There you are, sir. There's nothing more than to love and be loved.

In the 1970s, British food was beginning to get good, whereas in France it was just starting its long, sad decline. My most memorable meals, however, have been in Italy.

Gradually the feeling wears off, and I feel swamped again by the inexplicable pettiness of being alive.

Knowing one was comprised of recycled matter only and that selfhood was a delusion did not take away the aching of the heart.

Why take drugs specifically designed to send you insane?

That sense of happiness just out beyond my reach - I'm not sure I'd grasped that exactly, but I'd got something close to it, contentment maybe, or at least a functioning routine with regular rewards.

The thought of all that happiness was hard to bear. What's the point of happiness when all it does is throw the facts of dying into clear relief?