Anger is a fuel. You need fuel to launch a rocket. But if all you have is fuel without any complex internal mechanism directing it, you don't have a rocket. You have a bomb

Reading my way all the way through Sherlock Holmes gave me a lifelong love for crime and detective fiction.

Could an android listen to the whining, requests for advancement, and entreaties for guidance and affection that pour from subordinates? Sure it could. Frankly, all that would be easier on the robot than it is on me.

There are no living beings who exert more power over others, pound for pound, than tiny babies and extremely thin moguls.

If you can listen well, people will say you're a good conversationalist.

I particularly felt that my job in management was safe from the incursion of machines with friendly faces painted on the front of their heads, or whatever you call the metal constructions atop their shoulders, if those are indeed shoulders.

"Hi," I said. She came over, licked my hand discreetly, allowed herself to be scratched for a time, chased her tail in a dignified circle, lay down again. I remember thinking: "There are times God puts a choice in front of you." I often had such thoughts back then. We took the dog.