Updated Sayings And Quotes

Yes, we praise women over 40 for a multitude of reasons. Unfortunately, it's not reciprocal. For every stunning, smart, well-coiffed, hot woman over 40, there is a bald, paunchy relic in yellow pants making a fool of himself with some 22-year old waitress. Ladies, I apologize. For all those men who say, "Why buy the cow when you can get the milk for free?", here's an update for you. Nowadays 80% of women are against marriage. Why? Because women realize it's not worth buying an entire pig just to get a little sausage!

Maybe a friend is someone who wants your updates. Even if they're boring. Or sad. Or annoyingly cutesy. A friend says "Sign me up for your boring crap, yes indeed"--because he likes you anyways. He'll tolerate your junk

Josh turns to me. “I can’t believe she’s writing these things.” “Not she,” I say. “Me.” “Why would anyone say this stuff about themselves on the Internet? It’s crazy!” “Exactly,” I say. “I’m going to be mentally ill in fifteen years, and that’s why my husband doesn’t want to be around me.

I blame the Internet. Its inconsiderate inclusion of everything.Success is transparent and accessible, hanging down where it can tease but not touch us. We talk into these scratchy microphones and take extra photographs but I still feel like there are just SO MANY PEOPLE. Every day, 1,035.6 books are published; sixty-six million people update their status each morning. At night, aimlessly scrolling, I remind myself of elementary school murals. One person can make a difference! But the people asking me what I want to be when I grow up don't want me to make a poster anymore. They want me to fill out forms and hand them rectangular cards that say HELLO THIS IS WHAT I DO.

The calls are for updates and to see how her day went. The letters are for the things I can’t always say out loud.

Despite what many modern educators would say, this is not a psychological disturbance brought on by violent television or chemical imbalance. Aggression is part of the masculine design; we are hardwired for it.

A man who would letterspace lower case would steal sheep, Frederic Goudy liked to say. If this wisdom needs updating, it is chiefly to add that a woman who would letterspace lower case would steal sheep as well .

People walk the paths of the gardens below, and the wind sings anthems in the hedges, and the big old cedars at the entrance to the maze creak. Marie-Laure imagines the electromagnetic waves traveling into and out of Michel’s machine, bending around them, just as Etienne used to describe, except now a thousand times more crisscross the air than when he lived - maybe a million times more. Torrents of text conversations, tides of cell conversations, of televisions programs, of e-mails, vast networks of fiber and wire interlaced above and beneath the city, passing through buildings, arcing between transmitters in Metro tunnels, between antennas atop buildings, from lampposts with cellular transmitters in them, commercials for Carrefour and Evian and prebaked toaster pastries flashing into space and back to earth again, I am going to be late and Maybe we should get reservations? and Pick up avocados and What did he say? and ten thousand I miss yous, fifty thousand I love yous, hate mail and appointment reminders and market updates, jewelry ads, coffee ads, furniture ads flying invisibly over the warrens of Paris, over the battlefields and tombs, over the Ardennes, over the Rhine, over Belgium and Denmark, over the scarred and ever-shifting landscape we call nations. And is it so hard to believe that souls might also travel those paths? That her father and Etienne and Madame Manec and the German boy named Werner Pfennig might harry the sky in flocks, like egrets, like terns, like starlings? That great shuttles of souls might fly about, faded but audible if you listen closely enough? They flow above the chimneys, ride the sidewalks, slip through your jacket and shirt and breastbone and lungs, and pass out through the other side, the air a library and the record of every life lived, every sentence spoken, every word transmitted still reverberating within it. Every hour, she thinks, someone for whom the war was memory falls out of the world. We rise again in the grass. In the flowers. In songs.

In criticism parents attack children's personality attributes and their character. In guidance we state the problem and a possible solution. We say nothing to the child about himself or herself. When

Science makes major contributions to minor needs, Justice Holmes was fond of saying, adding that religion, however small its successes, is at least at work on the things that matter most.

As I grow in age, I value women who are over forty most of all. Here are just a few reasons why: A woman over forty will never wake you in the middle of the night to ask, “What are you thinking?” She doesn’t care what you think. If a woman over forty doesn’t want to watch the game, she doesn’t sit around whining about it. She does something she wants to do. And, it’s usually something more interesting. A woman over forty knows herself well enough to be assured in who she is, what she is, what she wants and from whom. Few women past the age of forty give a hoot what you might think about her or what she’s doing. Women over forty are dignified. They seldom have a screaming match with you at the opera or in the middle of an expensive restaurant. Of course, if you deserve it, they won’t hesitate to shoot you, if they think they can get away with it. Older women are generous with praise, often undeserved. They know what it’s like to be unappreciated. A woman over forty has the self-assurance to introduce you to her women friends. A younger woman with a man will often ignore even her best friend because she doesn’t trust the guy with other women. Women over forty couldn’t care less if you’re attracted to her friends because she knows her friends won’t betray her. Women get psychic as they age. You never have to confess your sins to a woman over forty. They always know. A woman over forty looks good wearing bright red lipstick. This is not true of younger women. Once you get past a wrinkle or two, a woman over forty is far sexier than her younger counterpart. Older women are forthright and honest. They’ll tell you right off if you are a jerk, if you are acting like one! You don’t ever have to wonder where you stand with her. Yes, we praise women over forty for a multitude of reasons. Unfortunately, it’s not reciprocal. For every stunning, smart, well-coiffed hot woman of forty-plus, there is a bald, paunchy relic in yellow pants making a fool of himself with some twenty-two-year-old waitress. Ladies, I apologize. For all those men who say, “Why buy the cow when you can get the milk for free,” here’s an update for you. Now 80 percent of women are against marriage, why? Because women realize it’s not worth buying an entire pig, just to get a little sausage.

God’s relationship with us and with our world is just that: a relationship. As with every relationship, there’s a certain amount of unpredictability, and the ever-present likelihood that you’ll get hurt. The ultimate risk anyone ever takes is to love, for as C. S. Lewis says, “Love anything and your heart will be wrung and possibly broken. If you want to make sure of keeping it intact you must give it to no one, not even an animal.” But God does give it, again and again and again, until he is literally bleeding from it all. God’s willingness to risk is just astounding—far beyond what any of us would do were we in his position.

The word Christ uses for “life” is the word psyche—the word for our soul, our inner self, our heart. He says that the things we do to save our psyche, our self, those plans to save and protect our inner life—those are the things that will actually destroy us.

Life is Beautiful? Beyond all the vicissitudes that are presented to us on this short path within this wild planet, we can say that life is beautiful. No one can ever deny that experiencing the whirlwind of emotions inside this body is a marvel, we grow with these life experiences, we strengthen ourselves and stimulate our feelings every day, in this race where the goal is imminent death sometimes we are winners and many other times we lose and the darkness surprises us and our heart is disconnected from this reality halfway and connects us to the server of the matrix once more, debugging and updating our database, erasing all those experiences within this caracara of flesh and blood, waiting to return to earth again. "Life is beautiful gentlemen" is cruel and has unfair behavior about people who looked like a bundle of light and left this platform for no apparent reason, but its nature is not similar to our consciousness and feelings, she has a script for each of us because it was programmed that way, the architects of the game of life they know perfectly well that you must experiment with all the feelings, all the emotions and evolve to go to the next levels. You can't take a quantum leap and get through the game on your own. inventing a heaven and a hell in order to transcend, that comes from our fears of our imagination not knowing what life has in store for us after life is a dilemma "rather said" the best kept secret of those who control us day by day. We are born, we grow up, we are indoctrinated in the classrooms and in the jobs, we pay our taxes, we reproduce, we enjoy the material goods that it offers us the system the marketing of disinformation, Then we get old, get sick and die. I don't like this story! It looks like a parody of Noam Chomsky, Let's go back to the beautiful description of beautiful life, it sounds better! Let's find meaning in all the nonsense that life offers us, 'Cause one way or another we're doomed to imagine that everything will be fine until the end of matter. It is almost always like that. Sometimes life becomes a real nightmare. A heartbreaking horror that we find impossible to overcome. As we grow up, we learn to know the dark side of life. The terrors that lurk in the shadows, the dangers lurking around every corner. We realize that reality is much harsher and ruthless than we ever imagined. And in those moments, when life becomes a real hell, we can do nothing but cling to our own existence, summon all our might and fight with all our might so as not to be dragged into the abyss. But sometimes, even fighting with all our might is not enough. Sometimes fate is cruel and takes away everything we care about, leaving us with nothing but pain and hopelessness. And in that moment, when all seems lost, we realize the terrible truth: life is a death trap, a macabre game in which we are doomed to lose. And so, as we sink deeper and deeper into the abyss, while the shadows envelop us and terror paralyzes us, we remember the words that once seemed to us so hopeful: life is beautiful. A cruel and heartless lie, that leads us directly to the tragic end that death always awaits us.

It's a world where people think it's OK to hide behind their screens and their usernames and say poisonous things about a person they don't even know. [...] So, next time you go to post a comment or an update or share a link, ask yourself: is this going to add to the happiness in the world? And if the answer's no, then please delete. There's enough sadness in the world already. You don't need to add to it.

Noel: A lot of people see friends as something you have on Twitter or Facebook or wherever. If someone wants to read your updates and you want to read their updates, then you’re friends. You don’t ever have to see each other. But that seems like a stupid definition to me. Roo: Yeah. Noel: Although on the other hand, rethink. Maybe a friend is someone who wants your updates. Even if they’re boring. Or sad. Or annoyingly cutesy. A friend says, “Sign me up for your boring crap, yes indeed” – because he likes you anyway. He’ll tolerate your junk. Roo: You have lots of friends. Noel: No, I don’t. Roo: You do. You know everyone at school. You get invited to parties. Noel: I get invited to parties, yeah. And I know people. But I don’t want their updates. Roo: Oh. Noel: And I sincerely doubt they want mine. Roo: I want your updates. Noel: I want your updates. (He looks down, bashfully.) I do. I want all your updates, Ruby.

A limit must be stated in a manner that is deliberately calculated to minimize resentment, and to save self-respect. The very process of limit-setting, of saying “no,” should convey authority, not insult. It should deal with a specific event, not with a developmental history.

In a matter of a moment the amount of sand in the upper part of the hour-glass had dwindled dramatically, the tiny grains were rushing through the opening, each grain more eager to leave then the last, time is just like people, sometimes it’s all it can do to drag itself along, but at others, it runs like a deer and leaps like a young goat, which, when you think about it, is not saying much, since the cheetah is the fastest of all the animals, and yet it has never occurred to anyone to say of another person He runs and jumps like a cheetah, perhaps because that first comparison comes from the magical late middle ages, when gentlemen went deer-hunting and no one had ever seen a cheetah running or even heard of its existence. Languages are conservative, they always carry their archives with them and hate having to be updated.

Sam and Bill and I would cut a hole in a watermelon and fill it with rum so Jimmy didn’t know we were drinking. “Boy, you men sure like your watermelon,” Jimmy would say.

Okay, so I stopped posting status updates on Facebook a long time ago. I noticed that whenever someone posts something completely mundane and stupid, like 'Sushi 2nite!' seventeen people have to comment on that. 'I ♥ sushi!' and 'Spicy Tuna 4 meee!' But if you ever try to actually say something serious about your feelings or, like, your life, every one of your 386 "friends" is suddenly mute. So there you have it: My life is a post with no comments. Less interesting than spicy tuna.

I sense a hint of bitterness in this letter of yours and in a previous one. Excellent: we are living in a dark period, there is absolutely nothing going right, and the only consolation we have is to think about the brevity of life. I have to say that in this situation I am absolutely fine, and I am giving myself up finally to total misanthropy, which I now discover corresponds fully to my true nature. But you seem to be still anxious about something or other. Ha, ha! Don’t worry, it will just get worse and worse.

Because while we all Facebook stalk, protocol is to not admit it. I might know, from status update, that a potential best friend swims laps every mornings, but it'd be creep to say "Don't worry about eating that doughnut, you deserve it after all those calories you burn!" Instead, I check out her profile and she reviews mine, but then we meet and pretend to know nothing.

Russell Bufalino’s penetrating good eye stayed on mine. I moved back up in my seat. I couldn’t show anything in my face. I couldn’t say a word. That’s not the way it works. The wrong look in my eyes and my house gets painted. Jimmy

Russell turned his head and said to me, “Say hello to Jimmy Hoffa.” Then Russ handed me the phone. I reached for the phone and I thought, can you imagine this? Jimmy Hoffa calling to talk to me? “Hello,” I said. “Glad to meet you.” Jimmy Hoffa didn’t even say hello. He got right to the point. The next thing I heard were the first words Jimmy Hoffa ever spoke to me. “I heard you paint houses,” Jimmy said.

If God lived on earth,” goes a sardonic Yiddish saying, “people would knock out all His windows.

They say the average number of days of actual combat for a veteran is around eighty. By the time the war was over the Army told me I had 411 combat days, which entitled me to $20 extra

Users take their technologies with them to bed.[cxiv] When they wake up, they check for notifications, tweets, and updates, sometimes even before saying “Good morning” to their loved ones.

I don’t understand. She’s always been so friendly toward me.” “Yes, so long as your work consisted of updating calendars and photocopying golf club bylaws.” “But there was no danger of my taking her place!” “She was never afraid of that.” “Then why denounce me? Why would it upset her if I went to work for you?” “Miss Mori struggled for years to get the job she has now. She probably found it unbearable for you to get that sort of promotion after being with the company only ten weeks.” “I can’t believe it. That’s just so … mean.” “All I can say is that she suffered greatly during the first few years she was here.” “So she wants me to suffer the same fate? It’s too pathetic. I must talk to her.” “Do you really think that’s a good idea?” “Of course. How else are we going to work things out if we don’t talk?” “You just talked to Mister Omochi. Does it strike you that things have been worked out?

As Buechner says, we are in constant danger of being not actors in the drama of our lives but reactors, “to go where the world takes us, to drift with whatever current happens to be running the strongest.

Though I have started emailing with one of my fellow readers whenever there's something important to say about Modern Family or Friday Night Lights, and with another when I notice her updates on Goodreads.com.

Only in the movies or comic books do people say they want you to go and hit somebody. All they ever say is that they want you to go straighten a matter out. They say they want you to do whatever you’ve got to do to straighten a matter out.

If you were AWOL when your company was going back into combat you might as well keep going because your own officers would blow you away, and they didn’t even have to say it was the Germans. That’s desertion in the face of the enemy. While

Ten days after Hoffa took the oath of office in 1957, the AFL-CIO kicked out the Teamsters, saying that they could get back in only if they got rid of “this corrupt control” of the union by Jimmy Hoffa and his racketeer union officials. On

Jimmy liked to control his environment. He didn’t drink, so no one took a drink in his presence. He didn’t smoke, so nobody lit up around him. Sometimes he’d get all riled up. He’d get impatient and he’d do things that would remind you of a kid scratching chicken pox. You couldn’t tell him he was going to end up with pockmarks. You couldn’t say a word. You just listened. Jimmy

I went to work for the union around the time all this was going on, right after Jimmy got the president’s job. After the wiretap trial everybody was saying they didn’t make a parachute big enough to save Bobby Kennedy’s ass when he jumped off the Capitol.

There was not a single smoker in Europe before the sixteenth century, because until then there was no tobacco there. Very few women smoked until the twentieth century; now the habit is more popular among young women than among young men. To say that individual differences in smoking are half caused by genes is simply not true. It all depends on the environment in which the individual is living.

I didn’t say anything on social media, though relatives tried to tag me in supportive status updates, which I did my best to untag myself from. I didn’t want to be a part of their mourning. I didn’t want to be involved in someone else’s grief when I knew so little about how to deal with my own.

One of my earliest childhood memories is getting birdshot picked out of my backside by my mother, Mary. My mother would say, “Tom, how come I’m always picking this stuff out of Francis’s behind?” My father, who always called her Mame, would say, “Because the boy doesn’t run fast enough, Mame.” I get my size

I had watched organics and fair trade explode into billion-dollar industries. But it was hard to say the world was becoming a better place for the marginal spending. In fact, it felt like it was becoming a more insulated one. I kept thinking of the medieval practice of simony, where the wealthy could pay money to be released from their sins. The grocery store felt like it was becoming a smug secular update. The seals and certifications acting like some sort of moral shield, allowing those of us with disposable income to pay extra for our salvation, and forcing everyone else to deal with the fact that on top of being poor, they were tacitly agreeing to harm the earth, pollute their children via their lunch boxes, and exploit their fellow man each time they made a purchase.

they wanted the guy left right there on the sidewalk as a message to those who needed to know the guy did not get away with whatever it was he had done. Anytime you read in the paper about a masked gunman, rest assured the gunman had no mask on. If there are any eyewitnesses on the street, they always say the gunman had a mask on, so everybody on the shooter’s side of the thing knows the eyewitnesses didn’t see a thing and the eyewitnesses don’t have to worry about a thing. I

They say good girls like bad boys. Opposites attract. Mary loved me, but her family hated me. They thought I was what they used to call shanty Irish, and I guess they thought they were what they used to call lace-curtain Irish. Or maybe they saw something in me; that as hard as I was trying I was still too unpredictable for their Mary. Mary

A great anatomist used to close his opening lecture to beginning medical students with words that apply equally to our own undertaking. “In this course,” he would say, “we shall be dealing with flesh and bones and cells and sinews, and there are going to be times when it’s all going to seem terribly cold-blooded. But never forget. It’s alive!” II.

FOLK SAYINGS: “Nine wise men don’t make a minyan, but ten cobblers do.” “Nine saints do not make a minyan, but one ordinary man can by joining them.

The moment you say “I know everything” is the end of your growth. —SHARON LEE, AMERICAN AUTHOR (1952

FOLK SAYING: “Your health comes first; you can always hang yourself later.

Why is sholem used for both “hello” and “good-bye”? Israelis say: “Because we have so many problems that half the time we don’t know whether we’re coming or going.

Centuries before Sigmund Freud published his Interpretation of Dreams (1900), the Jews had a saying: “In sleep, it is not the man who sins—but his dream.

Thank you,” said Lee’s voice. “And now we turn to regular contributor Royal, for an update on how the new Wizarding order is affecting the Muggle world.” “Thanks, River,” said an unmistakable voice, deep, measured, reassuring. “Kingsley!” burst out Ron. “We know!” said Hermione, hushing him. “Muggles remain ignorant of the source of their suffering as they continue to sustain heavy casualties,” said Kingsley. “However, we continue to hear truly inspirational stories of wizards and witches risking their own safety to protect Muggle friends and neighbors, often without the Muggles’ knowledge. I’d like to appeal to all our listeners to emulate their example, perhaps by casting a protective charm over any Muggle dwellings in your street. Many lives could be saved if such simple measures are taken.” “And what would you say, Royal, to those listeners who reply that in these dangerous times, it should be ‘Wizards first’?” asked Lee. “I’d say that it’s one short step from ‘Wizards first’ to ‘Purebloods first,’ and then to ‘Death Eaters,’” replied Kingsley. “We’re all human, aren’t we? Every human life is worth the same, and worth saving.” “Excellently put, Royal, and you’ve got my vote for Minister of Magic if ever we get out of this mess,” said Lee. “And now, over to Romulus for our popular feature ‘Pals of Potter.’” “Thanks, River,” said another very familiar voice; Ron started to speak, but Hermione forestalled him in a whisper. “We know it’s Lupin!

Social media has put an incredible pressure on the Facebook generation. We’ve made our lives so public to one another, and as a result we feel pressure to live up to a certain ideal version of ourselves. On social media, everyone is happy, and popular, and successful—or, at least, we think we need to look like we are. No matter how well off we are, how thin or pretty, we have our issues and insecurities. But none of that shows up online. We don’t like to reveal our weaknesses on social media. We don’t want to appear unhappy, or be a drag. Instead, we all post rose-colored versions of ourselves. We pretend we have more money than we do. We pretend we are popular. We pretend our lives are great. Your status update says I went to a totally awesome party last night! It won’t mention that you drank too much and puked and humiliated yourself in front of a girl you like. It says My sorority sisters are the best! It doesn’t say I feel lonely and don’t think they accept me. I’m not saying everyone should post about having a bad time. But pretending everything is perfect when it’s not doesn’t help anyone. The danger of these kinds of little white lies is that, in projecting the happiness and accomplishments we long for, we’re setting impossible standards for ourselves and others to live up to.

The melamed asked one of his young students, “Yussele, do you say your prayers before each meal?” “No, melamed.” “What? You don’t pray before each meal?!” “I don’t have to. My mother’s a good cook.

From there we’d go over to the Friendly Lounge at Tenth and Washington, owned by a guy named John who went by the nickname of Skinny Razor. At first I didn’t know anything about John, but some of the guys from Food Fair pushed a little money on their routes for John. A waitress, say, at a diner would borrow $100 and pay back $12 a week for ten weeks. If she couldn’t afford the $12 one week she’d just pay $2, but she’d still owe the $12 for that week and it would get added on at the end. If it wasn’t paid on time the interest would keep piling up. The $2 part of the debt was called the “vig,” which is short for vigorish. It was the juice. My

Jimmy did a lot of business with our friends, but he always did it on Jimmy Hoffa’s terms. That pension fund was the goose that laid the golden eggs. Jimmy was close with Red Dorfman out of the Chicago outfit. Red got the Waste Handlers Union in Chicago in 1939, when the president of that union got whacked. They say Red had Jack Ruby with him as the other officer in the union. That’s the same Jack Ruby who whacked Lee Harvey Oswald.

Cried out to us, "Debark, here is the entrance." More than a thousand at the gates I saw Out of the Heavens rained down, who angrily Were saying, "Who is this that without death Goes through the kingdom of the people dead?

On the other hand, in his book, The Enemy Within, Bobby Kennedy wrote about his experiences and observations as chief counsel for the McClellan Committee hearings on organized crime and labor unions, saying: “We saw and questioned some of the nation’s most notorious gangsters and racketeers. But there was no group that better fits the prototype of the old Al Capone syndicate than Jimmy Hoffa and some of his chief lieutenants in and out of the union.” Twentieth

Trump’s economic adviser Peter Navarro updates this refrain when he says: “My function, really, as an economist is to try to provide the underlying analytics that confirm his intuition. And his intuition is always right in these matters.

It really is a helluva fiver-upper," Henry said, because someone had to say it. "I feel like they should possibly renovate this basement if they want to get a good sale price. Hardwood floors, update the doorknobs, maybe put the wall back.

Something right in the morning can turn into something wrong in the afternoon! Even if you are on the right path, you must still question the rightness of your path! Conditions perpetually change! Update your path and your travel constantly!

Dear friends, maybe you have never sincerely said it because you never thought it was needed; but say it now if you mean it. “Oh Christ, let me be filled with the Holy Spirit. I will give up anything and everything. Accept my surrender of all to You!

Brett emails me with updates on foreign rights. We've sold rights in Germany, Spain, Poland, and Russia. Not France, yet, but we're working on it, says Brett. But nobody sells well in France. If the French like you, then you're doing something very wrong.

Blessed is the man who has come to know that our muted thoughts are our sweetest thoughts. “Blessed is the man who, from the blackest depths, can see the luminous figure of LOVE, and seeing, sing; and singing, say: "Sweeter far than uttered lays are the thoughts I have of you.

The pain of labor and birth has an entirely different message. It says: “Relax your pelvic muscles. Let go. Surrender. Go with the flow. Don’t fight this. It’s bigger than you.” This is far different from the message of “Protect yourself!” or “Run away!” that accompanies injury.

Most parents think that food regulators wouldn’t permit additives if they were harmful. But regulators don’t require food additives to be tested for their effects on children’s behaviour or learning ability; don’t require food additives to be tested on children at all; don’t monitor effects after they have been approved; see effects as only ‘minor’ problems; and say that people who are affected by food additives can choose to avoid them by reading labels – even though a lot of food is not labelled and there is no requirement to tell consumers what’s in it.

Another segment of society that has constructed a language of its own is business. People in business say that toner cartridges are in short supply, that they have updated the next shipment of these cartridges, and that they will finalize their recommendations at the next meeting of the board. They are speaking a language familiar and dear to them. Its portentous nouns and verbs invest ordinary events with high adventure; executives walk among toner cartridges, caparisoned like knights. We should tolerate them--every person of spirit wants to ride a white horse.

The sense of differentiation is so acute in Yiddish that a word like, say, paskudnyak has no peer in any language I know for the vocal delineation of a nasty character. And Yiddish coins new names with ease for new personality types: a nudnik is a pest; a phudnik is a nudnik with a Ph.D.

The good news keeps piling up. Brett emails me with updates on foreign rights sales. We’ve sold rights in Germany, Spain, Poland, and Russia. Not France, yet, but we’re working on it, says Brett. But nobody sells well in France. If the French like you, then you’re doing something very wrong.

Our memories are in part reconstructions. Whenever we retrieve a memory, the brain rewrites it a bit, updating the past according to our present concerns and understanding. At the cellular level, LeDoux explains, retrieving a memory means it will be “reconsolidated,” slightly altered chemically by a new protein synthesis that will help store it anew after being updated.40 Thus each time we bring a memory to mind, we adjust its very chemistry: the next time we retrieve it, that memory will come up as we last modified it. The specifics of the new consolidation depend on what we learn as we recall it. If we merely have a flare-up of the same fear, we deepen our fearfulness. But the high road can bring reason to the low. If at the time of the fear we tell ourselves something that eases its grip, then the same memory becomes reencoded with less power over us. Gradually, we can bring the once-feared memory to mind without feeling the rush of distress all over again. In such a case, says LeDoux, the cells in our amygdala reprogram so that we lose the original fear conditioning.41 One goal of therapy, then, can be seen as gradually altering the neurons for learned fear.

this: for some strange reason, God doesn’t want to change the world without us. There are times when we throw our hands up at God and say, “Do something!” and if we listen closely, we can hear God respond, “I did do something. I made you.” Sometimes we are waiting on God, and God is waiting on us. When

Success is transparent and accessible, hanging down where it can tease but not touch us. We talk into these scratchy microphones and take extra photographs but I still feel like there are just SO MANY PEOPLE. Every day, 1,035.6 books are published; sixty-six million people update their status each morning. At night, aimlessly scrolling, I remind myself of elementary school murals. One person can make a difference! But the people asking me what I want to be when I grow up don’t want me to make a poster anymore. They want me to fill out forms and hand them rectangular cards that say HELLO THIS IS WHAT I DO.

One night the three of us were out on the town. Bill was driving us to an Italian restaurant. I had been on my new job just a few weeks. I was in the backseat and Bill was watching me in the rearview mirror. Bill said to me, “We heard from Jimmy that you paint houses.” I didn’t say anything. I just nodded my head “yes.” Okay, here it is, I thought. So much for getting away from the downtown culture and getting into a new line of work. “We got something in Chicago that needs to be straightened out. We got a friend there named Joey Glimco. He runs the cab local there, 777. He’s got the trucks on the waterfront, too. Ever heard of him?” I

Jane Russell! My physical therapist had never heard of her. “Gentlemen Prefer Blondes,” I said. “Not in my experience,” she replied. Bina’s younger; perhaps that’s it. All this was earlier today; before I could argue with her, she laced one of my legs over the other, capsized me onto my right side. The pain left me breathless. “Your hamstrings need this,” she assured me. “You bitch,” I gasped. She pressed my knee to the floor. “You’re not paying me to go easy on you.” I winced. “Can I pay you to leave?” Bina visits once a week to help me hate life, as I like to say, and to provide updates on her sexual adventures, which are about as exciting as my own. Only in Bina’s case it’s because she’s picky. “Half the guys on these apps are using five-year-old photos,” she’ll complain, her waterfall of hair poured over one shoulder, “and the other half are married. And the other half are single for a reason.” That’s three halves, but you don’t debate math with someone who’s rotating your spine.

Update your belief! If necessary, throw it to the bin! Don’t exaggerate your belief! Remember that your belief is not that much important; the important thing is what the science, what the reason and the truth say! And remember also that with the earthquake of knowledge many beliefs have collapsed and again many more will collapse!

Mother Teresa offers us that brilliant glimpse of hope that lies in little things: “We can do not great things, only small things with great love. It is not how much you do but how much love you put into doing it.” Above our front door, we have hung a sign that says, “Today . . . small things with great love (or don’t open the door).

As the minuteness of the parts formed a great hindrance to my speed, I resolved, contrary to my first intention, to make the being of a gigantic stature, that is to say, about eight feet in height, and proportionably large. After having formed this determination and having spent some months in successfully collecting and arranging my materials, I began.

Which is more important: money or wisdom? “Wisdom,” says the philosopher. “Ha!” scoffs the cynic. “If wisdom is more important than money, why is it that the wise wait on the rich, and not the rich on the wise?” “Because,” says the scholar, “the wise, being wise, understand the value of money; but the rich, being only rich, do not know the value of wisdom.

And in a very special way, as Jesus says in Matthew 25:40, in the least of these, we find Jesus in disguise. Perhaps we are just as likely to encounter God over the dinner table or in the slums or in the streets as in a giant auditorium. Of course, suggesting that God doesn’t need these million-dollar megacathedrals is the sort of thing that gets you in big trouble.

I wouldn’t say ‘Hello’ to a paskudnyak like that!” “Did you ever hear of such a paskudnyak?” “That whole family is a collection of paskudnyaks.” This word is one of the most greasily graphic, I think, in Yiddish. It offers the connoisseur three nice, long syllables, starting with a sibilant of reprehension and ending with a nasality of scorn. It adds cadence to contempt.

I rest because he has said nothing would take his love from me, or you. I can’t say that would be true of any other human kind of love. In fact, it’s so different from “regular” love that it’s hard to believe that it could be really true. So God pursues us, courts us, and woos us to remind us. As if he wants to keep us mindful that he doesn’t get tired of us, he isn’t frustrated by our moods or by our irritating habits or put off by uncombed hair or out-of-style clothes. We are free to place the whole weight of our needs on him, to bring him our deepest questions, to look to him for acceptance and validation. And unlike any other relationship, the God who designed us will not lean, crumble, struggle, stagger, or falter in any way. This is a love that changes everything.

As the van door starts to close, Brad suddenly realizes that the instant the doors close completely, the van interior will become the terrifying bland gray space he's heard about all his life, the place one goes when one has been Written Out. The van interior becomes the bland gray space. From the front yard TV comes the brash martial music that indicates UrgentUpdateNewsMinute. Animal rights activists have expressed concern over the recent trend of spraying live Canadian geese with a styrene coating which instantaneously kills them while leaving them extremely malleable, so it then becomes easy to shape them into comical positions and write funny sayings in DryErase cartoon balloons emanating from their beaks, which, apparently, is the new trend for outdoor summer parties.

Amerigo Vespucci, an Italian sailor who took part in several expeditions to America in the years 1499–1504. Between 1502 and 1504, two texts describing these expeditions were published in Europe. They were attributed to Vespucci. These texts argued that the new lands discovered by Columbus were not islands off the East Asian coast, but rather an entire continent unknown to the Scriptures, classical geographers and contemporary Europeans. In 1507, convinced by these arguments, a respected mapmaker named Martin Waldseemüller published an updated world map, the first to show the place where Europe’s westward-sailing fleets had landed as a separate continent. Having drawn it, Waldseemüller had to give it a name. Erroneously believing that Amerigo Vespucci had been the person who discovered it, Waldseemüller named the continent in his honour – America. The Waldseemüller map became very popular and was copied by many other cartographers, spreading the name he had given the new land. There is poetic justice in the fact that a quarter of the world, and two of its seven continents, are named after a little-known Italian whose sole claim to fame is that he had the courage to say, ‘We don’t know.

Younger wizards in particular went about saying that is was time magic started to update its image and that they should all stop mucking about with bits of wax and bone and put the whole thing on a properly-organised basis, with research programmes and three-day conventions in good hotels where they could read papers with titles like 'Whither Geomancy?' and 'The role of Seven League Boots in a caring society

Our Constitution is not good. It is a document designed to create a society of enduring white male dominance, hastily edited in the margins to allow for what basic political rights white men could be convinced to share. The Constitution is an imperfect work that urgently and consistently needs to be modified and reimagined to make good on its unrealized promises of justice and equality for all. And yet you rarely see liberals make the point that the Constitution is actually trash. Conservatives are out here acting like the Constitution was etched by divine flame upon stone tablets, when in reality it was scrawled out over a sweaty summer by people making deals with actual monsters who were trying to protect their rights to rape the humans they held in bondage. Why would I give a fuck about the original public meaning of the words written by these men? Conservatives will tell you that the text of laws explicitly passed in response to growing political, social, or economic power of nonwhite minorities should be followed to their highest grammatical accuracy, and I’m supposed to agree the text of this bullshit is the valid starting point of the debate? Nah. As Rory Breaker says in the movie Lock, Stock and Two Smoking Barrels: “If the milk turns out to be sour, I ain’t the kind of pussy to drink it.” The Constitution was so flawed upon its release in 1787 that it came with immediate updates. The first ten amendments, the “Bill of Rights,” were demanded by some to ensure ratification of the rest of the document. All of them were written by James Madison, who didn’t think they were actually necessary but did it to placate political interests.

Though I am sometimes reluctant to admit it, there really is something 'timeless' in the Tyndale/King James synthesis. For generations, it provided a common stock of references and allusions, rivalled only by Shakespeare in this respect. It resounded in the minds and memories of literate people, as well as of those who acquired it only by listening. From the stricken beach of Dunkirk in 1940, faced with a devil’s choice between annihilation and surrender, a British officer sent a cable back home. It contained the three words 'but if not…' All of those who received it were at once aware of what it signified. In the Book of Daniel, the Babylonian tyrant Nebuchadnezzar tells the three Jewish heretics Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego that, if they refuse to bow to his sacred idol, they will be flung into a 'burning fiery furnace.' They made him an answer: 'If it be so, our god whom we serve is able to deliver us from the burning fiery furnace, and he will deliver us out of thy hand, o King. But if not, be it known unto thee, O king, that we will not serve thy gods, nor worship the golden image which thou hast set up.' A culture that does not possess this common store of image and allegory will be a perilously thin one. To seek restlessly to update it or make it 'relevant' is to miss the point, like yearning for a hip-hop Shakespeare. 'Man is born unto trouble as the sparks fly upward,' says the Book of Job. Want to try to improve that for Twitter?

WHAT DADDY WOULD HAVE DONE First he would have listened intently which one could always tell by the rhythmic shift and angle of the way he held his head. Then he would have gently spoken assuring me that all would eventually be well. Next he would tell me to bow with him in faith to obtain guidance and strength for my way. Finally, he would have made a few calls to some of the many folks he knew to see what they would say or do. In the end, he would complete a follow-up with me. He would stay abreast of the situation and through his participation I would glean the most useful updates. But, just a few years ago, he had to go away Now each time I have a problem, I remember how he handled things ‘back in the day’. This is when the realization hits me like a ton of bricks on the run—for I’m plumb on my own. But, though he’s now long gone, my past experience knows and stands to say what my Daddy would have done. I tell you, Daddy would have said… Daddy would have done…Well, now I think we all know what Daddy would have said and done…

I was ready to get this show on the road, creating a new generation with an updated set of rules and regulations. Not that there was anything wrong with the way either one of us was brought up, but still, the world is changing, so the way you bring up kids had to change, too. Part of my plan was to never one time mention picking cotton. My parents always talked about either real cotton or the idea of it. White people say, 'It beats digging a ditch'; black people say, 'It beats picking cotton.' I'm not going to remind my kids that somebody died in order for me to do everyday things. I don't want Roy III sitting up in the movie theater trying to watch Star Wars or what have you and be thinking about the fact that sitting down eating some popcorn is a right that cost somebody his life. None of that. Or maybe not much of that. We'll have to get the recipe right. Now Celestial promises that she will never say that they have to be twice as good to get half as much. 'Even if it's true,' she said, 'what kind of thing is that to say to a five-year-old?

And now, over to Romulus for our popular feature ‘Pals of Potter.’” “Thanks, River,” said another very familiar voice; Ron started to speak, but Hermione forestalled him in a whisper. “We know it’s Lupin!” “Romulus, do you maintain, as you have every time you’ve appeared on our program, that Harry Potter is still alive?” “I do,” said Lupin firmly. “There is no doubt at all in my mind that his death would be proclaimed as widely as possible by the Death Eaters if it had happened, because it would strike a deadly blow at the morale of those resisting the new regime. ‘The Boy Who Lived’ remains a symbol of everything for which we are fighting: the triumph of good, the power of innocence, the need to keep resisting.” A mixture of gratitude and shame welled up in Harry. Had Lupin forgiven him, then, for the terrible things he had said when they had last met? “And what would you say to Harry if you knew he was listening, Romulus?” “I’d tell him we’re all with him in spirit,” said Lupin, then hesitated slightly. “And I’d tell him to follow his instincts, which are good and nearly always right.” Harry looked at Hermione, whose eyes were full of tears. “Nearly always right,” she repeated. “Oh, didn’t I tell you?” said Ron in surprise. “Bill told me Lupin’s living with Tonks again! And apparently she’s getting pretty big too…” “…and our usual update on those friends of Harry Potter’s who are suffering for their allegiance?” Lee was saying. “Well, as regular listeners will know, several of the more outspoken supporters of Harry Potter have now been imprisoned, including Xenophilius Lovegood, erstwhile editor of The Quibbler,” said Lupin. “At least he’s still alive!” muttered Ron.

Tell The Truth. Most of your problems come from not telling the truth. The lies you tell, even to spare other people's feelings, always come back to haunt you. If you simply tell people what you mean you would be better off, a lot happier, not trapped in some awkward social situation. Others will know where they standand will be more honest with you. They won't expect you to be what you're not. They won'tneed to test you to discover your intentions. You won't have to make excuses for not doing things you didn't want to do or explain why you prefer to do what like to do. They'll know. Telling the truth and being your own person are closely linked. A strong person says what he or she means. A weak person lies to please others. A strong person lets the truth be other people's problem. A weak person holds the truth inside and complains about being treated unfairly. What is telling the truth hurts other people's feelings? You're not supposed to tell people that they look fat, are stupid or ugly. That's just being rude. Tell the truth avout what you feel, want, and like and mean what you say. If other's get hurt by your truth, they'll have to deal with it. Others may not like what you say, but they'll respect you for being honest and they'll survive better than if you lie to them. If you lie to please people, they won't really believe you. They'll be suspicious and suffer with every inconsistency they find in your story. You'll be called on to update alibis and others will undermine you and try to trap you. People hate being lie to, because lying takes away their free choice and their ability to defend themselves. Tell the truth. It only hurts once. Lies hurt everyone all the time.

Reading the groundbreaking modern studies on happiness, I came to the conclusion that happiness is less complicated than we sometimes think. The things that tend to make people happy—say, hanging out with friends or walking near a lake—aren’t exactly mind-blowing. Yet modern society tries to fool us into doing things that data (or even a little common sense) says are unlikely to make us happy. Many of us devote years working far too hard at jobs we don’t like with people we don’t like. Many of us spend hours poring over the latest updates on social media. Many of us go months without spending real time in nature.

Needless to say, elderly people taking steroids may also experience the same side effects as younger persons. So, if you are a senior and need to be on a long course of steroids, what should you do? We would suggest a practical approach—which could apply to anyone on steroids, regardless of age, but may be particularly relevant for seniors because they are particularly vulnerable to side effects: • Understand and verify the need for steroids in your own situation, weighing the anticipated benefit with the possible risks. This means that you should explore the range of other treatments that may be available for your particular condition. You need to learn about the benefits and risks of any other treatment suggested. In other words, get all the information you can prior to going on treatment, be it with steroids or other medications. • Be sure that your health is well-assessed before or at the start of therapy. If you have underlying, separate health conditions, those should be noted and followed while you are on steroids. • Assess bodily systems that might particularly be affected by being on steroids. This means an assessment of your skeletal health, your eyes, your teeth, and your internal organs. • Request guidance about staying active. Physical therapy should be planned, to minimize the chances that your muscles and joints will be overtaxed or that any existing damage might get worse. • Ask to reassess the length and dose of your medication course at various intervals. A reasonable interval is every couple of months, if you are on a long course of steroids.

The non-event is not when nothing happens. It is, rather, the realm of perpetual change, of a ceaseless updating, of an incessant succession in real time, which produces this general equivalence, this indifference, this banality that characterizes the zero degree of the event. A perpetual escalation that is also the escalation of growth - or of fashion, which is pre-eminently the field of compulsive change and built-in obsolescence. The ascendancy of models gives rise to a culture of difference that puts an end to any historical continuity. Instead of unfolding as part of a history, things have begun to succeed each other in the void. A profusion of language and images before which we are defenceless, reduced to the same powerlessness, to the same paralysis as we might show on the approach of war. It isn't a question of disinformation or brainwashing. It was a naIve error on the part of the FBI to attempt to create a Disinformation Agency for purposes of managed manipulation - a wholly useless undertaking, since disinformation comes from the very profusion of information, from its incantation, its looped repetition, which creates an empty perceptual field, a space shattered as though by a neutron bomb or by one of those devices that sucks in all the oxygen from the area of impact. It's a space where everything is pre-neutralized, including war, by the precession of images and commentaries, but this is perhaps because there is at bottom nothing to say about something that unfolds, like this war, to a relentless scenario, without a glimmer of uncertainty regarding the final outcome.

Forsake All I ask you to remember that the disciples were men who had forsaken all to follow Jesus. The Lord Jesus went to a fisherman and said, “Leave your net behind and follow Me.” To another man He said, “Leave your position as a tax collector and come and follow Me.” They did it. They left those things behind and followed Jesus. They could later say by the mouth of Peter, We have forsaken all and followed thee (Matthew 19:27). They left their homes, their families, and their good names. Men mocked and laughed at them. Men called them the disciples of Jesus, and when He was despised and hated, they were hated too. They identified themselves with Him and gave themselves up entirely to follow Him. This is the first step to being filled with the Holy Spirit. We must forsake all to follow Christ.

Torrents of text conversations, tides of cell conversations, of television programs, of e-mail, vast networks of fiber and wire interlaced above and beneath the city, passing through buildings, arcing between transmitters in Metro tunnels, between antennas atop buildings, from lampposts with cellular transmitters in them, commercials for Carrefour and Evian and prebaked toaster pastries flashing into space and back to earth again, I’m going to be late and Maybe we should get reservations? and Pick up avocados and What did he say? and ten thousand I miss yous, fifty thousand I love yous, hate mail and appointment reminders and market updates, jewelry ads, coffee ads, furniture ads flying invisibly over the warrens of Paris, over the battlefields and tombs, over the Ardennes, over the Rhine, over Belgium and Denmark, over the scarred and ever-shifting landscapes we call nations. And is it so hard to believe that souls might also travel those paths? That her father and Etienne and Madame Manec and the German boy named Werner Pfennig might harry the sky in flocks, like egrets, like terns, like starlings? That great shuttles of souls might fly about, faded but audible if you listen closely enough? They flow above the chimneys, ride the sidewalks, slip through your jacket and shirt and breastbone and lungs, and pass out through the other side, the air a library and the record of every life lived, every sentence spoken, every word transmitted still reverberating within it. Every hour, she thinks, someone for whom the war was memory falls out of the world. We rise again in the grass. In the flowers. In songs.

People you’re contacting to create a new relationship need to see or hear your name in at least three modes of communication—by, say, an e-mail, a phone call, and a face-to-face encounter—before there is substantive recognition. • Once you have gained some early recognition, you need to nurture a developing relationship with a phone call or e-mail at least once a month. • If you want to transform a contact into a friend, you need a minimum of two face-to-face meetings out of the office. • Maintaining a secondary relationship requires two to three pings a year. • Social media pings (status updates, retweets, comments, etc.) are terrific for ongoing relationship maintenance, especially for the fringe of your network, but they don’t replace the need for one-to-one pinging with the people in your highest-priority network, those people connected to your current goals.

Contemplating suicidal people - Why people are likable (edit) by Mad Herondale 19020307 descriptionjust what it says. genrePoetry stats Published on 2013-11-09 Why people are likable (edit) Chapter 1 — Updated Nov 09, 2013 — 648 characters I think there are two reasons people are drawn to other people: looks or personality. Some are both pretty and nice, but those are far and few between and everyone flocks to them like flies to honey. Then there are those who are pretty and treat others like crap, but people still like them, because let's face it were all drawn to pretty things. There are also the plain or ugly, but kind people, those we come to when we need help or a laugh or a smile, and love them for it. Lastly there are those who somehow got left with neither looks nor charisma. Those are the people who live out their lives lonely and depressed or who go off themselves.

The civil servant looks back at the file and says flatly, as if reading, “No children?” and then, looking directly up at Somer, “No babies?” Her cheeks flush with familiar shame in this country where fertility is so celebrated, where every woman has a child on each hip. She shakes her head. After a couple more exchanges with Krishnan, the civil servant tells them to come back in the morning for an update on their case. K rishnan takes her arm and leads her out of the building. “What was that about?” she says once they are outside. “Nothing,” he says. “Indian bureaucracy. Everything is like this here.” He flags a taxi “What do you mean ‘like this’? What happened back there? They kept us waiting an hour, that guy clearly hadn’t even read our file, and then he barely even talks to me!” “That’s because you’re—” “I’m what?” she snaps at him. “Look, things work differently here. I know how to handle this, just trust me. You can’t come here with your American ideas—” “I didn’t come here with anything.” She slams the taxicab door and feels the whole car reverberate.

For example, say you're an average web developer. You're familiar with a dozen programming languages, tons of helpful libraries, standards, protocols, what have you. You still have to learn more at the rate of about one a week, and remember to check the hundreds of things you know to see if they've been updated or broken and make sure they all still work together and that nobody fixed the bug in one of them that you exploited to do something you thought was really clever one weekend when you were drunk. You're all up to date, so that's cool, then everything breaks. "Double you tee eff?" you say, and start hunting for the problem. You discover that one day, some idiot decided that since another idiot decided that 1/0 should equal infinity, they could just use that as a shorthand for "Infinity" when simplifying their code. Then a non-idiot rightly decided that this was idiotic, which is what the original idiot should have decided, but since he didn't, the non-idiot decided to be a dick and make this a failing error in his new compiler. Then he decided he wasn't going to tell anyone that this was an error, because he's a dick, and now all your snowflakes are urine and you can't even find the cat.

#1. No Escape and feature keys Today’s Apple Event confirmed many of the rumors surrounding the lengthy-awaited refresh of the Macbook Pro line. The Escape and Function keys at the laptops had been deserted in choose of a hint bar that changed relying at the software that is getting used. The last the Macbook Pro got a chief update was a shocking 4 years in the past and many guides are celebrating the brand new design. However, the lack of bodily Escape and Function keys is a disaster for one major set of Apple’s customers — Developers. Let’s test numbers: There are ~ 19 million developers inside the global. And Apple has managed to promote ~19 million Macs over the past four quarters. What a twist of fate! Yes, builders are drawn toward Apple products mainly for software program reasons: the Unix-like running gadget and the proprietary development atmosphere. But builders want to have a useful keyboard to make use of that software and now they don’t. Why Tim Cook, why? This isn’t to say that the contact bar is an inherently awful concept. You should locate it on pinnacle of the Esc and feature keys as opposed to doing away with them completely! Something like this: #2 Power. Almost no improvement for RAM and a processor The 2016 MacBook Pro ships with RAM and processor specifications that are nearly equal to the 2010 model. Deja vu? RAM: At least it appears like that, because the MacBook Pro has had alternatives of as much as 16 GB of RAM in view that 2010. The best difference now's that you pay for the update. Processors: The MacBook Pro had options with 2.4 gigahertz twin-middle processors again in 2010. Anything new in 2016? Not absolutely, well… nope.

It's funny, you know. We're free. We make choices. We weigh things in our minds, consider everything carefully, use all the tools of logic and education. And in the end, what we mostly do is what we have no choice but to do. Makes you think, why bother? But you bother because you do, that's why. Because you're a DNA-brand computer running Childhood 1.0 software. They update the software but the changes are always just around the edges. You have the brain you have, the intelligence, the talents, the strengths and weaknesses you have, from the moment they take you out of the box and throw away the Styrofoam padding. But you have the fears you picked up along the way. The terrors of age four or six or eight are never suspended, just layered over. The dread I'd felt so recently, a dread that should be so much greater because the facts had been so much more horrible, still could not diminish the impact of memories that had been laid down long years before. It's that way all through life, I guess. I have a relative who says she still gets depressed every September because in the back of her mind it's time for school to start again. She's my great-aunt. The woman is sixty-seven and still bumming over the first day of school five-plus decades ago. It's sad in a way because the pleasures of life get old and dated fast. The teenage me doesn't get the jolt the six-year-old me got from a package of Pop Rocks. The me I've become doesn't rush at the memories of the day I skated down a parking ramp however many years ago. Pleasure fades, gets old, gets thrown out with last year's fad. Fear, guilt, all that stuff stays fresh. Maybe that's why people get so enraged when someone does something to a kid. Hurt a kid and he hurts forever. Maybe an adult can shake it off. Maybe. But with a kid, you hurt them and it turns them, shapes them, becomes part of the deep, underlying software of their lives. No delete. I don't know. I don't know much. I feel like I know less all the time. Rate I'm going, by the time I'm twenty-one I won't know a damned thing. But still I was me. Had no choice, I guess. I don't know, maybe that's bull and I was just feeling sorry for myself. But, bottom line, I dried my eyes, and I pushed my dirty, greasy hair back off my face, and I started off down the road again because whatever I was, whoever I was, however messed up I might be, I wasn't leaving April behind. Maybe it was all an act programmed into me from the get-go, or maybe it grew up out of some deep-buried fear, I mean maybe at some level I was really just as pathetic as Senna thought I was. Maybe I was a fake. Whatever. Didn't matter. I was going back to the damned dragon, and then I was getting April out, and everything and everyone else could go screw themselves. One good thing: For now at least, I was done being scared.

Bailey,” I say, my voice carrying easily across the marble floor. “Wait.” She turns back and rolls her eyes, clearly annoyed to see me coming her way. She quickly wipes at her cheeks then holds up her hand to wave me off. “I’m off the clock. I don’t want to talk to you right now. If you want to chew me out for what happened back there, you’ll have to do it on Monday. I’m going home.” “How?” Her pretty brown eyes, full of tears, narrow up at me in confusion. “How what?” “How are you getting home? Did you park on the street or something?” Her brows relax as she realizes I’m not about to scold her. “Oh.” She turns to the window. “I’m going to catch the bus.” The bus? “The stop is just down the street a little bit.” “Don’t you have a car?” She steels her spine. “No. I don’t.” I’ll have to look into what we’re paying her—surely she should have no problem affording a car to get her to and from work. “Okay, well then what about an Uber or something?” Her tone doesn’t lighten as she replies, “I usually take the bus. It’s fine.” I look for an umbrella and frown when I see her hands are empty. “You’re going to get drenched and it’s freezing out there.” She laughs and starts to step back. “It’s not your concern. Don’t worry about me.” Yes, well unfortunately, I do worry about her. For the last three weeks, all I’ve done is worry about her. Cooper is to blame. He fuels my annoyance on a daily basis, updating me about their texts and bragging to me about how their relationship is developing. Relationship—I find that laughable. They haven’t gone on a date. They haven’t even spoken on the phone. If the metric for a “relationship” lies solely in the number of text messages exchanged then as of this week, I’m in a relationship with my tailor, my UberEats delivery guy, and my housekeeper. I’ve got my hands fucking full. “Well I’m not going to let you wait out at the bus stop in this weather. C’mon, I’ll drive you.” Her soft feminine laugh echoes around the lobby. “Thank you, but I’d rather walk.” What she really means is, Thank you, but I’d rather die. “It’s really not a request. You’re no good to me if you have to call in sick on Monday because you caught pneumonia.” Her gaze sheens with a new layer of hatred. “You of all people know you don’t catch pneumonia just from being cold and wet.” She tries to step around me, but I catch her backpack and tug it off her shoulder. I can’t put it on because she has the shoulder straps set to fit a toddler, so I hold it in my hand and start walking. She can either follow me or not. I tell myself I don’t care either way. “Dr. Russell—” she says behind me, her feet lightly tap-tap-tapping on the marble as she hurries to keep up. “You’re clocked out, aren’t you? Call me Matt.” “Doctor,” she says pointedly. “Please give me my backpack before I call security.” I laugh because really, she’s hilarious. No one has ever threatened to call security on me before. “It’s Matt, and if you’re going to call security, make sure you ask for Tommy. He’s younger and stands a decent chance of catching me before I hightail it out of here with your pink JanSport backpack. What do you have in here anyway?” It weighs nothing. “My lunchbox. A water bottle. Some empty Tupperware.” Tupperware. I glance behind me to check on her. She’s fast-walking as she trails behind me. Am I really that much taller than her? “Did you bring more banana bread?” She nods and nearly breaks out in a jog. “Patricia didn’t get any last time and I felt bad.” “I didn’t get any last time either,” I point out. She snorts. “Yeah well, I don’t feel bad about that.” I face forward again so she can’t see my smile.

flicker?" He points to the screen and pauses the vid. "That's when they switched the footage." I stare at the screen. "How do I know you're not the ones lying?" "You saw it yourself on the street," Meyer says. I glance up from the pad and lock eyes with Meyer. "What else are they lying about?" Jayson chuckles. "Well… that's going to take longer than we have." "Here's one," Meyer says. "Remember that last viral outbreak that killed a bunch of Level Ones?" "3005B?" My heart races. That's the virus that ultimately killed Ben thirteen years ago. "That's it. The one they use in all the broadcasts to remind citizens how important it is to get your MedVac updates? It wasn't an accident." We were always told a virus swept through Level One because they hadn't gotten their updated VacTech yet. Hundreds of people died in the day it took to get everyone up to date. "My brother died because of that." Everything I've found out over the last week suddenly grips me with fear. This can't be real. My breath shortens, and suddenly my head starts slowly spinning. Everything goes blurry. Then black. ~~~ "It's all right, kid," a distant voice, which must be Jayson's, echoes in the back of my mind. The room swirls around me. Their faces blur in and out of focus. "Meyer, get her." Blinking a couple of times, I try to sit up. I guess I fell. Meyer's warm hands rest on the back of my neck, my head in his lap. "Don't stand. You could pass out again," he says. He helps me sit up. "Are you okay?" "No, I'm not okay," I mumble. "This is too much." I feel like I should be crying, but I'm not. The reality is that the anger I feel is so much greater than any sadness. Neither Meyer nor Jayson speak, and let me mull over what I've just heard. "Why did they do that?" I eventually ask. "Two reasons, kid," Jayson says. "To cull the Level Ones, and to scare Elore into taking the VacTech. If viral outbreaks are still a threat, no one questions it, and continues believing inside the perimeter is the safest place for them." "I'm sorry about your brother," Meyer says as he stands, offering me his hand. His words are genuine, filled with the emotions of someone who has also experienced loss. "I hate to end this," Jayson interrupts, "but it's time to go." Meyer eyes Jayson, and then me. "I understand if you're not ready, but you need to choose soon. Within the next few days." I take his hand and pull myself to my feet. Words catch somewhere between my heart and throat. The old me wants to tell them to get lost and to never bother me again. It's so risky. Then again, I can't stand by while Manning and Direction kill people to keep us in the dark. Joining is the right thing to do. Feelings I've never experienced before well inside my chest, and I long to shout, When do we start? Instead, I stuff them down and stare at the ground. Subtle pressure squeezes my hand, bringing me back to the present. I never let go of Meyer's hand. How long have we been like that? He releases my hand as he mutters and steps back. The heat from his touch still flickers on my skin. You didn't have to go. I clear my throat and turn toward Meyer. Our eyes lock. "I've already decided," I tell him. "I'll do it. For Ben. Direction caused his death, and there's no way I'm standing by and letting them do this to more people." I barely recognize my own voice as I ask, "What do I do?" A slap hits my back and I choke. Jayson. "Atta girl. Meyer and I knew you had it in you." "Jayson, you have to give Avlyn some time." Meyer steps toward me and holds his handheld in the air toward Jayson. "I'll bring her up to speed." "Sure thing." Jayson throws his hands in the air and walks to the other side of the room. "Sorry," Meyer murmurs. "Jayson is pretty… overwhelming. At least until you know him. Even then…" "Oh, it's fine." A white lie. "He's a nice guy. Now, why don't you tell me the instructions

Hyphen This word comes from two Greek words together meaning ‘under one’, which gets nobody anywhere and merely prompts the reflection that argument by etymology only serves the purpose of intimidating ignorant antagonists. On, then. This is one more case in which matters have not improved since Fowler’s day, since he wrote in 1926: The chaos prevailing among writers or printers or both regarding the use of hyphens is discreditable to English education … The wrong use or wrong non-use of hyphens makes the words, if strictly interpreted, mean something different from what the writers intended. It is no adequate answer to such criticisms to say that actual misunderstanding is unlikely; to have to depend on one’s employer’s readiness to take the will for the deed is surely a humiliation that no decent craftsman should be willing to put up with. And so say all of us who may be reading this book. The references there to ‘printers’ needs updating to something like ‘editors’, meaning those who declare copy fit to print. Such people now often get it wrong by preserving in midcolumn a hyphen originally put at the end of a line to signal a word-break: inter-fere, say, is acceptable split between lines but not as part of a single line. This mistake is comparatively rare and seldom causes confusion; even so, time spent wondering whether an exactor may not be an ex-actor is time avoidably wasted. The hyphen is properly and necessarily used to join the halves of a two-word adjectival phrase, as in fair-haired children, last-ditch resistance, falling-down drunk, over-familiar reference. Breaches of this rule are rare and not troublesome. Hyphens are also required when a phrase of more than two words is used adjectivally, as in middle-of-the-road policy, too-good-to-be-true story, no-holds-barred contest. No hard-and-fast rule can be devised that lays down when a two-word phrase is to be hyphenated and when the two words are to be run into one, though there will be a rough consensus that, for example, book-plate and bookseller are each properly set out and that bookplate and book-seller might seem respectively new-fangled and fussy. A hyphen is not required when a normal adverb (i.e. one ending in -ly) plus an adjective or other modifier are used in an adjectival role, as in Jack’s equally detestable brother, a beautifully kept garden, her abnormally sensitive hearing. A hyphen is required, however, when the adverb lacks a final -ly, like well, ill, seldom, altogether or one of those words like tight and slow that double as adjectives. To avoid ambiguity here we must write a well-kept garden, an ill-considered objection, a tight-fisted policy. The commonest fault in the use of the hyphen, and the hardest to eradicate, is found when an adjectival phrase is used predicatively. So a gent may write of a hard-to-conquer mountain peak but not of a mountain peak that remains hard-to-conquer, an often-proposed solution but not of one that is often-proposed. For some reason this fault is especially common when numbers, including fractions, are concerned, and we read every other day of criminals being imprisoned for two-and-a-half years, a woman becoming a mother-of-three and even of some unfortunate being stabbed six-times. And the Tories have been in power for a decade-and-a-half. Finally, there seems no end to the list of common phrases that some berk will bung a superfluous hyphen into the middle of: artificial-leg, daily-help, false-teeth, taxi-firm, martial-law, rainy-day, airport-lounge, first-wicket, piano-concerto, lung-cancer, cavalry-regiment, overseas-service. I hope I need not add that of course one none the less writes of a false-teeth problem, a first-wicket stand, etc. The only guide is: omit the hyphen whenever possible, so avoid not only mechanically propelled vehicle users (a beauty from MEU) but also a man eating tiger. And no one is right and no-one is wrong.