I don't get why prom is like a mini-wedding these days...No one should spend that kind of money for a high school dance.

Here, kitty, kitty, Chico says. The cover of his cage is still on, making his tiny clown voice slightly muffled. I feel bad for him under there, just waiting to start his evil little day...Freud walks toward Chico in his slinky fashion, sits under his cage and just stares. We have satanic pets...our pets seem to have made a pact with the devil.

The loneliness you feel with another person, the wrong person, is the loneliest of all.

Maybe it was wrong, or maybe impossible, but I wanted the truth to be one thing. One solid thing.

It makes you realize how basically everything we do comes down to a) mating or b) competing for resources. It’s just like Animal Planet, only we’ve got Cover Girl and Victoria’s Secret instead of colored feathers and fancy markings, and the violence occurs at the Nordstrom’s Half-Yearly Sale.

The most basic and somehow forgettable thing is this: Love is not pain. Love is goodness. And real love--it's less shiny than solid and simple.

When you raise an animal, you live it like your own child.