Everyone has something they don't want anyone to see; that is one of the functions of a home, to provide a spot to keep such things.

It is always wiser, where there is a choice, to trust inertia. It is the greatest force in the world.

Chili is one of the great peasant foods. It is one of the few contributions America has made to world cuisine. Eaten with corn bread, sweet onion, sour cream, it contains all five of the elements deemed essential by the sages of the Orient: sweet, sour, salty, pungent, and bitter.

Millions of American women, and some men, commit that outrage every summer day. They are turning a superb treat into mere provender. Shucked and boiled in water, sweet corn is edible and nutritious; roasted in the husk in the hottest possible oven for forty minutes, shucked at the table, and buttered and salted, nothing else, it is ambrosia. No chef’s ingenuity and imagination have ever created a finer dish. American women should themselves be boiled in water.

I think one or two of the later Holmes stories are among the best.

MY rule is never to be rude to anyone unless you mean it.

Afraid? I can dodge folly without backing into fear.