You're like a big hit of fermented hops.

Some radio deejay said it. Years ago. I forget who. But I liked it.
Could anyone resist such a well-crafted compliment?

Alfred, Lord Tennyson (1809-1892)

Ring out, wild bells, to the wild sky,

The flying cloud, the frosty light:
The year is dying in the night;
Ring out, wild bells, and let him die.

Ring out the old, ring in the new,
Ring, happy bells, across the snow:
The year is going, let him go;
Ring out the false, ring in the true.

Ring out the grief that saps the mind,
For those that here we see no more;
Ring out the feud of rich and poor,
Ring in redress to all mankind.

Ring out a slowly dying cause,
And ancient forms of party strife;
Ring in the nobler modes of life,
With sweeter manners, purer laws.

Ring out the want, the care, the sin,
The faithless coldness of the times;
Ring out; ring out my mournful rhymes,
But ring the fuller minstrel in.

Ring out false pride in place and blood,
The civic slander and the spite;
Ring in the love of truth and right,
Ring in the common love of good.

Ring out old shapes of foul disease;
Ring out the narrowing lust of gold;
Ring out the thousand wars of old,
Ring in the thousand years of peace.

Ring in the valliant man and free,
The larger heart, the kindlier hand;
Ring out the darkness of the land,
Ring in the Christ that is to be.

Writhe.

Euglena on holiday.

If you can’t be a good example, then you’ll just have to be a horrible warning.

Catherine Aird (1930 - )

The Wants of Man

"Man wants but little here below
Nor wants that little long,"
'Tis not with me exactly so;
But 'tis so in the song.
My wants are many, and, if told,
Would muster many a score;
And were each wish a mint of gold,
I still should long for more.

John Quincy Adams (177 - 1848)

Remembrance of Things Past

When from a long distant past nothing persists, after the people are dead, after things are broken and scattered, still alone, more persistent, more faithful, the smell and taste of things remain poised a long, long time like souls, ready to remind us, waiting, hoping for their moment amid the ruins of all the rest, and bear unfaltering in the tiny and almost impalpable drop of their essence the vast structure of recollection.

Valentin Louis Georges Eugène Marcel Proust (1871-1922)

Perfectionists

We're the ones who will hold on to a leaky old boat in the belief that someday we'll get the old tub fixed up just the way she ought to be. We're the ones who would gladly spend the second half of life in leisurely reconsideration of the first. We like our journeys short. We prefer having the end in sight when we set out, and that keeps us close to home and makes us shy of fog. We often have only one really big idea in an entire lifetime; if it arrives early, we're likely to spend a lifetime working on it, trying to get it right, trying to fill in all the details, fill every gap, stuff every crack.

Little Follies: The Personal History, Adventures, Experiences and Observations of Peter Leroy (so far) by Eric Kraft (Picador USA, New York, March 1995).