..there she is, and I am watching her through plexiglass, and she looks like Margo Roth Spiegelman, this girl I have known since I was two–this girl who was an idea that I loved. And it is only now, when she closes her notebook and places it inside a backpack next to her and then stands up and walks toward us, that I realize that the idea is not only wrong by dangerous. What a treacherous thing it is to believe that a person is more than a person.

You can pick your friends, and you can pick your nose, but you can’t pick your friend’s nose.

As Alaska zipped through something obvious about linear equations, stoner/baller Hank Walsten said, "Wait, wait. I don't get it." "That's because you have eight functioning brain cells." "Studies show that Marijuana is better for your health than those cigarettes," Hank said. Alaska swallowed a mouthful of fries, took a drag on her cigarette, and blew a smoke at Hank. "I may die young," she said. "But at least I'll die smart. Now, back to tangents.

Ultimately what I like about reading together is that we all make it happen together. Of course even amid shared experience we’re still alone… each reading of each book is unique. But what a comfort it is to share readings and experiences. How lucky we are when we get to be alone together.

Oh, Wikipedia, with your tension between those who would share knowledge and those who would destroy it.

I'm at the eye doctor. I'm always at the eye doctor. It's like this is my profession. I am no longer a writer, I'm now an optomoligical patient. By the way, this job doesn't pay well.

She waited for me to play out the string, to find the place where she had stopped and was waiting for me, to follow the breadcrumb tail until it dead-ended into her.