I'm most afraid of losing my mind. You lose your identity, your sense of who you are, where you are.

The only leverage the manufacturer can apply to the retailer is his relationship with the consumer. And the main element in profit growth is going to have to lie in making his brand more valuable to the retailer, through its being more valuable to the consumer. And that means his brand must be unique, it must have no adequate direct substitutes - because it is in this, after all, that value lies.

I looked at the ceiling and wished this life was over. This unhappy life that had started out so confidently. I thought I would sleep no more that night but eventually I did. In the end we always wear out our worries. That's what Wire man says.

Has it ever occurred to you that parents are nothing but overgrown kids until their children drag them into adulthood? Usually kicking and screaming?

He smiles a lot. But I think there might be worms inside him making him smile.

What happens to the wide-eyed observer when the window between reality and unreality breaks and the glass begins to fly?

For me, good description usually consists of a few well-chosen details that will stand for everything else.