LIPID (Last Idiot Person I Dated) syndrome: a largely undiagnosed but pervasive disease that afflicts single women.

It was lovely to see cynicism in one so young. It positively restored his faith in human nature.

There is, I have heard, a little thing called sunrise, in which the sun reverses the process we all viewed the night before. You might assume such a thing as mythical as those beasts that guard the corners of the earth, but I have it on the finest authority, and have, indeed, from time to time, regarded it with my own eyes.

Miles was still mourning the loss of his Romantic Plan. 'There was going to be champagne, and oysters, and you' - he held out both hands as though shifting a piece of furniture - 'were going to be sitting there, and I was going to get down on one knee, and...and...

It was the usual sort of academic battle: footnotes at ten paces, bolstered by snide articles in academic journals and lots of sniping about methodology, a thrust and parry of source and countersource. My sources had to be better.

Patience is only a virtue when there is something worth waiting for.

There's nothing so attractive as a blank slate. Take one attractive man, slap on a thick coat of daydream, and voila, the perfect man. With absolutely no resemblance to reality.