Ballplayers make people happy

Mr. Hastings, arguing long enough to keep face but eager to be convinced, listened as Granddad agreed that Astroturf was a disaster and the DH rule plain stupid, but said that he liked night games, because that made more baseball to look at, and loved watching good relief pitchers, and didn't think the players were overpaid. "Doesn't bother me how much they get," he said. "Ballplayers make people happy. There are a lot of people making a lot of money who don't make anybody happy but themselves. Generals and politicans, for instance. I say hurrah for the ballplayers, and let them make what they can while they can. It's a short enough career for the best of them."

-- The Explorer of Barkham Street by Mary Stolz

isn't the UPS man

"He's a good fellow. Well, Hastings, let's go in the house, shall we? I'll look over the papers and you can be on your way."

"For heavens sake, Joe," said Mrs. Gaylord. "Mr. Hastings isn't the UPS man. He and the boys will have coffee and doughnuts with us. Milk for the boys, of course--" The three grown-ups started for the house, and Buck, tail wagging, ran after them.
-- The Explorer of Barkham Street by Mary Stolz

chew slowly ... and ignore the odors

"Leave your stuff. I'll guard it." Jeb grinned. "In case a rabbit comes along," he said, looking at the apple and the carrot.

Again that jet of irritation rose in Martin and subsided. "I'm training for the decathlon," he said, walking off.

When they were all together, Martin trying to chew slowly (as his diet book advised) and ignore the odors that wafted around the cafeteria, Otto said, "No kidding, Marty, you got guts. I couldn't go on a diet. I mean, I might just manage to climb on one, but I'd fall off the other side right away."

Martin swallowed. Right this minute he thought he'd give a year of his life for a big bag of French fries and a chocolate shake. "It ain't easy," he said glumly.

"Yeah, but you do it," Otto persisted. "Takes guts."

Martin, who had just about decided to chuck the darn diet, changed his mind again. He went regularly up and down on this seesaw and wondered if it was going to be like this for the rest of his life. Well, as the book said, the thing was to take it a day at a time and not look ahead. Any jerk could stay on a diet for one day. And then another day, and another, and so on. A day at a time till doomsday, he thought. Still, Otto's praise had heartened him. The book said that was how alcoholics got sober, just not taking a drink today. Or, in his case, French fries and a chocolate shake. And since it was always today...
-- The Explorer of Barkham Street by Mary Stolz

Reading never hurt anybody

This sort of heavenly hot air quite warmed him, insulated him from the real world. For a while.

That morning his father had leaned over and put a finger on Martin's abdomen. "Doesn't look to me like a pemmican and tea diet. Not with that belly."

Martin's eyes widened with pained embarrassment. His father, not seeming to notice, went on in a friendly way. "So you're still reading that stuff, are you? Good. Reading never hurt anybody."

Other things hurt people, Martin thought miserably. Mean personal remarks hurt people.
-- The Explorer of Barkham Street by Mary Stolz

allowed to speak

They'd been talking to each other this way since he first started to use words, which he was told was when he was only a year old. He'd heard his father say that it had been a tragedy. "They shouldn't be allowed to speak at all until they're at least twelve," his father had said to whoever it had been he was saying it to.

-- The Explorer of Barkham Street by Mary Stolz

responsibility for his dog

Martin hunched his shoulders and tried to wrench his mind onto another track. Over a year now since they'd taken his dog from him, that big, wild-hearted puppy he'd named Rufus, and had owned such a short time, but had loved more than anyone or anything else in his life. They'd told him he had to take responsibility for his dog and warned him what they'd do if he didn't and he hadn't and they had, and he still thought it was the unfairest thing that had ever happened to anyone.
-- The Explorer of Barkham Street by Mary Stolz

The Gum Thief by Douglas Coupland

Reading a Douglas Coupland book makes you think. By you I mean me. His books make me think, and the thoughts are usually sad - thoughts about meaninglessness, about loneliness. There is humor in his books; not in-your-face punch-lines type humor, more of a subtle dark-humor type humor. But the humor, I find, is overwhelmed by sadness. The main character in The Gum Thief, Roger, has nothing going for him and he is working the aisles at the local Staples. He his attempting to write a book, titled Glove Pond. One of the characters in Glove Pond, Kyle, is in the middle of writing a book. The setting of Kyle's book: an office superstore. That is delicious.

The Gum Thief on BookCrossing.

anecdote from my youth

Here's an amusing anecdote from my youth. I used to like playing with green plastic soldiers, but my mom was anti-war (odd, considering what a battle-axe she was) and wouldn't buy me the soldiers. I was too young for a paper route to make my own money, and our house was miles away from a store. My father brought me home a bag of soldiers one night, and I was out of my mind with happiness. I began to play with them, but then my mom came into the room, holding a phone with an extension cord, and she sat down and said, "Okay, you can play with your soldiers, fine. But I'm going to sit here, and every time one of them gets killed or injured, I'm going to telephone their mother. Ready? One, two three, play ..." Well, you can imagine how much fun that was.
-- The Gum Thief by Douglas Coupland