The sad truth is that excellence makes people nervous.

As a general rule, fans and idols should always be kept at arm's length, the length of the arm to be proportionate to the degree of sheer idolatry involved. Don't take a Beatle to lunch. Don't wait up to see if the Easter Bunny is real. Just enjoy the egg hunt.

Californians tend to be outspoken. When the great migration began, the more timid people must have stayed home, and the bolder ones headed west.

The law changes and flows like water, and . . . the stream of women's rights law has become a sudden rushing torrent.

the metabolism of a consumer society requires it continually to eat and excrete, every day throwing itself away in plastic bags.

This is what holidays, travels, vacations are about. It is not really rest or even leisure we chase. We strain to renew our capacity for wonder to shock ourselves into astonishment once again.

Tourists moved over the piazza like drugged insects on a painted plate.