments.

According to the wire, you are resting well and are being taken care of by a nurse. I hope she is beautiful and that she has red hair. I don't know why, but whenever I dream of a nurse she always has red hair. Red hair makes a man want to recover his health quickly, so that he can get on his feet and get the nurse off hers." - Groucho Marx, letter to his son

Then, marveling at the recuperative powers and endurance of the Ranger horse breed, he tightened the girths on Blaze’s saddle and swung astride the bay, groaning softly as he did so. Ranger horses might recover quickly. Ranger apprentices took a little longer. It

It is never of the least use to be snide to boys suffering from calf-love: they seem to take it as a challenge. The only thing to do is be polite and elder-sisterly, and hope that they recover quickly.

Emotional resilience comes down to how quickly we recover from upsets. People who are highly resilient—who bounce back right away—can have as much as thirty times more activation in the left prefrontal area than those who are less resilient.

In their interpersonal relationships, this leads to early idealization in the honeymoon phase, where they groom you to become a constant source of positive energy—temporarily satisfying their pathological feelings of emptiness. But because they are also angry and impulsive, you quickly start to discover that there won’t be any room for your own happiness. Once you fail to meet their rapidly shifting standards, you will be devalued and criticized until you have nothing left to offer to them.

Stephen had been put to sleep in his usual room, far from children and noise, away in that corner of the house which looked down to the orchard and the bowling-green, and in spite of his long absence it was so familiar to him that when he woke at about three he made his way to the window almost as quickly as if dawn had already broken, opened it and walked out onto the balcony. The moon had set: there was barely a star to be seen. The still air was delightfully fresh with falling dew, and a late nightingale, in an indifferent voice, was uttering a routine jug-jug far down in Jack's plantations; closer at hand and more agreeable by far, nightjars churred in the orchard, two of them, or perhaps three, the sound rising and falling, intertwining so that the source could not be made out for sure. There were few birds that he preferred to nightjars, but it was not they that had brought him out of bed: he stood leaning on the balcony rail and presently Jack Aubrey, in a summer-house by the bowling-green, began again, playing very gently in the darkness, improvising wholly for himself, dreaming away on his violin with a mastery that Stephen had never heard equalled, though they had played together for years and years. Like many other sailors Jack Aubrey had long dreamed of lying in his warm bed all night long; yet although he could now do so with a clear conscience he often rose at unChristian hours, particularly if he were moved by strong emotion, and crept from his bedroom in a watch-coat, to walk about the house or into the stables or to pace the bowling-green. Sometimes he took his fiddle with him. He was in fact a better player than Stephen, and now that he was using his precious Guarnieri rather than a robust sea-going fiddle the difference was still more evident: but the Guarnieri did not account for the whole of it, nor anything like. Jack certainly concealed his excellence when they were playing together, keeping to Stephen's mediocre level: this had become perfectly clear when Stephen's hands were at last recovered from the thumb-screws and other implements applied by French counter-intelligence officers in Minorca; but on reflexion Stephen thought it had been the case much earlier, since quite apart from his delicacy at that period, Jack hated showing away. Now, in the warm night, there was no one to be comforted, kept in countenance, no one could scorn him for virtuosity, and he could let himself go entirely; and as the grave and subtle music wound on and on, Stephen once more contemplated on the apparent contradiction between the big, cheerful, florid sea-officer whom most people liked on sight but who would have never been described as subtle or capable of subtlety by any one of them (except perhaps his surviving opponents in battle) and the intricate, reflective music he was now creating. So utterly unlike his limited vocabulary in words, at times verging upon the inarticulate. 'My hands have now regained the moderate ability they possessed before I was captured,' observed Maturin, 'but his have gone on to a point I never thought he could reach: his hands and his mind. I am amazed. In his own way he is the secret man of the world.

Here are some of the essential take-homes: we all need nearby nature: we benefit cognitively and psychologically from having trees, bodies of water, and green spaces just to look at; we should be smarter about landscaping our schools, hospitals, workplaces and neighborhoods so everyone gains. We need quick incursions to natural areas that engage our senses. Everyone needs access to clean, quiet and safe natural refuges in a city. Short exposures to nature can make us less aggressive, more creative, more civic minded and healthier overall. For warding off depression, lets go with the Finnish recommendation of five hours a month in nature, minimum. But as the poets, neuroscientists and river runners have shown us, we also at times need longer, deeper immersions into wild spaces to recover from severe distress, to imagine our futures and to be our best civilized selves.

Nothing dries more quickly than a tear

Once when the great slaver turned abolitionist John Newton was praised for what he had achieved, he responded quickly: “Sir, the devil already told me that.” In a similar situation, when the eminent Scottish preacher Robert Murray M’Cheyne was congratulated by a parishioner for his saintliness, he replied sharply, “Madame, if you could see in my heart, you would spit in my face.” In each case, they refused to let others think that they were what they weren’t. They resisted hypocrisy by exposing the gap that was its essence—the gap between the inner and the outer, appearance and reality.

Not wishing, however, to squander my hard-earned advantage, I quickly recovered myself by using the trick of deflection: exerting acute concentration on something innately banal. In the visual equivalent of a fingertip search,

How come you" - I gasped - "recovered so quickly?" "I dove." "What?" "I don't know how I knew. I think I heard lapping water or something right before we hit. So I twisted around and dove. Whereas you went flat as a pancake on your back." "You could've told me." "Yeah, because there was plenty of time for that," he said sarcastically.

The North Americans' sense of time is very special. They are short on patience. Everything must be quick, including food and sex, which the rest of the world treats ceremoniously. Gringos invented two terms that are untranslatable into most languages: “snack” and “quickie,” to refer to eating standing up and loving on the run . . . that, too, sometimes standing up. The most popular books are manuals: how to become a millionaire in ten easy lessons, how to lose fifteen pounds a week, how to recover from your divorce, and so on. People always go around looking for shortcuts, and ways to escape anything they consider unpleasant: ugliness, old age, weight, illness, poverty, and failure in any of its aspects.

Ah, the Waking Dead.” Sloane let out a laugh and Dex gasped. He quickly recovered and slammed a fist down on the bar. “You can’t tell him about the Waking Dead! I forbid it! I’m demanding you adhere to the ex-boyfriend code of honor.” “There’s

Access to nature has been shown to improve sleep quality, decrease blood pressure, and even lengthen lifespan. Large-scale studies conducted in the United States, Britain, and the Netherlands show that people living in greener areas have a lower incidence of anxiety and depression and display an ability to recover more quickly from stressful life events than those in less green areas.

Re-entry taught me a new sort of fear that was slow and dull rather than quick and thrilling...the hardest part of reentry to a humdrum life was not recovering from the bad stuff. It was missing the good times, the friendship, intensity, fear, sense of purpose, the sheer exotic escapism of it all.

After the breakup, they will openly brag about how happy they are with their new partner, where most normal people would feel very embarrassed and secretive about entering a new relationship so quickly. And even more surprising, they fully expect you to be happy for them. Otherwise you are bitter and jealous.

Humans are so strange in the ways that we are either recovering too quickly from something or holding on to pain forever. There seems to be no middle ground. We bounce back or we wallow. But remembering the hardest moments of grief or loss and letting them be present for you in the good moments is something I’ve found useful and grounding as I age. It feels like a way of remembering that balance does exist. This too. This grief. This joy. Together always intertwined.

Next question.” He swipes the screen of his phone, but he’s not looking at it; he’s staring at me. Trying to intimidate me. Trying to see who’ll blink first. “Did you leave DC because (A) you couldn’t find any hotties to make out with? Or (B) your East Coast boyfriend is an ankle buster and you’d heard about legendary West Coast D, so you had to find out for yourself if the rumors were true?” he says with a smirk. “Idiot,” Grace mumbles, shaking her head. I may not understand some of his phrasing, but I get the gist. I feel myself blushing. But I manage to recover quickly and get a jab in. “Why are you so interested in my love life?” “I’m not. Why are you evading the question? You do that a lot, by the way.” “Do what?” “Evade questions.” “What business is that of yours?” I say, secretly irritated that he’s figured me out... Porter scoffs. “Seeing how this is your first day on the job, and may very well be your last, considering the turnover rate for this position? And seeing how I have seniority over you? I’d say, yeah, it’s pretty much my business.” “Are you threatening me?” I ask. He clicks off his phone and raises a brow. “Huh?” “That sounded like a threat,” I say. “Whoa, you need to chill. That was not . . .” He can’t even say it. He’s flustered now, tucking his hair behind his ear. “Grace . . .” Grace holds up a hand. “Leave me out of this mess. I have no idea what I’m even witnessing here. Both of you have lost the plot.

We must invert our conception of repose and activity, he continued. We should not sleep to recover the energy expended when awake but rather wake occasionally to defecate the unwanted energy that sleep engenders. This might be done quickly – a five-mile race at full tilt around the town and then back to bed and the kingdom of the shadows.

Failure is inevitable, and that the key to success is not dodging every bullet but being able to recover quickly.

Remember, making mistakes is part of the process. The key to success is to make mistakes quickly, and recover quickly, and keep forging forward.

people in a healthy organization, beginning with the leaders, learn from one another, identify critical issues, and recover quickly from mistakes.

You were a mess but aside from a few evil coughs and dirty little pants and some half-moon cuts on the back of your neck, you recovered quickly enough. I did not. I had long, ridiculous purple nails back then. The first thing they did when I got here was tie me down and cut them off. But it was love just the same Johnny. Believe me. For that, should I be ashamed? For wanting to protect you from the pain of living? From the pain of lovin Always from loving. Always for loving. Always. Perhaps my shame should really come from my failure. Tears just the same.

He recovered smoothly, his feet quickly finding their stance again in the gathering snow, but he looked stunned. The feat of strength, from such a diminutive theonite, should not have been possible. “What are you?” Takeru whispered. Something bigger than myself, she realized. “I’m Matsuda Misaki,” she said with pride and honesty she never attached to those words before. “I’m your wife.

To be extraordinary is to accept and embrace repeated failings, recover as quickly as possible; that is let go of all your reasons and excuses to justify the failing; then move on to carry out your

I wiped my eyes on my sleeve and jumped when I turned and found Ren’s brother standing behind me as a man. Ren got up, alert, and watched him carefully, suspicious of Kishan’s every move. Ren’s tail twitched back and forth, and a deep grumble issued from his chest. Kishan look down at Ren, who had crept even closer to keep an eye on him, and then looked back at me. He reached out his hand, and when I placed mine in it, he lifted it to his lips and kissed it, then bowed deeply with great aplomb. “May I ask your name?” “My name is Kelsey. Kelsey hayes.” “Kelsey. Well, I, for one, appreciate all the efforts you have made on our behalf. I apologize if I frightened you earlier. I am,” he smiled, “out of practice in conversing with young ladies. These gifts you will be offering to Durga. Would you kindly tell me more about them?” Ren growled unhappily. I nodded. “Is Kishan your given name?” “My full name is actually Sohan Kishan Rajaram, but you can call me Kishan if you like.” He smiled a dazzling white smile, which was even more brilliant due to the contrast with his dark skin. He offered an arm. “Would you please sit and talk with me, Kelsey?” There was something very charming about Kishan. I surprised myself by finding I immediately trusted and liked him. He had a quality similar to his brother. Like Ren, he had the ability to set a person completely at ease. Maybe it was their diplomatic training. Maybe it was how their mother raised them. Whatever it was made me respond positively. I smiled at him. “I’d love to.” He tucked my arm under his and walked with me over to the fire. Ren growled again, and Kishan shot a smirk in his direction. I noticed him wince when he sat, so I offered him some aspirin. “Shouldn’t we be getting you two to a doctor? I really think you might need stitches and Ren-“ “Thank you, but no. You don’t need to worry about our minor pains.” “I wouldn’t exactly call your wounds minor, Kishan.” “The curse helps us to heal quickly. You’ll see. We’ll both recover swiftly enough on our own. Still, it was nice to have such a lovely young woman tending to my injuries.” Ren stood in front of us and looked like he was a tiger suffering from apoplexy. I admonished, “Ren, be civil.” Kishan smiled widely and waited for me to get comfortable. Then he scooted closer to me and rested his arm on the log behind my shoulders. Ren stepped right between us, nudged his brother roughly aside with his furry head, creating a wider space, and maneuvered his body into the middle. He dropped heavily to the ground and rested his head in my lap. Kishan frowned, but I started talking, sharing the story of what Ren and I had been through. I told him about meeting Ren at the circus and about how he tricked me to get me to India. I talked about Phet, the Cave of Kanheri, and finding the prophecy, and I told him that we were on our way to Hampi. As I lost myself in our story, I stroked Ren’s head. He shut his eyes and purred, and then he fell asleep. I talked for almost an hour, barely registering Kishan’s raised eyebrow and thoughtful expression as he watched the two of us together. I didn’t even notice when he’d changed back into a tiger.

The paper comes in plastic, a little thinner each week, a few more ads. Pretty soon there'll be no news. We'll be underwhelmed, over-bored & all storied out. The clouds ready to burst with our blue-skinned memories. Everyone with a blog, a website, an online store, dedicated server & two-dimensional quick-response-coded documentary made about their precious life. Our brains at maximum capacity, running optimization programs to recover what's left of our sanity. Still, we hope. We go see the latest blockbuster, buy the latest iPhone, zone out in front of our schizo-screens drinking jugs of moonshine corn syrup with our latent mutant meals. Facebook keeps us chained to our pasts, our posts, screwed in our seats... Scarecrows surrounded by night soil & spirits. Your acid shield may protect you from outside threat, but it'll never protect you from yourself.

Men are dogs ... they just are. They need constant praise and rewards. Women are pack mules—we work without praise for long days, recover quickly, and wake up the next day plodding right along again. No treats. No pats on the head. No belly rubs

In the absence of this depth of community, the safe container is difficult to find. By default, we become the container ourselves, and when this happens, we cannot drop into the well of grief in which we can fully let go of the sorrows we carry. We recycle our grief, moving into it and then pulling it back into our bodies unreleased. Frequently in my practice patients tell me that they often cry in private. I ask them whether, at some point in this process, they ever allow their grief to be witnessed and shared with others. There is usually a quick retort of “No, I couldn’t do that. I don’t want to be a burden to anyone else.” When I push it a little further and ask them how it would feel if a friend came to them with his or her sorrows and pain, they respond that they would feel honored to sit with their friend and offer support. This disconnection between what we would offer others and what we feel we can ask for is extreme. We need to recover our right to ask for help in grief, otherwise it will continue to recycle perpetually. Grief has never been private; it has always been communal. Subconsciously, we are awaiting the presence of others, before we can feel safe enough to drop to our knees on the holy ground of sorrow.

he said. “Well what, Jay?” she replied. “Do you want to be my mommy?” Durell felt as though she had nearly fallen backwards into the tub, and she felt tightness and a lump in the back of her throat. She recovered quickly. “Jay, I would like nothing more in the world than to be your mommy!

More recently, studies by social scientists have emphasized that most people in modern Western society go through life with strong positive beliefs that the world is basically a nice place in which to live, that life is mostly fair, and that they are good people who deserve to have good things happen to them. Moreover, these beliefs are a valuable aid to happy, healthy functioning. But suffering and victimization undermine these beliefs and make it hard to go on living happily or effectively in society. Indeed, the direct and practical effects of some trauma or crime are often relatively minor, whereas the psychological effects go on indefinitely. The body may recover from rape or robbery rather quickly, but the psychological scars can last for many years. A characteristic of these scars is that the victims lose faith in their basic beliefs about the world as fair and benevolent or even in themselves as good people. Thus, evil strikes at people's fundamental beliefs.

He changes his perception of himself, becoming more realistic in his views of self. He becomes more like the person he wishes to be. He values himself more highly. He is more self-confident and self-directing. He has a better understanding of himself, becomes more open to his experience, denies or represses less of his experience. He becomes more accepting in his attitudes toward others, seeing others as more similar to himself. In his behavior he shows similar changes. He is less frustrated by stress, and recovers from stress more quickly. He becomes more mature in his everyday behavior as this is observed by friends. He is less defensive, more adaptive, more able to meet situations creatively.

Obviously, in those situations, we lose the sale. But we’re not trying to maximize each and every transaction. Instead, we’re trying to build a lifelong relationship with each customer, one phone call at a time. A lot of people may think it’s strange that an Internet company is so focused on the telephone, when only about 5 percent of our sales happen through the telephone. In fact, most of our phone calls don’t even result in sales. But what we’ve found is that on average, every customer contacts us at least once sometime during his or her lifetime, and we just need to make sure that we use that opportunity to create a lasting memory. The majority of phone calls don’t result in an immediate order. Sometimes a customer may be calling because it’s her first time returning an item, and she just wants a little help stepping through the process. Other times, a customer may call because there’s a wedding coming up this weekend and he wants a little fashion advice. And sometimes, we get customers who call simply because they’re a little lonely and want someone to talk to. I’m reminded of a time when I was in Santa Monica, California, a few years ago at a Skechers sales conference. After a long night of bar-hopping, a small group of us headed up to someone’s hotel room to order some food. My friend from Skechers tried to order a pepperoni pizza from the room-service menu, but was disappointed to learn that the hotel we were staying at did not deliver hot food after 11:00 PM. We had missed the deadline by several hours. In our inebriated state, a few of us cajoled her into calling Zappos to try to order a pizza. She took us up on our dare, turned on the speakerphone, and explained to the (very) patient Zappos rep that she was staying in a Santa Monica hotel and really craving a pepperoni pizza, that room service was no longer delivering hot food, and that she wanted to know if there was anything Zappos could do to help. The Zappos rep was initially a bit confused by the request, but she quickly recovered and put us on hold. She returned two minutes later, listing the five closest places in the Santa Monica area that were still open and delivering pizzas at that time. Now, truth be told, I was a little hesitant to include this story because I don’t actually want everyone who reads this book to start calling Zappos and ordering pizza. But I just think it’s a fun story to illustrate the power of not having scripts in your call center and empowering your employees to do what’s right for your brand, no matter how unusual or bizarre the situation. As for my friend from Skechers? After that phone call, she’s now a customer for life. Top 10 Ways to Instill Customer Service into Your Company   1. Make customer service a priority for the whole company, not just a department. A customer service attitude needs to come from the top.   2. Make WOW a verb that is part of your company’s everyday vocabulary.   3. Empower and trust your customer service reps. Trust that they want to provide great service… because they actually do. Escalations to a supervisor should be rare.   4. Realize that it’s okay to fire customers who are insatiable or abuse your employees.   5. Don’t measure call times, don’t force employees to upsell, and don’t use scripts.   6. Don’t hide your 1-800 number. It’s a message not just to your customers, but to your employees as well.   7. View each call as an investment in building a customer service brand, not as an expense you’re seeking to minimize.   8. Have the entire company celebrate great service. Tell stories of WOW experiences to everyone in the company.   9. Find and hire people who are already passionate about customer service. 10. Give great service to everyone: customers, employees, and vendors.

A person’s average or typical level of happiness is that person’s “affective style.” (“Affect” refers to the felt or experienced part of emotion.) Your affective style reflects the everyday balance of power between your approach system and your withdrawal system, and this balance can be read right from your forehead. It has long been known from studies of brainwaves that most people show an asymmetry: more activity either in the right frontal cortex or in the left frontal cortex. In the late 1980s, Richard Davidson at the University of Wisconsin discovered that these asymmetries correlated with a person’s general tendencies to experience positive and negative emotions. People showing more of a certain kind of brainwave coming through the left side of the forehead reported feeling more happiness in their daily lives and less fear, anxiety, and shame than people exhibiting higher activity on the right side. Later research showed that these cortical “lefties” are less subject to depression and recover more quickly from negative experiences.29 The difference between cortical righties and lefties can be seen even in infants: Ten-month-old babies showing more activity on the right side are more likely to cry when separated briefly from their mothers.30 And this difference in infancy appears to reflect an aspect of personality that is stable, for most people, all the way through adulthood. 31 Babies who show a lot more activity on the right side of the forehead become toddlers who are more anxious about novel situations; as teenagers, they are more likely to be fearful about dating and social activities; and, finally, as adults, they are more likely to need psychotherapy to loosen up.

I was on the first one when I felt his fingers encircle my wrist. “Sophie, come on. I don’t want to fight with you.” Turning, I opened my mouth to say I didn’t want to fight with him either. But before I could, I saw the telltale flash out of the corner of my eye, and the next thing I knew, my arm was jerking out of his grasp. “If you don’t want to fight with her, maybe you shouldn’t suggest she team up with people who want to kill her,” my voice snarled. Archer backed up so fast he nearly stumbled, and I wasn’t sure I’d ever seen him look so freaked out. But he recovered quickly. “Elodie, if I wanted to talk to you, I’d do a séance or something. Maybe go on an episode of Ghost Hunters. But right now, I want to talk to Sophie. So clear out.” Elodie had no intention of doing that. “You always were a crappy boyfriend,” she said. “Once you left, I chalked that up to you, you know, not actually liking me. But unless I’m blind as well as dead, you really like Sophie. In fact, hard as it is for me to fathom, I think you love her.” Shut up, shut up, shut up! Screw that, she retorted. You two spend all your time making stupid jokes and being all witty. Someone has to get real. “What’s your point?” Archer asked, narrowing his eyes at me. Her. Whatever. God, this was getting confusing. “Cal loves her, too, you know. And the last time I checked, he wasn’t part of a cult of monster killers. I’m just saying that if you’re going have loyalties that divided, maybe it’s time to bow out gracefully.” You couldn’t say Elodie didn’t know how to make a dramatic exit. The next thing I knew, I was pitching forward into Archer’s arms, my head swimming. Archer clutched my waist and then abruptly shoved me at arm’s length. “Sophie?” he asked, looking intently into my eyes. “Yeah,” I said, my voice shaking. “I’m back.” His fingers loosened, becoming more of a caress than a grip. “So you can’t control when she swoops in like that? She can just take you over…whenever?” I tried to laugh, but it came out more of a cough. “You know Elodie. I don’t think anyone has ever controlled her.” Frowning, Archer pulled his hands back and shoved them in his pockets. “Well, that’s awesome.” I grabbed the railing to steady myself. “Archer…that stuff she said. You know it’s not true.” He shrugged and moved past me onto the steps. “Saying the most hateful things possible is like Elodie’s superpower. Don’t worry about it.” He paused and looked over his shoulder. “We should probably go tell Jenna what we found down here.” Oh, right. We’d just unearthed a whole bunch of demons. That probably trumped over relationship issues. Another few seconds passed. “Come on, Mercer,” Archer said, holding his hand out to me. This time, I took it.

DO YOU HAVE OR HAVE YOU EXPERIENCED IN THE PAST SIX MONTHS . . . — PART A — ■ A feeling you’re constantly racing from one task to the next? ■ Feeling wired yet tired? ■ A struggle calming down before bedtime, or a second wind that keeps you up late? ■ Difficulty falling asleep or disrupted sleep? ■ A feeling of anxiety or nervousness—can’t stop worrying about things beyond your control? ■ A quickness to feel anger or rage—frequent screaming or yelling? ■ Memory lapses or feeling distracted, especially under duress? ■ Sugar cravings (you need “a little something” after each meal, usually of the chocolate variety)? ■ Increased abdominal circumference, greater than 35 inches (the dreaded abdominal fat, or muffin top—not bloating)? ■ Skin conditions such as eczema or thin skin (sometimes physiologically and psychologically)? ■ Bone loss (perhaps your doctor uses scarier terms, such as osteopenia or osteoporosis)? ■ High blood pressure or rapid heartbeat unrelated to those cute red shoes in the store window? ■ High blood sugar (maybe your clinician has mentioned the words prediabetes or even diabetes or insulin resistance)? Shakiness between meals, also known as blood sugar instability? ■ Indigestion, ulcers, or GERD (gastroesophageal reflux disease)? ■ More difficulty recovering from physical injury than in the past? ■ Unexplained pink to purple stretch marks on your belly or back? ■ Irregular menstrual cycles? ■ Decreased fertility?

Dawn was casting spun-gold threads across a rosy sky over Sawubona Game Reserve as Martine Allen took a last look around to ensure there weren’t any witnesses, leaned forward like a jockey on the track, wound her fingers through a tangle of silver mane, and cried, ‘Go, Jemmy, go!’ The white giraffe sprang forward so suddenly that she was almost unseated, but she recovered and, wrapping her arms around his neck, quickly adjusted to the familiar rhythm of Jemmy’s rocking-horse stride.

Northern European societies are among the few where people sleep alone or with a partner in a private room, and that may have significant implications for mental health in general and for PTSD in particular. Virtually all mammals seem to benefit from companionship; even lab rats recover more quickly from trauma if they are caged with other rats rather than alone. In humans, lack of social support has been found to be twice as reliable at predicting PTSD as the severity of the trauma itself.

All they told me was that he was forty-two when he died. I just wanted...to find out more about what kind of person he was. I could tell you more, amanda thought to herself. A lot more. She'd suspected the truth since Morgan Tanner had called, and she'd made some calls to confirm her suspicions. Dawson, she'd learned, had been taking off life support at CarolinaEast Regional Medical Center late Monday night. He's been kept alive long after doctors knew he would never recover, because he was an organ donor. Dawson, she knews, had saved Alan's life-but in the end, he'd saved Jared's as well. And for that meant...everything. I gave you the best of me, he'd told her once, and with every beat of her son's heart, she knew he'd done exactly that. How about a quick hug," she said, "before we go inside?" Jared rolled his eyes, but he opened his arms anyway. "I love you, Mom," he mumbled, pulling her close. Amanda closed her eyes, feeling the steady rhythm in his chest. "I love you, too.

Lady Cosgrove gasped louder but recovered quickly. “Mr. Turner,” she said, reaching out for Ash’s cuff. “Do listen to me. I know that you may believe that Lady Margaret has your best interests at heart, as she is some kind of a relation, if only a distant one. But if you intend to be a duke, you must not let yourself be guided so easily, not by one such as her. Take my warning to heart: she’s using you to punish me, because I kept my distance from her these past months. You know that any woman of good sense and decency would have done the same.” No, Margaret had never been like Lady Cosgrove. For one thing, she had never been so stupid. Ash’s smile grew darker, and he looked at the woman. “I knew the instant Margaret spoke that she intended to use me as a weapon. What you fail to understand is this: I am her weapon to use.” Margaret’s lungs burned. So much for not occasioning gossip. But she couldn’t fault him. She couldn’t reprimand him. She couldn’t even stop her own smile from spilling out, stupidly, over her face, the truth writ large for anyone to see.

Three miles from my adopted city lies a village where I came to peace. The world there was a calm place, even the great Danube no more than a pale ribbon tossed onto the landscape by a girl’s careless hand. Into this stillness I had been ordered to recover. The hills were gold with late summer; my rooms were two, plus a small kitchen, situated upstairs in the back of a cottage at the end of the Herrengasse. From my window I could see onto the courtyard where a linden tree twined skyward — leafy umbilicus canted toward light, warped in the very act of yearning — and I would feed on the sun as if that alone would dismantle the silence around me. At first I raged. Then music raged in me, rising so swiftly I could not write quickly enough to ease the roiling. I would stop to light a lamp, and whatever I’d missed — larks flying to nest, church bells, the shepherd’s home-toward-evening song — rushed in, and I would rage again. I am by nature a conflagration; I would rather leap than sit and be looked at. So when my proud city spread her gypsy skirts, I reentered, burning towards her greater, constant light. Call me rough, ill-tempered, slovenly— I tell you, every tenderness I have ever known has been nothing but thwarted violence, an ache so permanent and deep, the lightest touch awakens it. . . . It is impossible to care enough. I have returned with a second Symphony and 15 Piano Variations which I’ve named Prometheus, after the rogue Titan, the half-a-god who knew the worst sin is to take what cannot be given back. I smile and bow, and the world is loud. And though I dare not lean in to shout Can’t you see that I’m deaf? — I also cannot stop listening.

I hate to admit it," she said, "but for all we hear about the States, Canada's capacity for racism seems even worse." "Worse?" "The American Japanese were interned as we were in Canada, and sent off to concentration camps, but their property wasn't liquidated as ours was. And look how quickly the communities reestablished themselves in Los Angeles and San Francisco. We weren't allowed to return to the West Coast like that. We've never recovered from the dispersal policy. But of course that was the government's whole idea—to make sure we'd never be visible again. Official racism was blatant in Canada.

before he went back to helping the boy. Missing from the Warrior tent were Kalona and Aurox. For obvious reasons, Thanatos had decided the Tulsa community wasn’t ready to meet either of them. I agreed with her. I wasn’t ready for … I mentally shook myself. No, I wasn’t going to think about the Aurox/Heath situation now. Instead I turned my attention to the second of the big tents. Lenobia was there, keeping a sharp eye on the people who clustered like buzzing bees around Mujaji and the big Percheron mare, Bonnie. Travis was with her. Travis was always with her, which made my heart feel good. It was awesome to see Lenobia in love. The Horse Mistress was like a bright, shining beacon of joy, and with all the Darkness I’d seen lately, that was rain in my desert. “Oh, for shit’s sake, where did I put my wine? Has anyone seen my Queenies cup? As the bumpkin reminded me, my parents are here somewhere, and I’m going to need fortification by the time they circle around and find me.” Aphrodite was muttering and pawing through the boxes of unsold cookies, searching for the big purple plastic cup I’d seen her drinking from earlier. “You have wine in that Queenies to go cup?” Stevie Rae was shaking her head at Aphrodite. “And you’ve been drinkin’ it through a straw?” Shaunee joined Stevie Rae in a head shake. “Isn’t that nasty?” “Desperate times call for desperate measures,” Aphrodite quipped. “There are too many nuns lurking around to drink openly without hearing a boring lecture.” Aphrodite cut her eyes to the right of us where Street Cats had set up a half-moon display of cages filled with adoptable cats and bins of catnip-filled toys for sale. The Street Cats had their own miniature version of the silver and white tents, and I could see Damien sitting inside busily handling the cash register, but except for him, running every aspect of the feline area were the habit-wearing Benedictine nuns who had made Street Cats their own. One of the nuns looked my way and I waved and grinned at the Abbess. Sister Mary Angela waved back before returning to the conversation she was having with a family who were obviously falling in love with a cute white cat that looked like a giant cottonball. “Aphrodite, the nuns are cool,” I reminded her. “And they look too busy to pay any attention to you,” Stevie Rae said. “Imagine that—you may not be the center of everyone’s attention,” Shaylin said with mock surprise. Stevie Rae covered her giggle with a cough. Before Aphrodite could say something hateful, Grandma limped up to us. Other than the limp and being pale, Grandma looked healthy and happy. It had only been a little over a week since Neferet had kidnapped and tried to kill her, but she’d recovered with amazing quickness. Thanatos had told us that was because she was in unusually good shape for a woman of her age. I knew it was because of something else—something we both shared—a special bond with a goddess who believed in giving her children free choice, along with gifting them with special abilities. Grandma was beloved of the Great Mother,

So, what...in the meantime, you just...” He glanced at her then back at the road. “Deny yourself?” Em gave a half smile at the incredulity in his voice. Clearly it was a foreign concept to him. “It’s okay. I have a battery operated boyfriend awaiting my attention when I get home.” He shot her a quick, open-mouthed stare, his lips parted enticingly. He looked so stunned at her admission she couldn’t help but laugh. “Sorry, didn’t you know that women did that, too? Did I shock you?” “Not at all.” He recovered quickly, a big smile splitting his profile. “I’m just trying to decide which is sexier. Self-denial or self-abuse.

The wonderful thing about the human mind is the way it copes when the worst happens. Beyond that worst happening you think there can be nothing, the unimaginable has taken place, and on the other side is death, destruction, the end. But the worst happens and you reel from it, you stagger, the shock is enormous, and then you begin to recover. You rally, you stand up and face it. You get used to it. For what had happen was not the worst, you realize that. the worst was yet to come, was perhaps always yet to come, never would actually come, because if it did, you would know it, that would be reality, and there would be nothing then but to kill yourself. Quickly.

Therapeutic fasting accelerates the healing process and allows the body to recover from serious disease in a dramatically short period of time. In my practice I have seen fasting eliminate lupus and arthritis, remove chronic skin conditions such as psoriasis and eczema, heal the digestive tract in patients with ulcerative colitis and Crohn’s disease, and quickly eliminate cardiovascular diseases such as high blood pressure and angina. In these cases the recoveries were permanent: fasting enabled longtime disease sufferers to unchain themselves from their multiple toxic drugs and even eliminate the need for surgery, which was recommended to some of them as their only solution.

Mr Corcoran, whom by chance I was observing, smiled preliminarily but when about to speak, his smile was transfixed on his features and his entire body assumed a stiff attitude. Suddenly he sneezed, spattering his clothing with a mucous discharge from his nostrils. As my uncle hurried to his assistance, I felt that my gorge was about to rise. I retched slightly, making a noise with my throat similar to that utilized by persons in the article of death. My uncle's back was towards me as he bent in ministration. … I clutched my belongings and retired quickly as they worked together with their pocket-cloths. I went to my room and lay prostrate on my bed, endeavouring to recover my composure.

I did once feel a tendre, but that was when I was young, and I recovered from it so quickly that I shouldn't think I was truly in love. In fact, I am much disposed to think that if I hadn't met him at a ball, when he was wearing regimentals, I shouldn't have looked twice at him." She added earnestly: "Do you know, cousin, I am strongly of the opinion that gentlemen should not be permitted to attend balls and assemblies rigged out in smart dress-uniforms? There is something about regimentals which is very deceiving. Fortunately, since I believe he was quite ineligible, I chanced to meet him the very next week, when he was not wearing regimentals, so I never had time to fall in love with him. It was the most disillusioning thing imaginable!

Just then, more footsteps sounded in the hallway, and I did the first thing that came to mind to distract Christopher and give us an excuse for being up here. Grabbing his lapel, I pulled him toward me until my back was against the wall. Planting my lips on his, I watched as his eyes widened, clearly not expecting this behavior from me. Quickly, though, he recovered, his hands finding my hips, his eyes sliding closed. “Well, well, well, what do we have here?” the slick voice, that was all too recognizable now, broke us apart. When I pushed him away, Christopher seemed too bewildered to speak. Cortez stood behind us, a bemused look on his face. My heart stopped as my gaze quickly jumped to the man beside Andres when he spoke one word, the deep timbre of his voice sending electricity down my spine. “Parker?

He’s a murdering chud,” Zil was yelling. “What do you want to do? Lynch him?” Astrid demanded. That stopped the flow for a second as kids tried to figure out what “lynch” meant. But Zil quickly recovered. “I saw him do it. He used his powers to kill Harry.” “I was trying to stop you from smashing my head in!” Hunter shouted. “You’re a lying mutant freak!” “They think they can do anything they want,” another voice shouted. Astrid said, as calmly as she could while still pitching her voice to be heard, “We are not going down that path, people, dividing up between freaks and normals.” “They already did it!” Zil cried. “It’s the freaks acting all special and like their farts don’t stink.” That earned a laugh. “And now they’re starting to kill us,” Zil cried. Angry cheers. Edilio squared his shoulders and stepped into the crowd. He went first to Hank, the kid with the shotgun. He tapped him on the shoulder and said, “Give me that thing.” “No way,” Hank said. But he didn’t seem too certain. “You want to have that thing fire by accident and blow someone’s face off?” Edilio held his hand out. “Give it to me, man.” Zil rounded on Edilio. “You going to make Hunter give up his weapon? Huh? He’s got powers, man, and that’s okay, but the normals can’t have any weapon? How are we supposed to defend ourselves from the freaks?” “Man, give it a rest, huh?” Edilio said. He was doing his best to sound more weary than angry or scared. Things were already bad enough. “Zil, you want to be responsible if that gauge goes off and kills Astrid? You want to maybe give that some thought?” Zil blinked. But he said, “Dude, I’m not scared of Sam.” “Sam won’t be your problem, I will be,” Edilio snapped, losing patience. “Anything happens to her, I’ll take you down before Sam ever gets the chance.” Zil snorted derisively. “Ah, good little boy, Edilio, kissing up to the chuds. I got news for you, dilly dilly, you’re a lowly normal, just like me and the rest of us." “I’m going to let that go,” Edilio said evenly, striving to regain his cool, trying to sound calm and in control, even though he could hardly take his eyes off the twin barrels of the shotgun. “But now I’m taking that shotgun.” “No way!” Hank cried, and the next thing was an explosion so loud, Edilio thought a bomb had gone off. The muzzle flash blinded him, like camera flash going off in his face. Someone yelled in pain. Edilio staggered back, squeezed his eyes shut, trying to adjust. When he opened them again the shotgun was on the ground and the boy who’d accidentally fired it was holding his bruised hand, obviously shocked. Zil bent to grab the gun. Edilio took two steps forward and kicked Zil in the face. As Zil fell back Edilio made a grab for the shotgun. He never saw the blow that turned his knees to water and filled his head with stars. He fell like a sack of bricks, but even as he fell he lurched forward to cover the shotgun. Astrid screamed and launched herself down the stairs to protect Edilio. Antoine, the one who had hit Edilio, was raising his bat to hit Edilio again, but on the back swing he caught Astrid in the face. Antoine cursed, suddenly fearful. Zil yelled, “No, no, no!” There was a sudden rush of running feet. Down the walkway, into the street, echoing down the block.

Rafe slipped a third finger into Kris’s tight channel, opening and stretching him for his mate and the inevitable fulfillment of their seductive, sensuous confluence. Suddenly releasing Kris’s lips, Rafe licked his way down with a single wet line to Kris’s groin, flicking the tip of his tongue quickly over the silky-smooth, smoldering-hot crown of Kris’s dick that jumped at the brief contact, leaking milky drops of precum, and Kris moaned louder. Devoted to Kris’s dick with a hungry mouth, Rafe made a fierce foray over Kris’s shaft, suckling the length and tonguing the slit mercilessly until all that was left of Kris’s overactive brain evaporated in fumes, not knowing if he’d ever recover from this onslaught to his body’s nether regions and this attack on his senses and nerves until they overloaded and short-circuited.

When Camilla and her husband joined Prince Charles on a holiday in Turkey shortly before his polo accident, she didn’t complain just as she bore, through gritted teeth, Camilla’s regular invitations to Balmoral and Sandringham. When Charles flew to Italy last year on a sketching holiday, Diana’s friends noted that Camilla was staying at another villa a short drive away. On her return Mrs Parker-Bowles made it quite clear that any suggestion of impropriety was absurd. Her protestations of innocence brought a tight smile from the Princess. That changed to scarcely controlled anger during their summer holiday on board a Greek tycoon’s yacht. She quietly simmered as she heard her husband holding forth to dinner-party guests about the virtues of mistresses. Her mood was scarcely helped when, later that evening, she heard him chatting on the telephone to Camilla. They meet socially on occasion but, there is no love lost between these two women locked into an eternal triangle of rivalry. Diana calls her rival “the rotweiller” while Camilla refers to the Princess as that “ridiculous creature”. At social engagements they are at pains to avoid each other. Diana has developed a technique in public of locating Camilla as quickly as possible and then, depending on her mood, she watches Charles when he looks in her direction or simply evades her gaze. “It is a morbid game,” says a friend. Days before the Salisbury Cathedral spire appeal concert Diana knew that Camilla was going. She vented her frustration in conversations with friends so that on the day of the event the Princess was able to watch the eye contact between her husband and Camilla with quiet amusement. Last December all those years of pent-up emotion came flooding out at a memorial service for Leonora Knatchbull, the six-year-old daughter of Lord and Lady Romsey, who tragically died of cancer. As Diana left the service, held at St James’s Palace, she was photographed in tears. She was weeping in sorrow but also in anger. Diana was upset that Camilla Parker Bowles who had only known the Romseys for a short time was also present at such an intimate family service. It was a point she made vigorously to her husband as they travelled back to Kensington Palace in their chauffeur-driven limousine. When they arrived at Kensington Palace the Princess felt so distressed that she ignored the staff Christmas party, which was then in full swing, and went to her sitting-room to recover her composure. Diplomatically, Peter Westmacott, the Wales’s deputy private secretary, sent her avuncular detective Ken Wharfe to help calm her.

That was the first time in my life that anyone had rejected me so completely.' Tsukuru said. 'And the ones who did it were the people I trusted the most, my four best friends in the world. I was so close to them that they had been like an extension of my own body. Searching for the reason, or correcting a misunderstanding, was beyond me. I was simply, and utterly, in shock. So much so that I thought I might never recover. It felt like something inside me snapped.' The bartender brought over the glass of wine and replenished the bowl of nuts. Once he'd left, Sara turned to Tsukuru. 'I've never experienced that myself, but I think I can imagine how stunned you must have been. I understand that you couldn't recover from it quickly. But still, after time had passed and the shock had worn off, wasn't there something you could have done? I mean, it was so unfair. Why didn't you challenge it? I don't see how you could stand it.' Tsukuru shook his head slightly. 'The next morning I made up some excuse to tell my family and took the bullet train back to Tokyo. I couldn't stand being in Nagoya for one more day. All I could think of was getting away from there.' 'If it had been me, I would have stayed there and not left until I got to the bottom of it,' Sara said. 'I wasn't strong enough for that.' Tsukuru said. 'You didn't want to find out the truth?' Tsukuru stared at his hands on the tabletop, careful choosing his words. 'I think I was afraid of pursuing it, of whatever facts might come of light. Of actually coming face-to-face with them. Whatever the truth was, I didn't think it would save me. I'm not sure why, but I was certain of it.' 'And you're certain of it now?' 'I don't know,' Tsukuru said. 'But I was then.' 'So you went back to Tokyo, stayed holed up in your apartment, closed your eyes, and covered up your ears.' 'You could say that, yes.

You look nice,” he commented, before thanking her for the wine and making his way outside to the porch. Grateful he had turned away and so couldn’t see her blush, she fussed about in the kitchen for a while, preparing a dressing for the side salad, adding a few chopped herbs as an afterthought. Happy that all was well, she joined him, looking forward to another evening of lighthearted chat. “I thought we’d eat out here tonight, if that’s okay. It’s a lovely evening. We should make the most of it,” she said as she drew up a chair opposite him. “Definitely,” he replied, staring out toward Gull Rock. “Beautiful,” she sighed, realizing too late she was still looking at him as she spoke. Averting her eyes, she added, “The view, I mean.” “Oh, so not me?” he joked, one eyebrow raised in challenge. Recovering quickly, she grinned back. “You’re okay, I guess. Not my type, but I’m sure there’s plenty out there who’ll appreciate you.” “Thanks very much.” He appeared somewhat crestfallen. “I don’t know whether to be flattered or insulted.” “A bit of both, I think.” She winked, before heading back to the kitchen to bring dinner out.

Whispering Echoes, a contemporary fiction with Gothic undertones... Death is not the greatest loss in life. The greatest loss is what dies inside us while we still live… This is the tale of two women standing at opposite ends of the tunnel of life. Sally Donaldson is at the beginning, whilst Miss Bella Connelly , is at the end. The story opens in the winter of 1990. Sally is a young woman on the verge of a breakdown, slowly drowning in the sorrow of an unimaginable loss. When her husband sends her to Brackenleigh Manor to recover, she encounters the unconventional healing methods of Miss Bella Connelly. Sally quickly discovers that the manor itself harbor’s its own sorrow, and the secrets that lay within the old groaning house are none other than the sad Whispering Echoes of Miss Bella Connelly’s past. The Story then shifts back to 1939 – Britain on the eve of WW2 – and reveals the secrets and lies that transform Bella, and completely change the lives of all who meet Miss Bella after. The events that carved and marked Miss Bella’s journey finally draw Sally out of her own shadows and back into life. For it is within Miss Bella’s story, that Sally learns that life has a measure that no one can count… A measure that far outweighs Death…

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.

When their brother-in-law turned toward them at the sound,Lisa breathed with horror, "But you're dead." Her head swiveled to Christiana. "Wasn't he dead, Chrissy? We packed ice around him and everything." "The ice must have revived his cold dead heart," Suzette said, anger helping her recover quickly from her shock. Glaring at the man, she added a dry but heartfelt, "More's the pity." If Dicky looked surprised by her comments, Christiana looked absolutely horrified. "Suzette!" she gasped, shuffling a little closer as if to phsyically silence her if Suzette tried to make another such comment. "Perhaps we should go out for some air. Lisa looks ready to faint and you, Suzie, obviously need some time to cool yourself. Perhaps so much dancing has overheated you." Suzette was about to snort at the suggestion that dancing had brought about her bitter words when her arm was suddenly taken in a firm grip and the words "Allow me" rang in her ears. Glancing around with a start, she frowned at the man who had suddenly appeared out of seemingly thin air and stepped between her and Lisa, taking both of them in hand like recalcitrant children. He was already turning them firmly away from Christiana and Dicky as he added, "I shall see the ladies outside so the two of you might talk.

He looks at Erik. “The last thing you’re going to do is wallow. You’re going to get back on your feet and figure out how to adjust. Trust me, you’ll thank me for it later.” Erik grimaces but nods. “I’m sure I will,” he says, forcing himself to sit up, and groaning as he does. “But right now, I’d like to say some far less savory things to you.” “Keep a list,” Heron says with a small smile. “You can tell them to me over dinner.” For an instant, Erik is shocked and flustered—a look I’ve never seen on him before. He recovers his wits quickly enough. “It’s a deal,” he says. Artemisia looks between the two of them, eyebrows raised so high they almost disappear entirely into her hair. “We are at war,” she says with a sigh. “Surely there is a better time to flirt than when death is around every corner?” “Truth be told, I’m hard-pressed to think of a better time to flirt,” Erik says, pushing himself to his feet. “You very well may never get another chance.” Artemisia rolls her eyes. “Just because I can’t see you doesn’t mean I don’t know you’re rolling your eyes, Art,” he says, holding an arm out to her, which she takes. She guides him a couple of hesitant steps. “Just because you don’t know how to flirt—” “I know how,” she snaps indignantly as she leads him out of the tent, the two of them continuing to bicker as they go.

If you touch me,” he said in a guttural voice, “I’m going to drag you back to that bed. And I won’t be responsible for what happens next.” Win stopped, plaiting her fingers. Eventually Merripen recovered his breath. And he gave her a glance that should have immolated her on the spot. “Next time,” he said flatly, “some advance warning of your arrival might be a good idea.” “I did send advance notice.” Win was amazed that she could even speak. “It must have been lost.” She paused. “That was a f-far warmer welcome than I expected, considering the way you’ve ignored me for the past two years.” “I haven’t ignored you.” Win took quick refuge in sarcasm. “You wrote to me once in two years.” Merripen turned and rested his back against the wall. “You didn’t need letters from me.” “I needed any small sign of affection! And you gave me none.” She stared at him incredulously as he remained silent. “For heaven’s sake, Kev, aren’t you even going to say that you’re glad I’m well again?” “I’m glad you’re well again.” “Then why are you behaving this way?” “Because nothing else has changed.” “You’ve changed,” she shot back. “I don’t know you anymore.” “That’s as it should be.” “Kev,” she said in bewilderment, “why are you behaving this way? I went away to get well. Surely you can’t blame me for that.” “I blame you for nothing. But the devil knows what you could want from me now.

That man,” she announced huffily, referring to their host, “can’t put two words together without losing his meaning!” Obviously she’d expected better of the quality during the time she was allowed to mix with them. “He’s afraid of us, I think,” Elizabeth replied, climbing out of bed. “Do you know the time? He desired me to accompany him fishing this morning at seven.” “Half past ten,” Berta replied, opening drawers and turning toward Elizabeth for her decision as to which gown to wear. “He waited until a few minutes ago, then went of without you. He was carrying two poles. Said you could join him when you arose.” “In that case, I think I’ll wear the pink muslin,” she decided with a mischievous smile. The Earl of Marchman could scarcely believe his eyes when he finally saw his intended making her way toward him. Decked out in a frothy pink gown with an equally frothy pink parasol and a delicate pink bonnet, she came tripping across the bank. Amazed at the vagaries of the female mind, he quickly turned his attention back to the grandfather trout he’d been trying to catch for five years. Ever so gently he jiggled his pole, trying to entice or else annoy the wily old fish into taking his fly. The giant fish swam around his hook as if he knew it might be a trick and then he suddenly charged it, nearly jerking the pole out of John’s hands. The fish hurtled out of the water, breaking the surface in a tremendous, thrilling arch at the same moment John’s intended bride deliberately chose to let out a piercing shriek: “Snake!” Startled, John jerked his head in her direction and saw her charging at him as if Lucifer himself was on her heels, screaming, “Snake! Snake! Snnnaaaake!” And in that instant his connection was broken; he let his line go slack, and the fish dislodged the hook, exactly as Elizabeth had hoped. “I saw a snake,” she lied, panting and stopping just short of the arms he’d stretched out to catch her-or strangle her, Elizabeth thought, smothering a smile. She stole a quick searching glance at the water, hoping for a glimpse of the magnificent trout he’d nearly caught, her hands itching to hold the pole and try her own luck. Lord Marchman’s disgruntled question snapped her attention back to him. “Would you like to fish, or would you rather sit and watch for a bit, until you recover from your flight from the serpent?” Elizabeth looked around in feigned shock. “Goodness, sir, I don’t fish!” “Do you sit?” he asked with what might have been sarcasm. Elizabeth lowered her lashes to hide her smile at the mounting impatience in his voice. “Of course I sit,” she proudly told him. “Sitting is an excessively ladylike occupation, but fishing, in my opinion, is not. I shall adore watching you do it, however.” For the next two hours she sat on the boulder beside him, complaining about its hardness, the brightness of the sun and the dampness of the air, and when she ran out of matters to complain about she proceeded to completely spoil his morning by chattering his ears off about every inane topic she could think of while occasionally tossing rocks into the stream to scare off his fish.

Thanks again, sir.” Jules shook his hand again. “You’re welcome again,” the captain said, his smile warm. “I’ll be back aboard the ship myself at around nineteen hundred. If it’s okay with you, I’ll, uh, stop in, see how you’re doing.” Son of a bitch. Was Jules getting hit on? Max looked at Webster again. He looked like a Marine. Muscles, meticulous uniform, well-groomed hair. That didn’t make him gay. And he’d smiled warmly at Max, too. The man was friendly, personable. And yet . . . Jules was flustered. “Thanks,” he said. “That would be . . . That’d be nice. Would you excuse me, though, for a sec? I’ve got to speak to Max, before I, uh . . . But I’ll head over to the ship right away.” Webster shook Max’s hand. “It was an honor meeting you, sir.” He smiled again at Jules. Okay, he hadn’t smiled at Max like that. Max waited until the captain and the medic both were out of earshot. “Is he—” “Don’t ask, don’t tell.” Jules said. “But, oh my God.” “He seems nice,” Max said. “Yes,” Jules said. “Yes, he does.” “So. The White House?” “Yeah. About that . . .” Jules took a deep breath. “I need to let you know that you might be getting a call from President Bryant.” “Might be,” Max repeated. “Yes,” Jules said. “In a very definite way.” He spoke quickly, trying to run his words together: “I had a very interesting conversation with him in which I kind of let slip that you’d resigned again and he was unhappy about that so I told him I might be able to persuade you to come back to work if he’d order three choppers filled with Marines to Meda Island as soon as possible.” “You called the President of the United States,” Max said. “During a time of international crisis, and basically blackmailed him into sending Marines.” Jules thought about that. “Yeah. Yup. Although it was a pretty weird phone call, because I was talking via radio to some grunt in the CIA office. I had him put the call to the President for me, and we did this kind of relay thing.” “You called the President,” Max repeated. “And you got through . . .?” “Yeah, see, I had your cell phone. I’d accidently switched them, and . . . The President’s direct line was in your address book, so . . .” Max nodded. “Okay,” he said. “That’s it?” Jules said. “Just, okay, you’ll come back? Can I call Alan to tell him? We’re on a first-name basis now, me and the Pres.” “No,” Max said. “There’s more. When you call your pal Alan, tell him I’m interested, but I’m looking to make a deal for a former Special Forces NCO.” “Grady Morant,” Jules said. “He’s got info on Heru Nusantra that the president will find interesting. In return, we want a full pardon and a new identity.” Jules nodded. “I think I could set that up.” He started for the helicopter, but then turned back. “What’s Webster’s first name? Do you know?” “Ben,” Max told him. “Have a nice vacation.” “Recovering from a gunshot wound is not a vacation. You need to write that, like, on your hand or something. Jeez.” Max laughed. “Hey, Jules?” He turned back again. “Yes, sir?” “Thanks for being such a good friend.” Jules’s smile was beautiful. “You’re welcome, Max.” But that smile faded far too quickly. “Uh-oh, heads up—crying girlfriend on your six.” Ah, God, no . . . Max turned to see Gina, running toward him. Please God, let those be tears of joy. “What’s the verdict?” he asked her. Gina said the word he’d been praying for. “Benign.” Max took her in his arms, this woman who was the love of his life, and kissed her. Right in front of the Marines.

I shake my head, knowing that if it hadn’t been for me, Ben wouldn’t have been there in the first place. I try to tell him that, but he swats my words away with his hand and says he wants to show me something. “Sure,” I say, wondering if he’s really as nervous as he seems. He clenches his teeth and hesitates a couple of moments; the angles of his face seem to grow sharper. Finally, he motions to the pant leg of his jeans. There’s a tear right over his thigh. “I know you saw it in the hospital,” he says, exposing the chameleon tattoo through the torn fabric. “I felt you . . . looking at it. Anyway, I wanted you to know that I did this back home, before I ever came to Freetown. Before I ever met you.” “So it’s a coincidence?” His dark gray eyes swallow mine whole. “Do you honestly believe that?” “No,” I say, listening as he proceeds to tell me that a few months before he got to town, he touched his mother’s wedding band—something that reminded him of soul mates—and the image of a chameleon stuck inside his head. “I couldn’t get it out of my mind,” he explains. “It was almost like the image was welded to my brain, behind my eyes, haunting me even when I tried to sleep.” “And you got the tattoo because of that?” “Because I hoped its permanence might help me understand it more—might help me understand what it had to do with my own soul mate.” “And do you understand now?” I ask, swallowing hard. “Yeah.” He smiles. “I suppose I do.” I take a deep breath, trying to hold myself together, desperate to know what he’s truly trying to say here, and what I should say to him as well. I close my eyes, picturing that moment in the hospital when I held his hand and wondering if he would’ve recovered as quickly as if it hadn’t been for the connection between us—the electricity he must have sensed from my touch.

The defenders retreated, but in good order. A musket flamed and a ball shattered a marine’s collar bone, spinning him around. The soldiers screamed terrible battle-cries as they began their grim job of clearing the defenders off the parapet with quick professional close-quarter work. Gamble trod on a fallen ramrod and his boots crunched on burnt wadding. The French reached steps and began descending into the bastion. 'Bayonets!' Powell bellowed. 'I want bayonets!' 'Charge the bastards!' Gamble screamed, blinking another man's blood from his eyes. There was no drum to beat the order, but the marines and seamen surged forward. 'Tirez!' The French had been waiting, and their muskets jerked a handful of attackers backwards. Their officer, dressed in a patched brown coat, was horrified to see the savage looking men advance unperturbed by the musketry. His men were mostly conscripts and they had fired too high. Now they had only steel bayonets with which to defend themselves. 'Get in close, boys!' Powell ordered. 'A Shawnee Indian named Blue Jacket once told me that a naked woman stirs a man's blood, but a naked blade stirs his soul. So go in with the steel. Lunge! Recover! Stance!' 'Charge!' Gamble turned the order into a long, guttural yell of defiance. Those redcoats and seamen, with loaded weapons discharged them at the press of the defenders, and a man in the front rank went down with a dark hole in his forehead. Gamble saw the officer aim a pistol at him. A wounded Frenchman, half-crawling, tried to stab with his sabre-briquet, but Gamble kicked him in the head. He dashed forward, sword held low. The officer pulled the trigger, the weapon tugged the man's arm to his right, and the ball buzzed past Gamble's mangled ear as he jumped down into the gap made by the marines charge. A French corporal wearing a straw hat drove his bayonet at Gamble's belly, but he dodged to one side and rammed his bar-hilt into the man's dark eyes. 'Lunge! Recover! Stance!

I said to myself, This is going to be quick. I also thought: I’ll take the epidural now! Because the contractions were starting to demonstrate what the pain of birth is all about. The obstetrician came in. I smiled, ready for my shot. “I don’t know how to tell you this,” she said. “Your platelets are really, really low.” “Okay,” I said. I knew what platelets were-blood cells whose job it is to stop bleeding-but I had no idea why that was significant. “So, my epidural?” “You can’t have any medications.” “Come again?” “No drugs, no medications,” she said. “No epidural. I’ve called around to different anesthesiologists, and no one will touch you.” “No epidural?” “Nothing.” There are girls from third-world countries who do it with no drugs, I reminded myself. My mother elected for natural childbirth. How bad can it be? I got this. It started to hurt. I thought to myself, I am not going to cuss. Hell no! I am about to be a mother. I am bringing our baby into a positive environment and must be a good role model. Wow! The contractions built up quickly. My pristine vision of perfect, calm, quiet childbirth disappeared. A banshee snuck into the room and took over my body. Arrrgggh!!! No cursing! There was a rocking chair in the birth room. I went over and sat in it and began moving back and forth. Chris put on a CD by Enya that we’d brought to listen to: peaceful, pleasant music. I took a deep breath. Jeez, Louise! That one was a monster! Then, a breather. I’m doing goooooood! Breathe. Breathe… Wow! Then I said some other things. The banshee had a mind of her own. “I’m sorry, I’m sorry, I’m sorry!” I apologized to the nurses as I recovered from the surge of the contraction. “It’s okay,” said Chris. The pain surged again. Dang! Jiminy! And other things. Chris would watch the monitor. Suddenly he’d turn to look at me. “What?” I asked. “That was a strong one.” “Uh-huh.” The funny thing is, the stronger the contractions were on the monitor, the less they seemed to hurt. Maybe when things are really bad you focus more on being tough. Or perhaps my brain’s pain mechanism simply went on strike when the agony got too much.

The scheme began to unravel following the Panic of 1873 when railroad investments failed. The bank experienced several runs at the height of the panic. The panic would not have affected the bank if it had been a savings bank, but by 1866, the business of the bank had become…reckless speculation, over-capitalization, stock manipulation, intrigue and bribery, and downright plundering…. In a last ditch effort to save the bank, the Trustees appointed Frederick Douglas as Bank President in March of 1874. Douglass did not ask to be nominated and the Bank Board knew that Douglass had no experience in banking, but they felt that his reputation and popularity would restore confidence to fleeing depositors….Douglas lent the bank $10,000 of his own money to cover the bank’s illiquid assets….Douglass quickly discovered that the bank was full of dead men’s bones, rottenness and corruption. As soon as Douglass realized that the bank was headed towards certain failure, he imposed drastic spending cuts to limit depositors’ losses. He then relayed this information to Congress, underscoring the bank’s insolvency, and declaring that he could no longer ask his people to deposit their money in it. Despite the other Trustees’ attempts to convince Congress otherwise, Congress sided with Douglass, and on June 20, 1874, Congress amended the Charter to authorize the Trustees to end operations. Within a few weeks’ time, the bank’s doors were shut for good on June 29, 1874, leaving 61,131 depositors without access to nearly $3 million dollars in deposits. More than half of accumulated black wealth disappeared through the mismanagement of the Freedman’s Savings Bank. And what is most lamentable…is the fact that only a few of those who embezzled and defrauded the one-time liquid assets of this bank were ever prosecuted….Congress did appoint a commission led by John AJ Cresswell to look into the failure and to recover as much of the deposits as possible. In 1880, Henry Cook testified about the bank failure and said that bank’s depositors were victims of a widespread universal sweeping financial disaster. In other words, it was the Market’s fault, not his. The misdeeds of the bank’s management never came to light.

You have reason to be happy as well. You have found a brother today. And you found out that you’re half-Irish.” That actually drew a rumble of amusement from him. “That should make me happy?” “The Irish are a remarkable race. And I see it in you: your love of land, your tenacity …” “My love of brawling.” “Yes. Well, perhaps you should continue to suppress that part.” “Being part-Irish,” he said, “I should be a more proficient drinker.” “And a far more glib conversationalist.” “I prefer to talk only when I have something to say.” “Hmmm. That is neither Irish nor Romany. Perhaps there’s another part of you we haven’t yet identified.” “My God. I hope not.” But he was smiling, and Win felt a warm ripple of delight spread through all her limbs. “That’s the first real smile I’ve seen from you since I came back,” she said. “You should smile more, Kev.” “Should I?” he asked softly. “Oh yes. It’s beneficial for your health. Dr. Harrow says his cheerful patients tend to recover far more quickly than the sour ones.” The mention of Dr. Harrow caused Merripen’s elusive smile to vanish. “Ramsay says you’ve become close with him.” “Dr. Harrow is a friend,” she allowed. “Only a friend?” “Yes, so far. Would you object if he wished to court me?” “Of course not,” Merripen muttered. “What right would I have to object?” “None at all. Unless you had staked some prior claim, which you certainly have not.” She sensed Merripen’s inner struggle to let the matter drop. A struggle he lost, for he said abruptly, “Far be it from me to deny you a diet of pabulum, if that’s what your appetite demands.” “You’re likening Dr. Harrow to pabulum?” Win fought to hold back a satisfied grin. The small display of jealousy was a balm to her spirits. “I assure you, he is not at all bland. He is a man of substance and character.” “He’s a watery-eyed, pale-faced gadjo.” “He is very attractive. And his eyes are not at all watery.” “Have you let him kiss you?” “Kev, we’re on a public thoroughfare—” “Have you?” “Once,” she admitted, and waited as he digested the information. He scowled ferociously at the pavement before them. When it became apparent he wasn’t going to say anything, Win volunteered, “It was a gesture of affection.” Still no response. Stubborn ox, she thought in annoyance. “It wasn’t like your kisses. And we’ve never …” She felt a blush rising. “We’ve never done anything similar to what you and I … the other night …” “We’re not going to discuss that.” “Why can we discuss Dr. Harrow’s kisses but not yours?” “Because my kisses aren’t going to lead to courtship.

We need to be humble enough to recognize that unforeseen things can and do happen that are nobody’s fault. A good example of this occurred during the making of Toy Story 2. Earlier, when I described the evolution of that movie, I explained that our decision to overhaul the film so late in the game led to a meltdown of our workforce. This meltdown was the big unexpected event, and our response to it became part of our mythology. But about ten months before the reboot was ordered, in the winter of 1998, we’d been hit with a series of three smaller, random events—the first of which would threaten the future of Pixar. To understand this first event, you need to know that we rely on Unix and Linux machines to store the thousands of computer files that comprise all the shots of any given film. And on those machines, there is a command—/bin/rm -r -f *—that removes everything on the file system as fast as it can. Hearing that, you can probably anticipate what’s coming: Somehow, by accident, someone used this command on the drives where the Toy Story 2 files were kept. Not just some of the files, either. All of the data that made up the pictures, from objects to backgrounds, from lighting to shading, was dumped out of the system. First, Woody’s hat disappeared. Then his boots. Then he disappeared entirely. One by one, the other characters began to vanish, too: Buzz, Mr. Potato Head, Hamm, Rex. Whole sequences—poof!—were deleted from the drive. Oren Jacobs, one of the lead technical directors on the movie, remembers watching this occur in real time. At first, he couldn’t believe what he was seeing. Then, he was frantically dialing the phone to reach systems. “Pull out the plug on the Toy Story 2 master machine!” he screamed. When the guy on the other end asked, sensibly, why, Oren screamed louder: “Please, God, just pull it out as fast as you can!” The systems guy moved quickly, but still, two years of work—90 percent of the film—had been erased in a matter of seconds. An hour later, Oren and his boss, Galyn Susman, were in my office, trying to figure out what we would do next. “Don’t worry,” we all reassured each other. “We’ll restore the data from the backup system tonight. We’ll only lose half a day of work.” But then came random event number two: The backup system, we discovered, hadn’t been working correctly. The mechanism we had in place specifically to help us recover from data failures had itself failed. Toy Story 2 was gone and, at this point, the urge to panic was quite real. To reassemble the film would have taken thirty people a solid year. I remember the meeting when, as this devastating reality began to sink in, the company’s leaders gathered in a conference room to discuss our options—of which there seemed to be none. Then, about an hour into our discussion, Galyn Susman, the movie’s supervising technical director, remembered something: “Wait,” she said. “I might have a backup on my home computer.” About six months before, Galyn had had her second baby, which required that she spend more of her time working from home. To make that process more convenient, she’d set up a system that copied the entire film database to her home computer, automatically, once a week. This—our third random event—would be our salvation. Within a minute of her epiphany, Galyn and Oren were in her Volvo, speeding to her home in San Anselmo. They got her computer, wrapped it in blankets, and placed it carefully in the backseat. Then they drove in the slow lane all the way back to the office, where the machine was, as Oren describes it, “carried into Pixar like an Egyptian pharaoh.” Thanks to Galyn’s files, Woody was back—along with the rest of the movie.

Elvis was pretty slick. Nonetheless, I knew that he was cheating. His four-of-a-kind would beat my full house. I had two choices. I could fold my hand and lose all the money I’d contributed to the pot, or I could match Elvis’s bet and continue to play. If a gambler thought he was in an honest game, he would probably match the bet thinking his full house was a sure winner. The con artist would bet large amounts of money on the remaining cards, knowing he had a winning hand. I narrowed my eyes and pursed my lips, as if struggling to decide whether to wager five hundred pesos or fold my hand and call it quits. I knew there were five men between me and the door and watched them from the corner of my eye. Even if I folded and accepted my losses, I knew they would not let me leave without taking all my cash. They had strength in numbers and would strong arm me if they could. The men stared, intently watching my next move. I set down my beer and took five one hundred peso notes from my wallet. The men at the bar relaxed. My adrenaline surged, pumping through my brain, sharpening my focus as I prepared for action. I moved as if to place my bet on the table, but instead my hand bumped my beer bottle, spilling it onto Elvis’ lap. Elvis reacted instinctively to the cold beer, pushing back from the table and rising to his feet. I jumped up from my chair making a loud show of apologizing, and in the ensuing pandemonium I snatched all the money off the table and bolted for the door! My tactics took everyone by complete surprise. I had a small head start, but the Filipinos recovered quickly and scrambled to cut off my escape. I dashed to the door and barely made it to the exit ahead of the Filipinos. The thugs were nearly upon me when I suddenly wheeled round and kicked the nearest man square in the chest. My kick cracked ribs and launched the shocked Filipino through the air into the other men, tumbling them to the ground. For the moment, my assailants were a jumble of tangled bodies on the floor. I darted out the door and raced down the busy sidewalk, dodging pedestrians. I looked back and saw the furious Filipinos swarming out of the bar. Running full tilt, I grabbed onto the rail of a passing Jeepney and swung myself into the vehicle. The wide-eyed passengers shrunk back, trying to keep their distance from the crazy American. I yelled to the driver, “Step on the gas!” and thrust a hundred peso note into his hand. I looked back and saw all six of Johnny’s henchmen piling onto one tricycle. The jeepney driver realized we were being pursued and stomped the gas pedal to the floor. The jeepney surged into traffic and accelerated away from the tricycle. The tricycle was only designed for one driver and two passengers. With six bodies hanging on, the overloaded motorcycle was slow and unstable. The motorcycle driver held the throttle wide open and the tricycle rocked side to side, almost tipping over, as the frustrated riders yelled curses and flailed their arms futilely. My jeepney continued to speed through the city, pulling away from our pursuers. Finally, I could no longer see the tricycle behind us. When I was sure I had escaped, I thanked the driver and got off at the next stop. I hired a tricycle of my own and carefully made my way back to my neighborhood, keeping careful watch for Johnny and his friends. I knew that Johnny was in a frustrated rage. Not only had I foiled his plans, I had also made off with a thousand pesos of his cash. Even though I had great fun and came out of my escapade in good shape, my escape was risky and could’ve had a very different outcome. I feel a disclaimer is appropriate for those people who think it is fun to con street hustlers, “Kids. Don’t try this at home.

Another Cebolletan account tells the story of an intrepid defender named Domingo Baca, who was disemboweled by a Navajo lancer. Undaunted by his injury, Baca strapped a pillow around his belly to hold in his guts, then seized his musket and rejoined the fight. When he removed the pillow that night, writes historian Marc Simmons, Baca’s friends “were aghast, and quickly made the sign of the cross as for one already dead. But Baca returned the dangling entrails to their proper place, called for needle and sinew, and sewed up the wound himself. These crude ministrations proved effective, for he recovered and lived to fight again.

The singular elohim of Israel presides over an assembly of elohim. A quick read of Psalm 82 informs us that God has called this council meeting to judge the elohim for corrupt rule of the nations. Verse 6 of the psalm declares that these elohim are sons of God. God says to them: I have said, “You are gods [elohim], and sons of the Most High [beney elyon], all of you.

I need to get the *&%! out of here.” Look around. Are you surrounded by a real threat? If yes, please do get out of there quickly. If not—and this is obviously the most probable outcome—stay. Let it come. Decide to no longer let your life be dictated by the panic attacks. From now on, you no longer run from them. The anxiety and panic attacks don’t get to decide when you leave, what experiences you miss, how low or high the quality of your life is. You do! If the panic attack comes, you take it with you. You’ll smother it with so much acceptance and love, it will eventually grow tired of accompanying you! Besides the “whatever happens it’s OK,” it’s also beneficial to say, “Bring it on. I’m going to stay, and I want to see what happens. Let’s find out if it really is as bad as my negative voice wants me to believe.” This is powerful, and I’ve discussed it in detail before. What you’re feeling during a panic attack is already the pinnacle of what anxiety has in store. It cannot get worse; you’re already there. Furthermore, a full-blown panic attack can only last a couple of minutes. The adrenaline you’re feeling will be taken back up by organs like your liver; it will pass! Even if you stay. Do you know what the benefit of leaving is? Why does your anxiety often calm down when you do leave? Once you reach your safe place, you’ll probably think it’s over. You’re saved. As a result, your anxiety will drop. Can you see why? It’s because you told yourself so! You calmed yourself down by telling yourself you’re safe. The physical danger, in that safe place, is as small as it was in the place you were previously in. So why not stay there and calm your mind and body down there, on the spot? It works just as well. And the added benefit is that you won’t have to keep avoiding that location in the future. At first, it will take you five to twenty minutes to calm down, which is a bit more than if you sought out the exit and left. But the long-term consequences are so much better since you communicate to your mind and body that you no longer fear the fear. And that’s always the best choice to make.

Occasionally, service is bound to fail. The acid test is how quickly it recovers. Nothing infuriates a customer more than being told, ‘I will have to check with my boss and then revert.

Narcissists view others as an extension of themselves. They see people as their mirror image. If you are smart and beautiful and clever, they are attracted to you and idealize you. But as soon as you disagree with them or do something that they don’t want you to do, they become quickly disappointed and often try to put you down.

A considerable amount of research has been dedicated to showing how meditation positively affects gene expression. One study conducted at the University of Wisconsin–Madison, published in the journal Psychoneuroendocrinology in 2013, revealed that meditators, after only eight hours of meditation, experienced clear genetic and molecular changes, including decreased levels of pro-inflammatory genes, which would enable them to physically recover from stressful situations more quickly.10 Church says that when we meditate, we are “bulking up the portions of our brains that produce happiness.”11

The next time you experience suffering or distress, instead of saying, “Life’s not fair” or, “Why is this happening to me?” tell yourself, “I was aware that this could happen. I’m not alone. Others are also experiencing this same thing.” Once you know that suffering is an unavoidable part of the experience, you can embrace the fact that it will happen at some point, worry less about it, and be prepared to recover more quickly when it comes.

For some reason, perhaps because she was already walking a tightrope as far as her nerves were concerned, Harriet took offense at that comment. She swallowed the tea cake, which tasted like sawdust in her mouth, and managed a cool smile. “Yes, my lord. Quite recovered. I bounce back from ordeals very well, I must say. Why, here it is, only a few hours after finding myself ruined, yet I do not feel any of the remorse and despair one would expect after sacrificing one’s precious virginity to the Beast of Blackthorne Hall.” Effie was horrified. “Harriet.” Harriet smiled sweetly. “Well, it’s not like I was planning to do anything all that interesting with it, anyway. Therefore I am not overly concerned about the loss.

Manipulative relationships are impossible to see from the inside, yet when we find ourselves in one, we can still sense that something is wrong. Every time we try to pin down what exactly could be the issue, we’re quickly assured by our partner that we’re way off. This could be thanks to a sudden rush of sweetness or a big fight in which we find ourselves apologizing, though we’re not quite sure why we’re the sorry ones.

resilience this way: the capacity to recover quickly from difficulties; toughness.

Your object, however, offers the fantasy of a quick path to wealth and success, of recovering lost youth, of becoming a new person, and even of conquering death itself. People will grasp greedily at such things because they are considered so impossible. By the law of induction we can imagine all of these shortcuts and fantasies (just as we can imagine a unicorn), which gives us the desire to reach them, and imagining them is almost like experiencing them. Remember: it is not possession but desire that secretly impels people. To possess something inevitably brings about some disappointment and sparks the desire for something new to pursue. You are preying upon the human need for fantasies and the pleasures of

meditators, after only eight hours of meditation, experienced clear genetic and molecular changes, including decreased levels of pro-inflammatory genes, which would enable them to physically recover from stressful situations more quickly.10 Church says that when we meditate, we are “bulking up the portions of our brains that produce happiness.

The lunch went well, and the foundation appeared close to writing a big check to RIEF. To cap things off, a thick, iced vanilla cake was placed in the middle of the table. Everyone eyed the dessert, preparing for a taste. Just then, Simons walked in, setting the room ablaze. “Jim, can we take a picture?” asked one of the health organization’s investment professionals. As the small talk got under way, Simons began making odd motions with his right hand. The foundation executives had no clue what was happening, but nervous RIEF staffers did. When Simons was desperate for a smoke, he scrabbled at his left breast pocket, where he kept his Merits. There was nothing in there, though, so Simons called his assistant on an intercom system, asking her to bring him a cigarette. “Do you mind if I smoke?” Simons asked his guests. Before they knew it, Simons was lighting up. Soon, fumes were choking the room. The Robert Wood Johnson representatives—still dedicated to building a culture of health—were stunned. Simons didn’t seem to notice or care. After some awkward chitchat, he looked to put out his cigarette, now down to a burning butt, but he couldn’t locate an ashtray. Now the RIEF staffers were sweating—Simons was known to ash pretty much anywhere he pleased in the office, even on the desks of underlings and in their coffee mugs. Simons was in Renaissance’s swankiest conference room, though, and he couldn’t find an appropriate receptacle. Finally, Simons spotted the frosted cake. He stood up, reached across the table, and buried his cigarette deep in the icing. As the cake sizzled, Simons walked out, the mouths of his guests agape. The Renaissance salesmen were crestfallen, convinced their lucrative sale had been squandered. The foundation’s executives recovered their poise quickly, however, eagerly signing a big check. It was going to take more than choking on cigarette smoke and a ruined vanilla cake to keep them from the new fund.

To all your quirky damages, habituate yourself to recover quickly

Why is it all being done?” he thought. “Why am I standing here, making them work? What are they all so busy for, trying to show their zeal before me? What is that old Matrona, my old friend, toiling for? (I doctored her, when the beam fell on her in the fire)” he thought, looking at a thin old woman who was raking up the grain, moving painfully with her bare, sun-blackened feet over the uneven, rough floor. “Then she recovered, but today or tomorrow or in ten years she won’t; they’ll bury her, and nothing will be left either of her or of that smart girl in the red jacket, who with that skillful, soft action shakes the ears out of their husks. They’ll bury her and this piebald horse, and very soon too,” he thought, gazing at the heavily moving, panting horse that kept walking up the wheel that turned under him. “And they will bury her and Fyodor the thrasher with his curly beard full of chaff and his shirt torn on his white shoulders—they will bury him. He’s untying the sheaves, and giving orders, and shouting to the women, and quickly setting straight the strap on the moving wheel. And what’s more, it’s not them alone—me they’ll bury too, and nothing will be left. What for?” He thought this, and at the same time looked at his watch to reckon how much they thrashed in an hour. He wanted to know this so as to judge by it the task to set for the day.

About ten years ago, I decided I wanted to be a more attentive father. So I asked my daughter, “What can I do to be a better parent?” She said, “Daddy, you travel a lot, but I don’t mind that you’re away from home so much. What really bothers me is the way you act when you are home. You talk on the telephone, you watch sports on TV, and you don’t spend much time with me. One weekend, when you’d been traveling for two weeks, my friends were having a party. I wanted to go, but Mom wouldn’t let me. She said I had to spend time with you. So I stayed home, but you didn’t spend any time with me. That wasn’t right.” I was hurt and stunned, because (a) she nailed me and (b) I was an oafish dad who had needlessly caused his daughter pain. There’s no worse feeling in the world, I can assure you. You never want to see your children in any pain. And you certainly don’t want to be the source of it. I recovered quickly—and reverted to a simple response that I teach all my clients. I said, “Thank you. Daddy will do better.” From that moment I started keeping track

If you want a quick workout and would like to get your heart rate up a bit, then keep the rest short; 30-60 seconds max. Are you trying to get stronger? Use a weight or tempo on the high side of comfortable and rest for 1-3 minutes so that you're fully recovered and can really focus on each set.

Mindfulness, neuroplasticity, trauma-informed cognitive behavioral therapy, psychoanalysis, career coaching, Kripalu yoga – the list of “cures” for our lack of resilience and related problems is endless. If you are overweight, alone, miserable at work or crippled by stress or anxiety or depression, there are hordes of gurus and experts chasing you with books and quick fixes. With their advice, guidance, motivation or inspiration, you can fix your problems. But make no mistake: They are always your problems. You alone are responsible for them. It follows that failing to fix your problems will always be your failure, your lack of will, motivation or strength. Galen, the second-century physician who ministered to Roman emperors, believed his medical treatments were effective. “All who drink of this treatment recover in a short time,” he wrote, “except those whom it does not help, who all die. It is obvious, therefore, that it fails only in incurable cases.” This is the way of the billion-dollar self-help industry: You are to blame when the guru’s advice does not produce the expected outcome, and by now, we are all familiar enough with self-help to know that expected outcomes are elusive. […] Personal explanations for success actually set us up for failure. TED Talks and talk shows full of advice on what to eat, what to think and how to live seldom work. Self-help fixes are like empty calories: The effects are fleeting and often detrimental in the long term. Worse, they promote victim blaming. The notion that your resilience is your problem alone is ideology, not science. We have been giving people the wrong message. Resilience is not a DIY endeavor. Self-help fails because the stresses that put our lives in jeopardy in the first place remain in the world around us even after we’ve taken the “cures.” The fact is that people who can find the resources they require for success in their environments are far more likely to succeed than individuals with positive thoughts and the latest power poses. […] The science of resilience is clear: The social, political and natural environments in which we live are far more important to our health, fitness, finances and time management than our individual thoughts, feelings or behaviors.

Todd Burleson’s amazement stemmed in part from my appearance, and in part from the news he’d received that everyone above High Camp, including me, was dead. He quickly recovered his composure, reached out and took me by the arm to the first tent—the dead Scott Fischer’s tent—where they put me into two sleeping bags, shoved hot water bottles under my arms, and gave me a shot of steroids. “You are not going to believe what just walked into camp,” they radioed down to Base Camp. The response back was “That is fascinating. But it changes nothing. He is going to die. Do not bring him down.” Fortunately, they didn’t tell me that. Conventional wisdom holds that in hypothermia cases, even so remarkable a resurrection as mine merely delays the inevitable. When they called Peach and told her that I was not as dead as they thought I was—but I was critically injured—they were trying not to give her false hope. What she heard, of course, was an entirely different thing. I also demurred from the glum consensus. Having reconnected with the mother ship, I now believed I had a chance to actually survive this thing. For whatever reason, I seemed to have tolerated the hypothermia, and genuinely believed myself fully revived. What I did not at first think about was the Khumbu Icefall, which simply cannot be navigated without hands. I was going to require another means of exit, something nobody had ever tried before.

Everyone gasped as Autumn flew through the air and swung her iron sword down at Jasmine. But instinctively, the quick monk rolled back and out of the way so that she could recover. Autumn instantly followed up with additional swings after she landed. The monk, though blind, still had an acute sense of hearing, so she was able to dodge her opponent’s attacks. “Tsk! How are you doing that?!” yelled Autumn. “Doing what?” Jasmine replied. “How are you dodging my attacks with your eyes closed?” “You’re as noisy as can be,” she grinned.

plus recover more quickly after

In the 1980s, the American researcher Roger Ulrich discovered that simply having a room with a view of a natural environment rather than a brick wall helped patients at a Philadelphia hospital recover more quickly from gallbladder surgery. They also reported being less depressed and having less pain. Other studies have shown that being immersed in nature can lower blood pressure, reduce stress, and lessen ADHD symptoms.

who are married, have close family and friends, belong to social and religious groups, and participate widely in these networks—recover more quickly from disease and live longer. Roughly eighteen studies show a strong connection between social connectivity and mortality.” Devoting more time and energy to being with the people in our lives whom we find most nourishing, Cohen says, has health benefits.30 He also urges patients, to the extent possible, to reduce the number of emotionally toxic interactions in their day, while increasing the nourishing ones.

entrepreneurial success and wealth creation, as well as wealth attraction, requires a willingness to risk and experience failure, and the emotional resiliency to recover from it quickly, decisively, passionately, and persistently.

On reflection, it happens so naturally you begin to feel or to tell yourself, ‘Well, it would have happened anyway,’ and you quickly recover from this wonderful experience of yours.

Living in the Green Zone Developing inner resources is like deepening the keel of a sailboat so that you’re more able to deal with the worldly winds—gain and loss, pleasure and pain, praise and blame, fame and slander—without getting tipped over into the reactive mode—or at least you can recover more quickly. With growing confidence in these capabilities, you become more comfortable raising your sights in life and sailing even farther into the deep, dark blue.

Even as depression and anxiety, or else simple dissatisfaction with the state of things, are as prevalent as ever, we are urged to get over these feelings, to recover from them, to bounce back quickly, or else to conceal them. To do otherwise is to embrace the “fail.” You are not following the rules. Start acting like a happy winner or you might become a depressed loser forever.

Incremental and anecdotal infection cases are irrelevant. Total numbers are irrelevant. Most of these are not even “cases” but just positive test results. Most will experience no symptoms or mild to moderate symptoms and recover quickly. Many international studies show that countries that use HCQ as an early treatment for COVID patients have an exponentially lower mortality rate. You’ll never hear that in the United States.

What is it about falling? "He died of a fall." "The poor thing never recovered after his fall." "He broke his hip in a fall and was never the same." "Death came relatively quickly after a fall in the back yard." How fucking far do these people fall? Off of buildings? Over spamming cataracts? Down manholes? Is it farther to the ground than it used to be?

With little soil wealth to extract, she said, Amazonian farmers face inherent ecological limitations. The only form of agriculture they can practice for a long time is “slash-and-burn,” or “swidden,” as it is sometimes known. Farmers clear small fields with axes and machetes, burn off the chaff and refuse, and plant their seeds. The ash gives the soil a quick shot of nutrients, giving the crop a chance. As the crops grow, the jungle rapidly returns—weeds first, then fast-growing tropical trees. In the few years before forest recovers the plot, farmers can eke something out of the land.

Few grown humans can normally survive a fall of much more than twenty-five or thirty feet, though there have been some notable exceptions—none more memorable perhaps than that of a British airman in World War II named Nicholas Alkemade. In the late winter of 1944, while on a bombing run over Germany, Flight Sergeant Alkemade, the tail gunner on a British Lancaster bomber, found himself in a literally tight spot when his plane was hit by enemy flak and quickly filled with smoke and flames. Tail gunners on Lancasters couldn’t wear parachutes because the space in which they operated was too confined, and by the time Alkemade managed to haul himself out of his turret and reach for his parachute, he found it was on fire and beyond salvation. He decided to leap from the plane anyway rather than perish horribly in flames, so he hauled open a hatch and tumbled out into the night. He was three miles above the ground and falling at 120 miles per hour. “It was very quiet,” Alkemade recalled years later, “the only sound being the drumming of aircraft engines in the distance, and no sensation of falling at all. I felt suspended in space.” Rather to his surprise, he found himself to be strangely composed and at peace. He was sorry to die, of course, but accepted it philosophically, as something that happened to airmen sometimes. The experience was so surreal and dreamy that Alkemade was never certain afterward whether he lost consciousness, but he was certainly jerked back to reality when he crashed through the branches of some lofty pine trees and landed with a resounding thud in a snowbank, in a sitting position. He had somehow lost both his boots, and had a sore knee and some minor abrasions, but otherwise was quite unharmed. Alkemade’s survival adventures did not quite end there. After the war, he took a job in a chemical plant in Loughborough, in the English Midlands. While he was working with chlorine gas, his gas mask came loose, and he was instantly exposed to dangerously high levels of the gas. He lay unconscious for fifteen minutes before co-workers noticed his unconscious form and dragged him to safety. Miraculously, he survived. Some time after that, he was adjusting a pipe when it ruptured and sprayed him from head to foot with sulfuric acid. He suffered extensive burns but again survived. Shortly after he returned to work from that setback, a nine-foot-long metal pole fell on him from a height and very nearly killed him, but once again he recovered. This time, however, he decided to tempt fate no longer. He took a safer job as a furniture salesman and lived out the rest of his life without incident. He died peacefully, in bed, aged sixty-four in 1987. —

On the one hand, I recognize the power of the placebo effect: if you believe it’s working, it may well work. If you think an object brings you luck, you are more confident. And yet what the Italian students in the “lucky” seats showed wasn’t confidence; it was overconfidence. They thought they were doing better, but the evidence didn’t actually back them up. And then there’s the flip side of the placebo, the nocebo effect: the belief in evil signs or bad luck. It turns out people can literally scare themselves to death. If you think you’ve been cursed or otherwise made ill, you may end up actually getting sick, failing to improve poor health, or, yes, dying altogether. In one medically documented instance, a man was given three months to live after a diagnosis of metastatic cancer of the esophagus. He died shortly after. When his body was autopsied, doctors realized that he had been misdiagnosed: he did indeed have cancer, but a tiny, non-metastatic tumor on his liver. Clinically speaking, it could not have killed him. But, it seems, being told he was dying of a fatal illness brought about that very outcome. In another case, a man thought he was hexed by a voodoo priest. He came close to death, only to recover miraculously after an enterprising doctor “reversed” the curse through a series of made-up words. In yet a third, a man almost died in the emergency room after overdosing on pills. He’d been in a drug trial for depression and decided to end his life with the antidepressants he’d been prescribed. His vitals were so bad when he was admitted that doctors didn’t think he would make it—until they discovered his blood was completely clear of any drugs. He’d been taking a placebo. Once he found out he had not in fact taken a life-threatening quantity of pills, he recovered quickly. The effect our mind has on our body makes for a scary proposition. Belief is a powerful thing. Our mental state is crucial to our performance. And ultimately, while some superstitions may give you a veneer of false confidence, they also have the power to destroy your mental equilibrium. I like to think of this as the black cat effect. You see one cross the parking lot as you walk to a tournament. You brood about the bad luck. Your game is thrown off. You blame the cat. You bust. You feel validated. Superstitions are false attributions, so they give you a false sense of your own abilities and in the end, impede learning.

Tch,” she snorted, recovering quickly from whatever had caught her off guard about what Arlo had said. “Figures. Kids these days—” “I’m eighteen!” Arlo corrected. “—no respect for their elders—” “No offense, but you don’t look much older than I am.” “—runnin’ around accusing perfectly innocent assholes of assholery they’ve been actively trying to avoid.” “What? You mean you normally feel like picking off children?” “Uh, I’m currently really considering it,” Nausicaä equipped her statement with a pointed stare. “But I meant the murdering business in general.

Large-scale studies conducted in the United States, Britain, and the Netherlands show that people living in greener areas have a lower incidence of anxiety and depression and display an ability to recover more quickly from stressful life events than those in less green areas.

Christopher Lasch, a history professor at the University of Rochester. In 1979, Lasch published what became a highly influential book titled The Culture of Narcissism: American Life in an Age of Diminishing Expectations. Describing “postwar America as a society of dangerously self-absorbed individuals, fixated on personal goals, fearful of their impulses, and easily controlled by power elites,” according to a summary in the New York Times, the book quickly became a national bestseller, spent seven weeks on the Times bestseller list, and generated much discussion around the country, including inside the White House and even in the Oval Office.[90]

When a woman is touched by an archetypal experience, she often collapses before it. It is in this collapse that she quickly recovers her archetypal connection and restores her inner being.

But we’re Sukie’s brother and sister,’ I protested. ‘You’re supposed to be her friend!’ Queenie looked surprised. ‘Me? I don’t know what you mean.’ ‘You’ve written to…’ I trailed off hopelessly. There was no point in arguing any more. Queenie has made up her mind. ‘Well, I don’t trust Esther Jenkins,’ I muttered, as much to myself as anyone. ‘And I bet she’ll not be as quick doing the deliveries, either.’ Queenie gave me a withering look. ‘For your information, Esther’s moved house, city and country more times than you’ve had hot dinners. I don’t think she’d manage it again. At least you two have each other.’ Glancing at Cliff, all I felt was more worry, not less. I hadn’t got the hang of this ‘big sister’ lark – you only had to look at Cliff’s split lip to see my attempt at looking after him wasn’t exactly going well. ‘All Esther’s anger, all that bluster – it’s just a front.’ Queenie went on. ‘Behind it she’s a smashing girl. You need to give her a chance.’ ‘She said horrible things about my sister!’ I insisted, though I was beginning to feel uncomfortable. Because I’d started the fight, hadn’t I? I’d been the angry one – Esther had almost tried to apologise. Queenie stopped. ‘You’ve heard of the Kindertransport, have you?’ ‘Some Jewish kids joined our school from Europe,’ I said. ‘But I don’t see what –’ ‘Esther was one of them,’ Queenie interrupted. ‘Not at your school but another one in London. She’s a Jewish refugee.’ ‘Well, she as good as called Sukie a spy!’ I pointed out. Queenie ignored my comment. ‘Esther’s had a terrible time of it. Everyone she loves has either died or disappeared, or failing that, lives in another country. Imagine what that feels like, can you?’ I swallowed miserably. The thing was I could imagine it – bits of it, anyway – and I felt ashamed, which didn’t improve my temper. ‘That doesn’t excuse what she did to Cliff’s lip,’ I mumbled, though really I was cross with myself. After what I’d overheard about kosher meat, I should have realised she was a Kindertransport child. But I didn’t think, did I? Instead, I’d grabbed her by the hair. What sort of person was I turning into to be so bitter? So angry? Queenie set off walking again. ‘That lip’ll heal in no time. Now hurry up and stop dawdling.’ Glancing sideways at Cliff, I felt a funny sensation in my chest. His lip looked horrid now but he would recover – Queenie was right. At least he was here, my living, breathing, sticky-handed brother. I was pretty lucky, all things considered.

Yes, I had my doubts she would recover so quickly. I can still see pain in her eyes when she speaks of her family. I do not know what happened at Rosings, but something did, more than Mr. Darcy’s proposal.

You know that we have lost the sense of space. We say “space is annihilated”, but we have annihilated not space, but the sense thereof. We have lost a part of ourselves. I determined to recover it, and I began by walking up and down the platform of the railway outside my room. Up and down, until I was tired, and so did recapture the meaning of “Near” and “Far”. “Near” is a place to which I can get quickly on my feet, not a place to which the train or the air-ship will take me quickly. “Far” is a place to which I cannot get quickly on my feet; the vomitory is “far”, though I could be there in thirty-eight seconds by summoning the train. Man is the measure. That was my first lesson. Man's feet are the measure for distance, his hands are the measure for ownership, his body is the measure for all that is lovable and desirable and strong. ...Man is the measure.

I just wanted to be quiet and alone – get my head around everything. Make sure I was really back to normal. I drank hot chocolate and … waited. I even slept for a bit. When I was sure nothing bad was going to happen, I came home. And, you know, found Mio nearly being eaten by a giant spider.”   “What? I didn’t see that!” Jack yelped.   “You were too busy grabbing the firebombs,” Hikaru put in. “I saw it, though. Rachel clocked it in the side and knocked it right off. It went flying.”   I gave Rachel a questioning look.   She shrugged again and put down her mug on the coffee table. Picking up an empty metal serving plate with her right hand, she poked it sharply with the index finger of her left. There was a rending noise, and Rachel’s finger popped out of the bottom of the plate.   “I’m pretty strong,” she said, with what I thought was epic understatement. “But I can control it now.”   Seeing the alarmed expressions on Hikaru and my dad’s faces, I quickly said, “The king – your king, Hikaru – told me this could happen. If people recover from the Nekomata’s bite, they have gifts. Seeing in the dark. Speed. Strength.”   “Let me get this straight,” Jack said slowly. “My sister is Catwoman now?”   “I suppose that makes you the Joker, then.” Rachel reached out to mess up Jack’s spiky hair.   Jack squeaked, trying to bat Rachel’s hands away. “Not the hair!”   “Oh, please. Try that on me when you don’t have an inch of roots.”   Hikaru leaned out of their way, looking confused and not sure if he should try to intervene. I could sympathize. Siblings were odd.

Listening to a man brag about unloading the dishwasher or the incessant need to announce every single thing he did in a day. That stuff is worth something. Give him a bone! Men are dogs ... they just are. They need constant praise and rewards. Women are pack mules—we work without praise for long days, recover quickly, and wake up the next day plodding right along again. No treats. No pats on the head. No belly rubs.

Where is your fire?” Trenton asked, every word punctuated with another blow.   Shea kept silent and concentrated on getting out of the encounter with no internal bleeding. With the way he was hammering at her guard, he’d cause an injury if a blow landed.   “Is this the woman who convinced her men to follow her on a fool’s errand?”   Shea didn’t respond.   “Where is the spirit that drove you off a cliff onto a shadow beetle?”   He was very talkative as he drove her across the small practice ring. She envied him the ability.   “You’re weak.”   Now he was onto insults.   “You don’t belong here.”   Yeah, yeah, yeah. She’d heard that one before.   He closed with her, bearing down with his blade until her arms were shaking with the strain. His face was close to hers as their match became a test of strength. “Your stupidity is going to get everyone killed.”   Abruptly, Shea released the blade with one hand, sidestepped and launched a punch straight into his ear. His head rocked to the side and Shea, taking advantage of his distraction, grabbed his arm and hooked her leg around his before pushing with all her might.   He toppled backwards, landing hard on the ground for the first time that day. Shea didn’t wait for him to recover and kicked him in the ribs. He rolled into her legs as she prepared to do it again, bringing her to the ground with him.   She kicked, punched and wiggled her way back to standing and quickly backed up as he rose to his feet.   He didn’t look happy. Shea backed up even further.   The dark expression on his face was a bit scary. Guess she shouldn’t have kicked him when he was down. The biting probably didn’t help either. Trying to dig her fingers into his eyes had been a low blow. Even she could admit that. This was practice. Some things were just off limits.   He started for her, not even bothering to pick up his practice sword. Shea prepared to run. New energy coursed through her as she felt genuine danger rolling off Trenton.   “Test complete,” the old man crowed.   “What?” Shea asked in disbelief.   “You passed.”   “That’s it?”   The test had been difficult but not impossible. She’d been expecting impossible given the hesitation the old man showed in testing her.   “Mostly.”   That’s what she thought.

And then there’s the flip side of the placebo, the nocebo effect: the belief in evil signs or bad luck. It turns out people can literally scare themselves to death. If you think you’ve been cursed or otherwise made ill, you may end up actually getting sick, failing to improve poor health, or, yes, dying altogether. In one medically documented instance, a man was given three months to live after a diagnosis of metastatic cancer of the esophagus. He died shortly after. When his body was autopsied, doctors realized that he had been misdiagnosed: he did indeed have cancer, but a tiny, non-metastatic tumor on his liver. Clinically speaking, it could not have killed him. But, it seems, being told he was dying of a fatal illness brought about that very outcome. In another case, a man thought he was hexed by a voodoo priest. He came close to death, only to recover miraculously after an enterprising doctor “reversed” the curse through a series of made‑up words. In yet a third, a man almost died in the emergency room after overdosing on pills. He’d been in a drug trial for depression and decided to end his life with the antidepressants he’d been prescribed. His vitals were so bad when he was admitted that doctors didn’t think he would make it—until they discovered his blood was completely clear of any drugs. He’d been taking a placebo. Once he found out he had not in fact taken a life-threatening quantity of pills, he recovered quickly. The effect our mind has on our body makes for a scary proposition.

But normally, when Albertine was sleeping, she seemed to have recovered her innocence. In the position where I had placed her, but which in sleep she quickly made her own, she seemed to be trusting herself to me. Her face had lost any expression of deviousness or vulgarity, and when she raised her arm toward me or laid her hand upon me, each of us seemed entirely given up to the other, indissolubly joined.

If you are trying to recover from something or replenish yourself, place a hand on your heart and say to yourself, “I give myself my own love.” It is a powerful statement. I give myself my own love. Some of you will feel it going through the hand back into the heart recycling what it is you send out. A lot of love escapes your body from this point, so send it back in. The heart is a magnet when it is full. Think about that for a second. Think about the times in your life when you are greatly in love with a person, a project, or your own experience of life. Everything flows. The colors are more vivid. The light is brighter. You are your own master of your heart, and the fastest way to feed it is through yourself. Very quickly you will find you will be able to connect with others to have the experiences you want, the relationships you want, the work you want, or the creations you want to birth.

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It is time to end this." He ducked under her sword, stepped around her with blinding speed until he was at her back. She turned at once. He thrust his sword with great precision to catch the grip just above her hand and flick the sword from her grasp. It was a move he had long ago perfected. Her eyes widened, she stepped back, stumbled, and fell to the ground. He stood over her, aiming his sword at her midsection. "Have you had enough then?" He smiled smugly down at her. "No." She rolled quickly, caught his ankle with her foot, and he tumbled to the ground. Before he could recover she scrambled to her knees, grabbed his sword, and held it against his chest. "You're right, it is time to end this." He looked at the sword and winced. "Do be careful with that. You could inflict a great deal of harm.

In ordinary times the Jhelum river flows gently between high stable banks of deep soil, and until the stream shrinks in November, navigation, in spite of the absence of a proper tow-path, is easy. But in the winter the river above Sriiiagar is blocked by shoals, and the boatmen often have to dig out a channel for the heavy grain barges. In times of flood the river overtops its natural banks, and when the flood is high the water pours over the artificial embankments which have been constructed on either side of the river. Great damage is then caused to the crops of maize and linseed, and sometimes stacks of wheat, barley, and rape-seed are swept away. The loss caused by floods is always greatest below Srinagar, as the fall of the country is slight and the flood-water remains on the land rotting the crops. Above Srinagar the fall of the river and the slope of the country cause the flood-water to run down quickly and the crops often recover. In former times the villages lying along the river were obliged to keep the artificial embankments in repair, and flood-gates existed which let out the water of the mountain streams, and protected the country against the floods of the Jhelum. For many years this obligation had not been enforced, and under my supervision the embankments below Srinagar were repaired, and the normal floods of 1892 were kept in check. Above Srinagar the question of repairing embankments is complicated by the presence of the city, the safety of which must not be endangered. It is unfortunate that Srinagar should have been built on its present site. It is not only exposed to constant danger from floods, but is itself the cause of floods, because it checks the drainage of the country. The old Hindus were wise for they chose high land for their cities, and ancient Srinagar stood on ground secure from floods. Akbar, the first of the Mughal rulers, selected the slopes of the Hari-Parbat for his city Nagar, but his successors, without thought for the future, closed the Dal lake to the floods of the Jhelum, and thereby robbed the river of one of the escapes for its flood-water. Later the Pathans built their palace on the left bank of the Jhelum and prevented the river from escaping to the west, and now all the flood-water from the south of the valley must pass through the narrow waterway of Srinagar. There the channel of the river is narrowed by stone embankments, by the piles of encroaching city magnates, and the flow is further

Parents have been taught to fear fevers, to see them as bad, and to try to lower them as quickly as possible. Unfortunately, most parents don’t know why fevers occur, what is really a “high fever” and how (and why) to work with fevers instead of against them to help their children recover.

In PayPal co-founder Max Levchin’s words: “The very first company I started failed with a great bang. The second one failed a little bit less, but still failed. The third one, you know, proper failed, but it was kind of okay. I recovered quickly. Number four almost didn’t fail. It still didn’t really feel great, but it did okay. Number five was PayPal.

Colds and flu are not just inconveniences; they are alarm bells telling us that all is not well. While seen as a minor illness, each cold does permanent damage to the body, causing us to age prematurely. Yet millions of Americans suffer four to six colds per year, sometimes taking weeks to resolve. Healthy people do not get infections, and, if they do, they recover from them very quickly.

He gave a different edge to the defensive side of the game and that is where Barça became strong and attractive: losing the ball but then, within five seconds, trying to win it back. The principle is simple and comes from as far back as van Gaal: after losing the ball there are five seconds of pressure to win it back; if it isn’t recovered, the defensive phase would begin and players should quickly drop back.

So how about we stop putting on a show for everyone out here and go find ourselves a floating playpen?” He grinned. “Well, when you put it like that…” He leaned down, kissed her soundly, and tried not to let his thoughts stray to what came next. He’d exhausted himself with that the past three days and was thankful they were back to doing, not thinking. “I’d tell you to get a room, but I happen to know you already have one.” The sudden intrusion of a deep voice with an entirely different accent made Kerry jump, and it was only because Cooper already had his arms around her that he was able to pull her back before they both went in the drink. “Sorry,” Brodie said with a grin as he covered the last ten yards at the end of the pier, a small mutt racing down the docks behind him. “Didn’t mean to startle.” “So, an Irishman and an Aussie walk into a bar,” Kerry said, recovering quickly and teasing Grace’s husband as he stopped a few feet away.

Sorry,” Brodie said with a grin as he covered the last ten yards at the end of the pier, a small mutt racing down the docks behind him. “Didn’t mean to startle.” “So, an Irishman and an Aussie walk into a bar,” Kerry said, recovering quickly and teasing Grace’s husband as he stopped a few feet away. She bent down and clapped her hands as the scruffy mutt came skidding to a stop in front of her. “Hello, Mr. Whomper, and how are you today?” She gave him a good ear scratch, then laughed when he immediately wriggled over to his back in hopes of a belly rub to go with it. Laughing she obliged, then straightened, leaving the dog to sniff out Cooper’s feet, hoping for more of the same from the newcomer. “Heck of a watchdog you have there, Monaghan,” Cooper said, squatting down to give the dog a good once-over. “You realize,” Brodie said, “you’ve just made a shameless love slave out of him for life.” “Well, he has good hands,” Kerry said, then lifted her own in mock surrender when both men looked at her. Cooper was certain his surprised expression mirrored Brodie’s. “What?” Brodie chuckled, and his grin had the same cheek Cooper had been told his did.

I waited until I was five months pregnant to tell my mother that I was having a baby. "I'm calling with some news," I said. "God, what?" she responded, sounding hopeful for something juicy and terrible. She could be counted on to be sober and in good spirits until late afternoon, and I timed my calls accordingly but always braced myself. The death of her parents and of her brother, my uncle Mike, who had been gone for almost five years now, and the sale of the land had left her in a raw and scattered state that I still hoped she would recover from, eventually. She seemed to want to talk only about tragedies and bad news and would complain to me that my sister never called her and that nobody ever told her anything, or included her in any of their lives. I cut her off as she began to tell me something I did not want to hear. "I'm calling with good news," I said, starting again as though she might not recognize it as such. "What?" she said, her tone urgent, almost desperate. "I'm going to have a baby," I told her. She let out an exhale, then, sounding exhausted from the three seconds of suspense and relived but not happy, she said, "Well, it's nice to hear some good news, because I've been following this massacre? In Arizona? With the congresswoman who was shot in the head by that lunatic? It's just god-awful." I forced myself to give her a few details calmly, including the due date, then got off the phone as quickly as I could. She sent me an email the next day that said, simply, "I don't have any advice for you. Everything is different now than when I had you. I hope that you'll let me see my grandchild sometime. Your sister won't let me see her kids." I spent that whole day in bed, with a hand on my stomach, terrified.

fitness is the ability to recover quickly

Something’s happened to you, my love. That odious man has treated you wrongly, I have no doubt, and filled your mind with his vile rhetoric. I’m so sorry, Eliza. You must get away from here and back to your home where you can recover and begin to think properly again. I’m ready to take you away this instant.” Eliza shook her head and tried to answer but he stopped her with his finger on her lips. His eyes narrowed and his wounded tone carried fire. “I saw him kissing you.” The blood drained from her face and settled at her feet. The dark barn began to spin. “What?” she breathed. “I saw you at the rally. I saw you running from him.” Bile crept up her throat. Samuel continued. “I tried to get to you, but Watson was there first. I followed you . . . I saw everything.” A pitiful hurt knit his face. Oh, Dear Lord, what have I done. He came closer to her and stroked her arms. “I know you love me, Eliza. We’re meant for one another. I can only assume he’s forced himself upon you and that’s the reason you refuse me, but I don’t want you to worry. When you and I—” “You’re wrong Samuel! He’s done nothing but help and protect me.” He continued his gentleness, tracing her face with his eyes and stroking her arms. “I heard you’d been hurt—stabbed. Is that true? Did he do it because you tried to escape him?” Eliza’s nerves pricked. How much did he know? How long had he been watching them? “No . . . yes . . . no!” The words wouldn’t come quick enough. “I was hurt, very badly, but it wasn’t Thomas who did it. It was the sailors, we saw them . . .” She shook her head and waved her hands in front of her. “It’s too long to explain, but Thomas rescued me. Samuel, he saved my life!” Samuel’s eyes brimmed with emotion. “And for that, I will always be grateful.” His arms encircled her and he brushed his nose against her ear, his lips tracing along her jaw. An icy chill wriggled over her spine as she tried to push away. “Stop, Samuel! Don’t!” He stilled, then stepped away and dropped his lifeless hands at his sides. His features went slack and the muscles in his face ticked. “I care for you Samuel.” Eliza straightened, pulling the shawl back around her shoulders. “But I do not love you. I’m sorry. I don’t believe I ever really did. And how could I marry you now, knowing what you’ve done?” She lifted her chin and straightened her posture. “I love Thomas. We’re to be married.” His face twisted and flooded with red as he stepped forward. Eliza recoiled as his shoulders heaved from his heavy breathing “No. Never! You’re mine, Eliza!” His voice boomed as he spoke through his clenched teeth. He took a step closer reaching his hands toward her, a wicked desperation spinning in his gaze. “I know you are frightened to make such choices in your life. You could never come to a decision this easily. He’s forcing you to do these things. You don’t have to marry him, Eliza. You’re acting so different from the woman I know and love, and it pains me to see it. I will take you away and help you think clearly again.” “I am thinking clearly!” Eliza leaned into her words and clenched her fists, holding her arms rigid at her sides. “Samuel, I love Thomas and I am staying with him. I will be his wife! I’ll not go anywhere with you!” Samuel’s face turned to stone. “Yes. You. Will.” Eliza

For a few awful, shameful seconds, I seriously contemplate dashing through the gate and joining the line at Passport Control. It’s moving fairly quickly; in the minutes it will take Mum to recover any shreds of composure, I’ll be into Security, where if she tries to follow me, she’ll be detained by the guards. I’m a bad daughter even to think that. A terrible daughter. Not only am I leaving my mother on her own for two whole months, I’m fantasizing about running away from her and possibly getting her arrested.

Part 3: She hadn’t “stayed.” And neither had Finn. They both flanked Sean, munching on the cookies. A woman sat at the check-in desk with a laptop, her fingers a blur, the tip of her Santa hat quivering as she typed away. She looked up and smiled as she took in the group. That is until her gaze landed on Sean and she froze. He’d already done the same because holy shit— “Greetings,” she said, recovering first and so quickly that no one else seemed to notice as she stood and smiled warmly everyone but Sean. “Welcome to the Hartford B&B. My name’s Charlotte Hartford and I’m the innkeeper here. How can I help you?” Good question. And Sean had the answer on the tip of his tongue, which was currently stuck to the roof of his mouth because he hadn’t been prepared for this sweet and sassy redheaded blast from his past.

Point for Electra,” Niobe says. Sevro has to stop himself from clapping. Pax tries to recover, but Electra is on him. Three more quick blows knock his razor from his hand. He falls down and Electra lifts her razor to smash him hard on the head. Thraxa slips forward and catches the blade mid-swing with her metal hand. “Temper, temper, little lady.” She pours a little beer on her head. Electra glares up at her. Sevro can’t contain himself any longer. “My little harpy!” He lunges up off the bench and I follow through to the grotto. “Daddy’s home!” A smile slashes across Electra’s dour face as she turns to see her father. She runs to him and lets him scoop her up off the ground.

Rachel slips off the bed and stands before him to rearrange his collar, aware that in this small gesture there is a quality acutely other than motherly, sisterly, companionable, and that, in this moment, everything ever intended for her, for them, has begun, that the beginning is in the rearrangement of his collar and not the first kiss they share now, Zach recovering his wind as quickly as he lost it, a Great Northern Diver resurfacing. Zach clasps his hands round her ears, steps into her body and breathes the very air from her lungs. His teeth scrape against hers and he rests his open mouth against her face, gasping for air, his eyes squeezed shut as in great pain. And Rachel and Zachariah are born. Now truly they are born. 'Zachariah, Zachariah,' whispers Rachel. 'My fighting man.

We need to lose less often in the fight against the bad guys. Or, at least, lose more gracefully and recover quickly.

When your meta-attention becomes strong, you will be able to recover a wandering attention quickly and often, and if you recover attention quickly and often enough, you create the effect of continuous attention, which is concentration. Relaxed

In the late 1990s, Parachute was the market leader with more than 50 per cent market share. Fresh from its success in taking market share in toothpaste away from Colgate using Pepsodent, HUL entered the coconut oil category to take on Marico. Dadiseth, the then chairman of HUL, had warned Mariwala to sell Marico to HUL or face dire consequences. Mariwala decided to take on the challenge. Even the capital markets believed that Marico stood no chance against the might of HUL which resulted in Marico’s price-to-earnings ratio dipping to as low as 7x, as against 13x during its listing in 1996. As part of its plans to take on Marico, HUL relaunched Nihar in 1998, acquired Cococare from Redcon and positioned both brands as price challengers to Parachute. In addition, HUL also increased advertising and promotion spends for its brands. In one quarter in FY2000, HUL’s advertising and promotional (A&P) spend on coconut oil alone was an amount which was almost equivalent to Marico’s full year A&P budget (around Rs 30 crore). As Milind Sarwate, former CFO of Marico, recalls, ‘Marico’s response was typically entrepreneurial and desi. We quickly realized that we have our key resource engine under threat. So, we re-prioritized and focused entirely on Parachute. We gave the project a war flavour. For example, the business conference on this issue saw Mariconians dressed as soldiers. The project was called operation Parachute ki Kasam. The leadership galvanized the whole team. It was exhilarating as the team realized the gravity of the situation and sprang into action. We were able to recover lost ground and turn the tables, so much so that eventually Marico acquired the aggressor brand, Nihar.’ Marico retaliated by relaunching Parachute: (a) with a new packaging; (b) with a new tag line highlighting its purity (Shuddhata ki Seal—or the seal of purity); (c) by widening its distribution; and (d) by launching an internal sales force initiative. Within twelve months, Parachute regained its lost share, thus limiting HUL’s growth. Despite several relaunches, Nihar failed against Parachute. Eventually, HUL dropped the brand Nihar off its power brand list before selling it off to Marico in 2006. Since then, Parachute has been the undisputed leader in the coconut oil category. This leadership has ensured that when one visits the hair oil section in a retail store, about 80 per cent of the shelves are occupied by Marico-branded hair oil.

Anytime we’re not converting to others the same glorious realities that sealed our own redemption in Christ, we’re always an inch or less away from doing something wicked to somebody else—from not listening to them, not caring about them, not working hard for them, not valuing them, and all the various, ugly expressions that our lack of real love can embody. We won’t give people the benefit of the doubt. We won’t feel inclined to be gracious. We’ll all too quickly assume our attack positions, establishing ourselves on a war footing. We’ll flare up at perceived injustices and fight back with counterstrikes. We’ll turn against people. We’ll do it all. And know we’re doing it. And sometimes, we won’t even care.

The nature of capital was a major debate issue at the turn of the twentieth century because economist wanted to know how quickly the economy could adjust and recover from a depression. If capital were homogeneous and highly liquid, then the adjustment process should not take long and the economy could soon be back on its feet. But if capital were heterogeneous and not easily transferable to other uses, then the adjustment process could take much longer and it might take years for a nation to recover from a depression

Forgive me, Sophia. I didn’t mean to offend you. I was just coming over to apologize for hurting you during the, er, ceremony.” “It’s all right.” She looked down at the ground, feeling awkward all over again when she remembered the strange sensations that had flooded her body during the Luck Kiss. “No, it’s not. I drew your blood and for that I must beg your forgiveness.” He sounded formal again, just as he had when he was talking to the priestess. “The gift of blood must be freely given—never taken or forced.” “The…the gift of blood?” She looked up at him uncertainly. “Is that some kind of Kindred ceremony?” He looked uncomfortable. “It is part of the mating ritual of the Blood Kindred. And since you have made it abundantly clear you have no wish to be called as a bride, I shouldn’t have taken your blood.” “So if you did call a bride that would be part of it—of your relationship, I mean? You’d always be…biting her?” She couldn’t help looking at his fangs again and feeling glad they were still small. “Only when we made love,” Sylvan assured her as though that made it all right. Sophie felt her stomach do a slow forward flip but she tried not to show her dismay. “That’s…uh interesting.” “And off the point.” Sylvan frowned, as though irritated with himself. “What I’m trying to say is, please accept my apologies and my best wishes for your health and happiness. I truly did not mean to bite you.” “It’s…I know it was an accident but…” She wanted to ask him more. Wanted to know why his fangs had grown when he kissed her. It wasn’t just his fangs that grew, whispered a little voice in her head and a wave of embarrassment swept over her. “Yes?” Sylvan looked at her earnestly but she shook her head. “It’s okay,” she mumbled, not meeting his eyes. “Seriously, I’m fine. Let’s just…leave it at that.” “I appreciate your willingness to put the incident behind us but I need to examine the wound.” “Why?” Sophie asked. “I know you’re a doctor…er medic but—” “I need to know how serious the injury I inflicted was.” He looked so stern that she tilted her chin up to allow the examination. “It’s not bad at all. See?” she pointed at her bottom lip which, to tell the truth, was still pretty sore. Sylvan cupped her cheek in one hand and leaned forward, studying her hurt lip. For some reason Sophie’s face got hot at the gentle touch and she had to close her eyes. What is he looking for? What’s taking so long? She wished he would hurry up and finish the examination. His hand was so warm and the feel of his skin on hers made her nervous. “Is…is everything all right?” she asked at last. “It appears to be.” He sounded cautiously relieved. “I nicked you pretty badly but I don’t think you got any of my essence.” “Your what?” She opened her eyes to see him looking at her intently. Blushing, she looked quickly away. “My essence. It’s…never mind. You should recover normally.” His voice dropped. “I would offer to heal it for you but I don’t think you’d care for my method of healing.” “What do you mean?

Then came Dani’s turn to read a question. “‘Who’s in charge in the bedroom?’” Much to the group’s amusement, none of them got a match, and Sean didn’t think they would either as he held up his notepad. “‘I am, since I carry the big stick.’” Emma read hers with a remarkably straight face. “‘Sean, because he has a magic penis.’” “Wow. Um…so Sean and Emma have a point,” Dani said as the men nearly pissed themselves laughing. No way in hell was he leaving that unpunished, and he winked at Emma when Kevin read the next question. “‘Where’s the kinkiest place you’ve had sex?’” The fact that Joe and Keri had done the dirty deed on the back of his ATV led to a few questions about the logistics of that, but then it was Emma’s turn. “‘In bed, because Sean has no imagination.’” Roger threw an embarrassed wince his way, but his cousins weren’t shy about laughing their asses off. Sean just shrugged and held up his notepad. “In the car in the mall parking lot. Emma’s lying because she doesn’t want anybody to know being watched turns her on.” Her jaw dropped, but she recovered quickly and gave him a sweet smile that didn’t jibe with the “you are so going to get it” look in her eyes. Beth asked the next question. “‘Women, where does your man secretly dream of having sex?’” Keri knew Joe wanted to have sex in the reportedly very haunted Stanley Hotel, from King’s The Shining. Dani claimed Roger wanted to do the deed on a Caribbean beach, but he said that was her fantasy and that his was to have sex in an igloo. No amount of heckling would get him to say why. And when it came to Kevin, even Sean knew he dreamed of getting laid on the pitcher’s mound at Fenway Park. Then, God help him, it was Emma’s turn to show her answer. “‘In a Burger King bathroom.’” The room felt silent until Dani said, “Ew. Really?” “No, not really,” Sean growled. “Really,” Emma said over him. “He knows that’s the only way he can slip me a whopper.” As the room erupted in laughter, Sean knew humor was the only way they’d get through the evening with their secret intact, but he didn’t find that one very funny, himself. It was the final answer that really did him in, though. The question: “If your sex had a motto, what would it be?” Joe and Keri’s was, not surprisingly, Don’t wake the baby Kevin and Beth wrote, Better than chocolate cake, whatever that was supposed to mean. Dani wrote, Gets better with time, like fine wine, and Roger wrote, Like cheese, the older you get, the better it is, which led to a powwow about whether or not to give them a point. They probably would have gotten it if they weren’t tied with Keri and Joe, who took competitive to a cutthroat level. When they all looked at Sean, he groaned and turned his paper around. They’d lost any chance of winning way back, but he was already dreading what the smart-ass he wasn’t really engaged to had written down. “‘She’s the boss.’” The look Emma gave him as she slowly turned the notepad around gave him advance warning she was about to lay down the royal flush in this little game they’d been playing. “Size really doesn’t matter,” she said in what sounded to him like a really loud voice. Before he could say anything—and he had no idea what was going to come out of his mouth, but he had to say something--Cat appeared at the top of the stairs. “I hate to break up the party,” she said, “but it’s getting late, so we’re calling it a night.” Maybe Cat was, but Sean was just getting started.

From this basis, Boyd sets out to develop a normative view on a design for command and control. As in Patterns of Conflict, he starts with some ‘samples from historical environment’, offering nine citations from nine practitioners, including from himself (see Box 6.1):6 Sun Tzu (around 400 BC) Probe enemy strength to unmask his strengths, weaknesses, patterns of movement and intentions. Shape enemy’s perception of world to manipulate/undermine his plans and actions. Employ Cheng/Ch’I maneuvers to quickly and unexpectedly hurl strength against weaknesses. Bourcet (1764–71) A plan ought to have several branches . . . One should . . . mislead the enemy and make him imagine that the main effort is coming at some other part. And . . . one must be ready to profit by a second or third branch of the plan without giving one’s enemy time to consider it. Napoleon (early 1800s) Strategy is the art of making use of time and space. I am less chary of the latter than the former. Space we can recover, time never. I may lose a battle, but I shall never lose a minute. The whole art of war consists in a well-reasoned and circumspect defensive, followed by rapid and audacious attack. Clausewitz (1832) Friction (which includes the interaction of many factors, such as uncertainty, psychological/moral forces and effects, etc.) impedes activity. Friction is the only concept that more or less corresponds to the factors that distinguish real war from war on paper. In this sense, friction represents the climate or atmosphere of war. Jomini (1836) By free and rapid movements carry bulk of the forces (successively) against fractions of the enemy. N.B. Forrest (1860s) Git thar the fustest with the mostest. Blumentritt (1947) The entire operational and tactical leadership method hinged upon . . . rapid concise assessment of situations, . . . and quick decision and quick execution, on the principle: each minute ahead of the enemy is an advantage. Balck (1980) Emphasis upon creation of implicit connections or bonds based upon trust, not mistrust, that permit wide freedom for subordinates to exercise imagination and initiative – yet harmonize within intent of superior commanders. Benefit: internal simplicity that permits rapid adaptability. Yours truly Operate inside adversary’s observation-orientation-decision-action loops to enmesh adversary in a world of uncertainty, doubt, mistrust, confusion, disorder, fear, panic, chaos . . . and/or fold adversary back inside himself so that he cannot cope with events/efforts as they unfold.

those seconds that we lose could prove fatal.” His voice was hard, but the tenderness in his eyes touched me. The steely reserve that I’d been holding on to faltered a little, but I quickly recovered. Pasting on a small smile, I said, “I’m fine, see?” I spread my arms wide to prove my point. He studied me carefully through narrowed gray eyes, inspecting every detail of my appearance for signs of damage. I felt like a child under Mac’s hard gaze, but refused to avert my eyes. In addition to my seizures, Mac feared me so depressed that I might injure myself. His unsubstantiated

Writing to his sister Willemina two years later, van Gogh still considered The Potato Eaters his most successful painting: “What I think about my own work is that the painting of the peasants eating potatoes that I did in Nuenen is after all the best thing I did” However, the painting was criticised by his friend Anthon van Rappard soon after it was completed, which was a blow to van Gogh’s confidence. He wrote back to his friend, “you... had no right to condemn my work in the way you did.” On April 14, 1991, twenty major paintings were stolen from the Vincent van Gogh National Museum, including The Potato Eaters. For unknown reasons, the thieves abandoned the artworks thirty-five minutes after the robbery and the paintings were quickly recovered.

Sally herself: early forties, recovering alcoholic, divorced with no kids, quick and witty, savvy and tough, and, of course, quite attractive. She published once a year and toured extensively, always stopping at Bay Books and usually when Noelle was out of town.

Chicago’s population had topped one million for the first time, making the city the second most populous in the nation after New York, although disgruntled residents of Philadelphia, previously in second place, were quick to point out that Chicago had cheated by annexing large expanses of land just in time for the 1890 decadal census. Chicago shrugged the sniping off. Big was big. Success today would dispel at last the eastern perception that Chicago was nothing more than a greedy, hog-slaughtering backwater; failure would bring humiliation from which the city would not soon recover, given how heartily its leading men had boasted that Chicago would prevail. It was this big talk, not the persistent southwesterly breeze, that had prompted New York editor Charles Anderson Dana to nickname Chicago “the Windy City.

You fear that any fight could be your last. Normal couples argue to resolve issues, but psychopaths make it clear that negative conversations will jeopardize the relationship, especially ones regarding their behavior. Any of your attempts to improve communication will typically result in the silent treatment. You apologize and forgive quickly, otherwise you know they’ll lose interest in you.

After a short silence, he said, “We grew up together, we’re in love, and she’s going to marry me.” Quinn choked on the water he’d just brought to his lips, drawing everyone’s attention to him. He recovered quickly, replaced the glass, and stared at Nico as though he were an alien

between the ink mage and the wizard, his mouth falling open at the sight. The hulk had nearly let her go after Talbun’s shock attack, but he recovered quickly and took her head in his meaty hands. Don’t. With appalling ease, the ink mage twisted. The snap was so loud, it made Brasley flinch even from across the chamber. His mouth fell open to scream. “No!” The brute’s mouth twisted into a contemptuous grin as he let the limp body fall from his hands. Brasley watched it happen in slow motion, almost like she was floating, eyes closed, face peaceful, hair floating up around her. It was as if life had been some tremendous weight, and now that it was gone, her shell drifted down to the floor like a dry leaf. Talbun’s body hit with a dull thud that brought Brasley back to reality.

Unless the church quickly recovers the authoritative biblical message, we may witness the spectacle of millions of Christians going outside the institutional church to find spiritual food.

Perhaps that’s the best way to recover, to return to the way things were before as quickly as we can. We won the Great Battle, so nothing needs to change.

Furthermore, he may see you in new and profoundly different ways now, and his sense of responsibility to his growing family can be overwhelming. All in all, he might need some support, too, and may not be as quickly responsive to your needs as you’d like. He also can’t entirely understand the feelings you’re going through, either emotionally or physically, as you recover from birth, your hormones skyrocket and plummet, and you integrate your experience of birth and new motherhood.

I couldn’t wait to get home. I was foggy for a few weeks after, and I had a few headaches, but I recovered pretty quickly. I was covered in bruises though. I guess I earned those by fighting with everyone. I heard the stories--I elbowed a male nurse in the chest so hard I caused a big bruise. I slapped a paramedic in the ambulance. And apparently I even kicked Martin between the legs. Sorry, Martin! Willie said at one point I balled up my fist, and he backed away, knowing he was about to get sucker-punched in the face. He was afraid if that happened, he’d hit me back, and he didn’t want to do that since I was clearly out of my mind. Brothers.

It is by no means an accident that the only successful attempt of the American citizenry to force the ending of a foreign war occurred simultaneously with a wide revision in sexual attitudes. The civilization quickly recovered from this threat, however, by tempting these revolutionaries into a new sexual politics, one of societal standoff, where sexual genius is confused with such struggles as the passage of the Equal Rights Amendment and the election of women to national office.

He turns around and resumes his pace, saying over his shoulder, “Tell me. All those projects that Jimmy your CISO is pushing. Do they increase the flow of project work through the IT organization?” “No,” I quickly answer, rushing to catch up again. “Do they increase operational stability or decrease the time required to detect and recover from outages or security breaches?” I think a bit longer. “Probably not. A lot of it is just more busywork, and in most cases, the work they’re asking for is risky and actually could cause outages.” “Do these projects increase Brent’s capacity?” I laugh humorlessly. “No, the opposite. The audit issues alone could tie up Brent for the next year.” “And what would doing all of Jimmy’s projects do to WIP levels?” he asks, opening the door

If you close your eyes and stay still, it can be over quickly. It will hurt, but you’ll recover. And then, most terrifying of all, Be sure not to struggle. It will only encourage him.

They sat in a sphere of quiet, save the sound of their breathing and the carriage’s creaks and sways. Outside, the coachman yelled his encouragement to the steeds moving them forward. The whole carriage cocooned them in a peculiar world with the heaven’s wool-thick mists pressing against the windows. Her hand didn’t stop rubbing his neck, but she shifted her leg, bending her knee to rest her leg on his thigh. Her patten slipped off, dropping to the floor with a thud. Cyrus’s head moved off the squab. “Are you undressing for my benefit?” His smile’s wicked curve played on her. From her stays to her drawers, everything was too tight, too much against her skin. Cyrus reached for her hand working his neck muscles. He brought it to his lips and kissed her knuckles thrice with slow adoration. “We don’t have to stop,” she said, her voice breathy and quick. “I’m sure you have more aches and pains.” Mid-kiss, he smiled against the back of her hand, his warm breath brushing her skin. “There are so many ways a man could go with that.” Humor lightened his voice. “But I’m sure you mean to provide tender care to my neck only.” She grinned at her unintended innuendo. This was the experience she craved—to flirt and tease, to kiss and touch. Cyrus put his lips to her wrist, marking her with hot kisses. A spangle of pleasure shot up her arm. “You would break down the meanest soul with your soft heart.” He set her hand on the blanket’s scratchy folds, his thumb caressing her wrist. “High praise, indeed, sir.” Tinseled sparks danced across her skin, not letting her recover from those gentle touches, his lips to her arm. He stroked a lone finger on her hand that rested between them. “And you don’t care one bit that I’m the son of a Midland swine farmer, do you?” Cyrus asked the unexpected question, but his voice conveyed confidence in her answer. Was her chivalrous brawler showing a hidden spot? She peered at him, wanting a better view of his shadowed features. How was she to decipher this latest turn? The carriage bumped and rocked, and the outside candle lantern swung another shaft of light inside. His quicksilver stare pinned her. “Miss Mayhew, have you ever wondered how a freehold farmer got to be in such a fine place?

5. Unfaithful husbands in long-term marriages described their affairs as more emotional than sexual. Men whose affairs were primarily sexual seldom chose to leave.   6. Commitment to working on the marriage was low at the beginning of therapy. Involved spouses who were not committed to do everything possible to save their marriage were more likely to drop out of therapy quickly and leave the marriage.

in our quest for spiritual discovery we found that God moves in many mysterious ways. He is active in other continents, and I quickly realized that the church is much bigger than I ever thought it could be.

PETTY I SLOWED TO a limp at the crest of the hill, above the tailings pond. There sat the Taurus, parked and running, throwing billowy fumes into the air. I couldn’t swallow, my throat was so dry. I had to recover, and quick. My eyeballs felt as if they’d shrunk and my field of vision was narrowed almost to the point of blindness. I rubbed them and gasped for air, trying to determine if Mitch or Dekker were in the car. It appeared to be empty. Where were they? At the bottom of the slope, by the edge of the water, I saw two mounds of black, like two bears foraging slowly along the rocky ground. Was I hallucinating? But then I saw it was Mitch, dragging Dekker’s motionless body toward the deep lake.

If a child is distressed and sees Mom react with panic, he knows he should wail; if she’s compassionate but calm, he tends to recover quickly.

For Step 2, Maffetone had me wearing a runner’s heart rate monitor, a basic model with a chest strap and wristwatch console. The alarm was set to go off just before I hit my fat-burning threshold, which I’d calculated according to Maffetone’s quick-and-easy equation. To figure out your fat-burning zone, you subtract your age from 180 and then fine-tune by this scale: (a) If you’ve been sidelined for a while with injury or illness, subtract another 5. (b) If you’ve been sidelined a long time (like recovering from a heart attack), subtract 10. (c) If you’ve been training at least four times a week for two years, add 0. (d) If you’ve trained hard for two years and are progressing in competition, add 5. In my case, it works like this: I’m fifty years old, so 180 – 50 = 130.

The basic reason for German failure at the Marne, “the reason that transcends all others,” said Kluck afterward, was “the extraordinary and peculiar aptitude of the French soldier to recover quickly. That men will let themselves be killed where they stand, that is a well-known thing and counted on in every plan of battle. But that men who have retreated for ten days, sleeping on the ground and half dead with fatigue, should be able to take up their rifles and attack when the bugle sounds, is a thing upon which we never counted. It was a possibility not studied in our war academy.

Something smells amazing. What are we having?" "Moules marinières," Rachel said. "It seemed a shame to let mussel season close without making it at least once." "Oh la la," Melody said. "Paris must have been in the air today, because I made a napoleon." Ana handed over a half-filled wineglass and gave Melody a quick hug. "You're killing me, Mel. I'm still recovering from last week's Death by Chocolate Mousse.

What is your recovery rate? How long does it take you to recover from actions and behaviors that upset you? Minutes? Hours? Days? Weeks? The longer it takes you to recover, the more influence that incident has on your actions, and the less able you are to perform to your personal best. In a nutshell, the longer it takes you to recover, the weaker you are and the poorer your performance. 카톡►ppt33◄ 〓 라인►pxp32◄ 홈피는 친추로 연락주세요 프릴리지파는곳,프릴리지구입방법,프릴리지복용법,프릴리지지속시간,프릴리지처방,프릴리지구매 You are well aware that you need to exercise to keep the body fit and, no doubt, accept that a reasonable measure of health is the speed in which your heart and respiratory system recovers after exercise. Likewise the faster you let go of an issue that upsets you, the faster you return to an equilibrium, the healthier you will be. The best example of this behavior is found with professional sportspeople. They know that the faster they can forget an incident or missd opportunity and get on with the game, the better their performance. In fact, most measure the time it takes them to overcome and forget an incident in a game and most reckon a recovery rate of 30 seconds is too long! Imagine yourself to be an actor in a play on the stage. Your aim is to play your part to the best of your ability. You have been given a script and at the end of each sentence is a ful stop. Each time you get to the end of the sentence you start a new one and although the next sentence is related to the last it is not affected by it. Your job is to deliver each sentence to the best of your ability. Don’t live your life in the past! Learn to live in the present, to overcome the past. Stop the past from influencing your daily life. Don’t allow thoughts of the past to reduce your personal best. Stop the past from interfering with your life. Learn to recover quickly. Remember: Rome wasn’t built in a day. Reflect on your recovery rate each day. Every day before you go to bed, look at your progress. Don’t lie in bed saying to you, “I did that wrong.” “I should have done better there.” No. look at your day and note when you made an effort to place a full stop after an incident. This is a success. You are taking control of your life. Remember this is a step by step process. This is not a make-over. You are undertaking real change here. Your aim: reduce the time spent in recovery. The way forward? Live in the present. Not in the precedent.

Through the Woods Imagine you’re going on a hike through the woods. You’re enjoying the sights and sounds, maybe stopping occasionally to admire a bit of birdsong or take a picture of a particularly lovely flower. Then, suddenly, as you’re strolling serenely along, a bear jumps out of the bushes directly at you, roaring loudly. You’re probably screaming in fear for your very life, trying desperately to think of a way to save yourself, bitterly regretting the decision to go on this hike, wondering what will happen to your children. “Why me?” you may think. “Why this?” But then, let’s say the bear stands up and takes off its head. It isn’t really a bear; it‘s just a guy in a bear costume trying to scare hikers. Now imagine taking that hike again, but this time, before you go, I warn you that someone is hiding along the path, dressed in a bear costume and jumping out to scare people. Now that you know, you’ll be on the lookout. Of course, the hike is long, and at times you forget. The moment the guy in the bear costume jumps out to scare you, you’ll still be startled. You might even jump or scream. But you won’t be completely terrorized, and you’ll recover from the shock more quickly, because you were forewarned and had some time to accept the idea that someone was going to jump out at you. You’ll say to yourself, “I knew this was going to happen at some point. It’s happened to lots of other hikers.” This is essentially what Buddhism teaches us about suffering. It’s there, and it’s scary, and at some point it’s going to jump out and startle you, but it doesn’t have to utterly terrify you. Try this: The next time you experience suffering or distress, instead of saying, “Life’s not fair” or, “Why is this happening to me?” tell yourself, “I was aware that this could happen. I’m not alone. Others are also experiencing this same thing.” Once you know that suffering is an unavoidable part of the experience, you can embrace the fact that it will happen at some point, worry less about it, and be prepared to recover more quickly when it comes.

Most people in the world will not treat you the same way your dysfunctional family did.  It takes a while to begin to see that the world is different than the family atmosphere.  The more time you can spend thinking about what you want, noticing what situations in the present remind you of the past and releasing the related emotions, and encouraging yourself in what you most want to do, the more quickly you can heal from the past.

Rate yourself from 1 to 5, where 1 means no/rarely (denotes you have a lack of ability) and 5 means most often/always (denotes you can do this easily): ___ I experience relationships rather than things as a source of relief when I am stressed. ___ I seek help, comfort, or support from a person rather than a thing. (In contrast, addictions are ways you get relief or distractions from unwanted feelings without needing people.) ___ I can ask for help when I am unsure of myself. ___ I can list eight feelings I experience on a regular basis. ___ I can identify and articulate these feelings with my spouse and kids. ___ I use my feelings to identify my needs, and I am able to communicate my needs and ask directly for what I need, rather than hoping someone will guess correctly. ___ I know my childhood history, so I am aware when the past is influencing my present feelings and causing me to overreact. ___ I can name five strengths I possess in my character and talents, and three weaknesses. ___ I can recover quickly from a mistake. ___ I can find middle ground in life, versus being an eternal optimist or constant pessimist. ___ I can delay gratification and wait for something I want. ___ I am aware of my spouse’s behavior when he or she is stressed and can take measures to bring him or her relief. ___ I can admit when I am wrong and apologize without saying, “I am sorry, but…” ___ I can accept criticism and feedback and thoughtfully consider it. ___ I am a good listener and know how to ask thoughtful questions. ___ I have experienced the connection and closeness that results when a conflict is resolved. ___ I can say no and draw boundaries even when it makes someone mad. ___ I know how to use my anger to identify more vulnerable feelings underneath the anger and communicate the more vulnerable feelings. ___ I can control the level of my reactivity so I am able to stay engaged in difficult conversations. ___ I am comfortable with reality and don’t minimize problems. ___ I can keep listening and explore another’s feelings, experiences, and point of view even when I disagree with him or her. ___ I can ask to be held or hugged when I need comfort. ___ I am not afraid of conflict, because I have skills to compromise, negotiate, and usually resolve conflict. ___ I don’t hold on to resentments and am able to forgive my spouse. ___ Because I have relationships with God and close friends, I don’t expect my spouse to meet every need. ___ I have compassion for my spouse in his or her areas of weakness because I understand the childhood wounds that contributed to those areas of struggle. ___ I don’t have secrets I am keeping from my spouse. ___ I can ask for a do-over and try again when I blow it with my spouse.

Think about it this way. If your health is strong, when viruses come they will not make you sick. If your overall health is weak, even small viruses will be very dangerous for you. Similarly, if your mental health is sound, then when disturbances come, you will have some distress but quickly recover. If your mental health is not good, then small disturbances, small problems will cause you much pain and suffering. You will have much fear and worry, much sadness and despair, and much anger and aggravation

You can learn how to lose your shit a whole lot less often and how to recover more quickly when you do lose it. This isn’t going to happen overnight, and it will take some work on your part, but as they say, the best things in life aren’t free and your kids will probably break them anyway, so we’re not going for the best. We’re just going for better than what we have now.

Give People Space When situations become heated, sometimes all people need is a little space, a little time to cool off. If you’re someone who needs closure on a tense situation, you may need to wait a day or so and apply one of the relationship tips mentioned previously, such as bringing the peace pipe, or breaking bread with someone. When people need space, timing can make the difference between a mended fence and salt in the wound. Remember: If you’re feeling bad about the situation, it’s likely the other person is too. And she may just need a day or two to hide out and lick her wounds—and recover from her own embarrassment about how she also handled the situation. Don’t let the silence bother you too much, but, if the person is still giving you the cold shoulder after a few days, you’ll need to muster up the courage to sit down with him one on one, and smooth things over—as much as is appropriate. You should not extend yourself further than the situation warrants. There is no shame in extending the olive branch. It only shows that you’re open to working things out, and maintaining a productive relationship.

the owners of PetCo and Lucky Brand Jeans, Prospect Holdings, purchased the longtime community hospital shortly after the election. That’s right: suddenly decisions about patient care would be dictated by people who pored over quarterly numbers of whether sales of dry kibble versus wet food or skinny jeans versus bell-bottoms made more money, and for whom the bottom line—and not how quickly your aunt is recovering from a heart attack or cancer—is paramount.

Resilient means the ability to withstand or recover quickly from difficulties. It doesn't mean things aren't hard. It doesn't mean we aren't hurt. It just means we keep going. We keep living. We keep trying.

Lady Dearborn glanced quickly through the papers, impatient to continue her talk with her new daughter-in-law, pausing to open only one letter. "My goodness!" she exclaimed as she read it through. "It is from Lord Kerrigan, your grandfather, my dear. He is quite recovered, it seems, and was delighted to learn that I had made your acquaintance. He expresses a desire to see me again and asks if I would consider escorting you to Ireland. For the sake of old friendship, of course!" Ellie noticed that the Dowager's cheeks had pinkened somewhat. "I must tell him of my marriage at once, of course," she said. "'T'would be wonderful if I could do so in person." She looked questioningly to her husband as she spoke. "A splendid notion, I think," said Forrest at once. "In fact, I had already thought that Ireland might be just the place to begin our wedding trip. My mother may remain there when we continue on to the Continent, if she wishes." The look he directed at the Dowager Countess was one of mingled amusement and curiosity. The Dowager's blush deepened, but she said composedly enough, "Perhaps I shall. No one I know can play whist as Kerrigan used to. The four of us will have some rare games, I doubt not." "Pray do not expect Ellie and me to spend an inordinate time at the card table," said Forrest with a wink at his new Countess. "We shall have other things to occupy our time.

Acting quickly, Alex stepped to the left. Azazel recovered quicker than he expected and a punch whizzed by his head. This didn’t deter Alex as he reached out, latched onto Azazel’s wrist in a vise-grip, and pulled. The armored Angelisian stumbled forward. Alex used his opponent’s precarious balance to put a foot through Azazel’s instep, ending his foe’s stumbling advance, and then launching a palm strike that bounced off Azazel’s segmented breastplate. “Yeowch!” A pause ensued in their battle as Azazel watched Alex run around the grassy canal, frantically gripping his now swollen hand and shouting obscenities. “Holy crap, that hurt! Why does this hurt so much?! What the frack is your armor made out of?!” “It’s made out of adamantine, the strongest alloy on Angelisia. A human such as yourself would never be able to break through it to damage me.” “I already know what your armor is made of! That was a rhetorical question!” Alex snapped, blowing on his hand. By Mars that hurt! It felt like he’d tried to stop a speeding shuttle by punching it. Alex made a mental note to avoid hitting that armor.

Yes,” Elias said with his mind voice, standing. His long Enderman body towered over me in the sunlight. “Most zombies have problems with their minds, and forget things very quickly. They live in the moment, every moment, and don’t last long. You … are unique, Skeleton Steve. Zebulon is unique too, it seems. Both of you have retained sharp minds in your undead states. But, even still, you don’t know who you are, and our main quest, during my Seed Stride, is to try to recover your memories. You, my friend, have problems with your own mind as well…” “Yeah, I guess so,” I replied. Foom! I heard another gout of flame from down below. “I’m on fire! I’m on fire!!” a zombie shouted. “Zed’s on fire! It’s Zed!” another cried. I scoffed. “Oh, come on!!” I shouted, dropped down to the ladder, and scrambling to get out to the street. “Really?!” Running through the open doorway, stepping over the remnants of the shattered wooden door, I saw another zombie on fire, wandering around the cobblestone street. Flames sputtered and sparked and licked at his body and clothes—I couldn’t even see his face. “Zed?!” I asked. “Is that you??” “I’m on fire!” Zed said. “I’m on fire!” I recognized his voice.

Something wrong?" "No," Vince said quickly, forming a faint smile before seeming to reconsider. "Well, my gum lost its flavor. But I think I'll recover.

Successful marathoners have these physiological attributes: • High proportion of slow-twitch muscle fibers. This trait is genetically determined and influences the other physiological characteristics listed here. • High lactate threshold. This is the ability to produce energy at a fast rate aerobically without accumulating high levels of lactate in your muscles and blood. • High glycogen storage and well-developed fat utilization. These traits enable you to store enough glycogen in your muscles and liver to run hard for 26.2 miles (42.2 km) and enable your muscles to rely more on fat for fuel. • Excellent running economy. This is the ability to use oxygen economically when running at marathon pace. • High maximal oxygen uptake (VO2max). This is the ability to transport large amounts of oxygen to your muscles and the ability of your muscles to extract and use oxygen. • Quick recovery. This is the ability to recover from training quickly.

You fucked the groom fifteen minutes before he was to say his vows.” “Ah, yeah.” I adjust my erection again. “Then you took the father-in-law.” “Well, I was already naked and you know I recover quickly-” “Eros!

Everything happened too fast for Daisy to comprehend. She gripped the ribbons as Hubert jerked forward with a panicked whinny, the cart rattling and bouncing as if it were a child’s toy. Daisy tried in vain to keep her seat, but as the cart hit a deep rut she was thrown clear of the vehicle. Hubert continued racing pell-mell down the lane while Daisy landed on the hard-packed earth with stunning force. The breath was knocked from her, and she choked and wheezed. She had the impression of a massive creature, a monster rushing toward her, but the sound of a gunshot rent the air and caused her ears to ring. A bone-chilling animal squeal… then nothing. Daisy tried to sit up, then flopped weakly on her stomach as her lungs spasmed. Her chest felt as if it had been caught in a vise. There was a good chance she was going to cast up her crumpets, but the thought of how much that would hurt was enough to keep her gorge down. In a moment the thundering of hooves— several sets— vibrated the ground beneath Daisy’s cheek. Finally able to draw a shallow breath, she pushed up on her elbows and lifted her chin. Three riders— no, four— were galloping toward her, hooves thrasing up clouds of dust in the lane. One of the men swung off his horse before it had even stopped and rushed to her in a few ground-eating strides. Daisy blinked in surprise as he dropped to his knees and gathered her up in the same motion. Her head fell back on his arm, and she found herself staring hazily up into Matthew Swift’s dark face. “Daisy.” It was a tone she had never heard from him before, rough and urgent. Cradling her in one arm, he ran his free hand over her body in a rapid search for injuries. “Are you hurt?” Daisy tried to explain that she’d just gotten the wind knocked out of her, and he seemed to understand her incoherent sounds. “All right,” he said. “Don’t try to talk. Breathe slowly.” Feeling her stir against him, he resettled her in his arms. “Rest against me.” His hand passed over her hair, smoothing it back from her face. Tiny shivers of reaction ran through her limbs, and he gathered her closer. “Slowly, sweetheart. Easy. You’re safe now.” Daisy closed her eyes to hide her astonishment. Matthew Swift was murmuring endearments and holding her in hard, strong arms, and her bones seemed to have melted like boiling sugar. Years of uncivilized rough-and-tumble with her siblings had taught Daisy to recover quickly from a fall. In any other circumstances she would have sprung up and dusted herself off by now. But every pleasure-saturated cell in her body sought to preserve the moment for as long as possible.

Hundreds of studies have shown that children and adults recover more quickly when they realize that hardships aren’t entirely their fault, don’t affect every aspect of their lives, and won’t follow them everywhere forever.

Returning my attention to Quinn, I found him watching me with a glare of suspicion. “How old are you?” I reared back an inch, but then quickly recovered, giving him my most affable shrug and an answer meant to distract. “I was born during the war.” “Which war?” Shelly rushed back into the room. “Here is your coffee.

Lana leveled the gun at Penny. “Stop,” Lana said. Penny’s reddened face grew pale. Whatever visions she was inflicting on the people below her stopped. Kids cried in pain, sobbed from the memories. “Oh, everyone has to kiss your butt, don’t they, Healer.” Penny spit that last word. She made her hands into claws and pawed at the air. Her lips were drawn back in a teeth-baring animal snarl. “If I shoot you, I won’t heal you,” Lana said calmly. That caught Penny off guard. But she recovered quickly. She put her head down and started to laugh. It began low and rose a few decibels at a time. Lana’s arm burst into flame. A noose was flung from the ruined church wall. The rope dropped over her head, landed on her shoulders, and tightened around her throat. The limestone beneath her feet was suddenly a forest of knives all stabbing up at her. “Yeah,” Lana said. “That won’t work on me. I’ve gone one-on-one with the gaiaphage. He could teach you a few things. Stop it. Now. Or bang.” Penny’s laugh choked off. She looked hurt. As if someone had said something cruel to her. The visions ceased as suddenly as if someone had switched off a TV. “I’m kind of opposed to murder,” Lana said. “But if you don’t turn and walk away, I’ll blow a hole right where your heart is supposed to be.” “You can’t…” Penny said. “You… No.” “I missed killing a monster once. I’ve always regretted it,” Lana said. “But you’re a human. Sort of. So you get this chance: walk. Keep walking.” For what felt like a very long time Penny stood staring at Lana. Not with hatred, but with disbelief. Lana saw her very, very clearly: a head resting atop the sights of her pistol. Penny took a step back. Then another. There was a wild look of defiance, but then it died. Penny spun on her heel and walked quickly away.

He respected Ellen’s choice as one she felt compelled to make, not easy for her, but necessary. He also hoped when he heard her reasons, he could argue her past them, and the hoping was… awful. Hope and Val Windham were old enemies. Best enemies. He’d hoped his brother Victor would recover, but consumption seldom eased its grip once its victims had been chosen. He’d hoped his hand wasn’t truly getting worse, until he couldn’t deny that reality without losing use of the hand entirely. He’d hoped his brother Bart would come home from war safe and sound, not in a damned coffin. He’d hoped St. Just might escape military service without substantial wound to body or soul, but found even St. Just had left part of his sanity and his spirit at Waterloo. He’d hoped he might someday do something with his music, but what that silly hope was about, he’d never been quite sure. And now, he was hoping he and Ellen had a future. The hope sustained him and tortured him and made each second pass too quickly when he was with her. But he couldn’t always be with her, because Ellen insisted she have time to tend her gardens and set up her little conservatory. Val

You look very pretty,” said my mother at last, opening the conversation. “And how do you like being the wife of a master glass-maker here at Rougemont?” “Well enough,” replied Cathie, “but I find it rather fatiguing.” “No doubt,” said my mother, “and a great responsibility. How many workmen are employed here, and how many of them are married with families?” Cathie opened large eyes. “I have no idea,” she said. “I have never spoken to any of them.” I thought this would silence my mother, but she quickly recovered. “In that case,” she continued, “what do you do with your time?” Cathie hesitated. “I give orders to the servants,” she said, “and I watch them polish the floors. The rooms are very spacious, as you can see.” “I can indeed,” replied my mother. “No wonder you are fatigued.

A leap of faith may not happen with certitude, because those magic moments vanish, and our very human qualities of doubt and second-guessing rush in to fill the void... If you've done your homework, you'll see what's happening and recover much more quickly than when you were less aware.

I became mad for a time, wanting to dig her up just to be certain she was dead. Once, I even had the shovel in my hand. But then I knew I could not let her suffer the indignity of a man who had lost his mind to grief and loss. Not a man at all, really, but a bio-organic whose soul might never recover from her quick and sudden departure from my life just as we’d found an avenue for happiness.

Idealization is the first step in the psychopath’s grooming process. Also known as love-bombing, it quickly breaks down your guard, unlocks your heart, and modifies your brain chemicals to become addicted to the pleasure centers firing away. The excessive flattery and compliments play on your deepest vanities and insecurities—qualities you likely don’t even know you possess. They will feed you constant praise and attention through your phone, Facebook Timeline, and email inbox. Within a matter of weeks, the two of you will have your own set of inside jokes, pet names, and cute songs. Looking back, you’ll see how insane the whole thing was. But when you’re in the middle of it, you can’t even imagine life without them.

I was so caught up in the discussion that I almost didn't notice Apicata sneaking shy glances at young Casca. Celera had, however, and was watching with amusement. She winked at me when she saw I had also noticed their interest. As Casca mouthed a sweet nothing to Apicata, Celera seized the moment. "Apicata, I understand you have begun reading the Histories of Herodotus. Tell me, how do you like them?" She almost choked on her honey water, not expecting to be addressed. Casca averted his eyes when he saw me looking in his direction and both of them turned as red as the cushions upon which we were seated. Apicata recovered quickly. "I've almost finished them. Father was entertaining Annaeus Seneca and when he heard I had not yet read it, he sent me a copy." "Have you reached the part about how the Ethiopians bury their dead in crystal coffins?" Casca asked, turning his body to rest his chin on both hands and stare at her directly. "Oh, yes, I'm long past that! I'm reading about how Xerxes had the waters of Hellespont whipped for not obeying him." Her eyes sparkled. "Wait till you reach the Battle of Thermopylae. What a heroic story!" The exchange continued for a few minutes with additional commentary from the others, who were oblivious to the undercurrent between the youths.

Similarly, if your mental health is sound, then when disturbances come, you will have some distress but quickly recover. If your mental health is not good, then small disturbances, small problems will cause you much pain and suffering. You will have much fear and worry, much sadness and despair, and much anger and aggravation.