“‘To find themselves utterly alone at night where company is desirable and expected makes some people fearful; but a case more trying by far to the nerves is to discover some mysterious companionship when intuition, sensation, memory, analogy, testimony, probability, induction–every kind of evidence in the logician’s list–have united to persuade consciousness that it is quite in isolation. ”

                     --Thomas Hardy, Far From the Madding Crowd,
                          revised final version in 1912

“YOU’RE GREAT, HONEY! YOU’RE WASTED HERE! YOU DESERVE SOMETHING BETTER THAN A TYPEWRITER AND THIS SNEAKY CRUMB! GET YOURSELF A BIKINI AND START A CHAIN OF HEART ATTACKS AT A GARDEN PARTY!”

                     --Jack Kirby, SUPERMAN'S PAL, JIMMY OLSEN, 
            Vol. 1, No. 141, "Will the Real Don Rickles Panic?!?," 1971