Chapter 44: Casey Have I Loved

If each man or woman could understand that every other human life is as full of sorrows, or joys, or base temptations, of heartaches and of remorse as his own . . . how much kinder, how much gentler he would be. – William Allen White

Chapter 43: She's the Blade and I'm Just Paper

Be who you are and say what you feel because those who mind don't matter and those who matter don't mind. — Dr. Seuss

Fortune Favors Fools 02: In the Chillest Land

"Hope" is the thing with feathers -
That perches in the soul -
And sings the tune without the words -
And never stops - at all -
And sweetest - in the Gale - is heard -
And sore must be the storm -
That could abash the little Bird
That kept so many warm -
I've heard it in the chillest land -
And on the strangest Sea -
Yet - never - in Extremity,
It asked a crumb - of me.
- Emily Dickinson, "Hope" is the Thing with Feathers

In the Chillest Land

Fortune Favors Fools 01: As Constant as the Northern Star

I am constant as the northern star,
Of whose true-fix'd and resting quality
There is no fellow in the firmament.
- William Shakespeare, Julius Caesar, III, i, 60-62

As Constant as the Northern Star

Chapter 42: California Dreamin'

There is a great difference between knowing and understanding: you can know a lot about something and not really understand it. — Charles F. Kettering

Chapter 41: The Couch Most Ravenous

Deep listening is miraculous for both listener and speaker. When someone receives us with open-hearted, non-judging, intensely interested listening, our spirits expand. – Sue Patton Thoele

Chapter 40: Larger Than Real Life

A thing long expected takes the form of the unexpected when at last it comes. – Mark Twain

Chapter 39: All That...And a Bag of Chips

To be happy with a man you must understand him a lot and love him a little. To be happy with a woman you must love her a lot and not try to understand her at all. - Helen Rowland

The Bank Job 02: Surf and Turf

Surf and Turf

The Bank Job 01: Yin and Yang

The Bank Job

Yin and Yang

Truth, Lies, and the CIA

con·flict /v. kənˈflɪkt; n. ˈkɒnflɪkt/ [v. kuhn-flikt; n. kon-flikt]
–verb (used without object)
- to come into collision or disagreement; be contradictory, at variance, or in opposition; clash.

–noun
- a fight, battle, or struggle, esp. a prolonged struggle; strife.
- controversy; quarrel: conflicts between parties.
- discord of action, feeling, or effect; antagonism or opposition, as of interests or principles: a conflict of ideas.
- incompatibility or interference, as of one idea, desire, event, or activity with another. 

To Sleep, Perchance to Scream

"Ay, there's the rub."
Hamlet (III, i, 68)

Wasted On Us

There are good ships, and there are wood ships,
The ships that sail the sea.
But the best ships, are friendships,
And may they always be.
- Friendship Proverb

Sleeping on the Job

Sometimes a thousand twangling instruments
Will hum about mine ears, and sometime voices
That, if I then had waked after long sleep,
Will make me sleep again: and then, in dreaming,
The clouds methought would open and show riches
Ready to drop upon me that, when I waked,
I cried to dream again.
- William Shakespeare, The Tempest

He'll Someday Call Her Bunny

I have enjoyed the [training dummy]. It allows you to focus on 'features' that are not on a normal punching bag,ex; uppercut training is there without the need to buy an extra bag. Sand is heavier than the water but much harder to get into the container. All in all I have no regrets on the purchase and give it a 5 star rating. Enjoy your training. - actual five-star Amazon-dot-com review of the Century Body Opponent Freestanding Heavy Bag

To Resist Both Wind and Tide Chapter 04: Keeping the Stars Apart

here is the deepest secret nobody knows
(here is the root of the root and the bud of the bud
and the sky of the sky of a tree called life; which grows
higher than the soul can hope or mind can hide)
and this is the wonder that's keeping the stars apart

- ee cummings, i carry your heart with me 

To Resist Both Wind and Tide Chapter 03: Only a Lilting Song

He'd have given me rolling lands,
Houses of marble, and billowing farms,
Pearls, to trickle between my hands,
Smoldering rubies, to circle my arms.
You— you'd only a lilting song,
Only a melody, happy and high,
You were sudden and swift and strong—
Never a thought for another had I.
He'd have given me laces rare,
Dresses that glimmered with frosty sheen,
Shining ribbons to wrap my hair,
Horses to draw me, as fine as a queen.
You— you'd only to whistle low,
Gayly I followed wherever you led.
I took you, and I let him go—
Somebody ought to examine my head!

- Dorothy Parker, The Choice

To Resist Both Wind and Tide Chapter 02: Earth and Sky

Oh, East is East, and West is West, and never the twain shall meet,
Till Earth and Sky stand presently at God's great Judgment Seat;
But there is neither East nor West, Border, nor Breed, nor Birth,
When two strong men stand face to face,
tho' they come from the ends of the earth!

- Rudyard Kipling, The Ballad of East and West

To Resist Both Wind and Tide Chapter 01: The Wisest Course

Let me embrace thee, sour adversity,
for wise men say it is the wisest course.
- William Shakespeare, King Henry VI, Part III

Chapter 38: A Day in the Life

Many times a day I realize how much my own life is built upon the labors of my fellowmen, and how earnestly I must exert myself in order to give in return as much as I have received. – Albert Einstein