At the next table in the restaurant:

"I was in my bathing suit pregnant. Who says that to someone who's pregnant?"

I yearn for the good old days, when you could go about and tell people what you thought of them with a hatchet and a bow and arrows.

-- Jerome K. Jerome

More from "Toward You"

" . . . The interesting thing is that most felons actually prefer novels to short stories or even poems . . . the prisoners themselves tell us that the novels' longer narrative arcs give them a sense of continuity, as well as a chance, in a way, for them to escape their present unhappy circumstances, if only temporarily. As for their own writing, which we encourage through weekly workshops, they much prefer poetry. I don't know if it's a certain criminal lack of attention span -- somebody ought to do a study someday -- or just poetry's innate potential for violence and its implied permission to use inflammatory language, but they certainly do churn it out for whatever reason."

Someone, a girl actually, chose to describe me as "a perfect capybara," which -- none of us but her ever having seen one -- left me undisturbed until the following morning when I looked it up in the single volume of the World Book Encyclopedia I owned, unfortunately the letter C. . . . I took a good look in the mirror. The girl had been right. What woman would ever want to date a capybara? But the bright side of that experience was that the research I did that morning began a lifelong interest in animals -- not a bad thing for someone who spends most of his time alone.

from " Toward You" by Jim Krusoe.

Bar talk:

"I bought some moss. Boy, is it expensive there. I bought some moss. $7.00. I don't even need moss."

Bartender to me: "I'm sorry, I'm interrupting you. You are probably 'These damn kids.'"

Things I am sure are true

"There are things in here they'll never teach you in school." -- Woman handing out book to passersby at LA BookFestival