response 15 of 224:

Oct 15 06:53 UTC 2003

  Hmmm..  I'm accustomed to having my own books around me but don't have
  that luxury at the moment -- they're mostly in storage back in Michigan.
  So I'll just make do with what's handy on my sister's bookshelves.

      "Brother to a Prince and fellow to a beggar if he be found worthy.
      The law, as quoted, lays down a fair conduct of life, and one not
      easy to follow.  I have been fellow to a beggar again and again
      under circumstances which prevented either of us finding out whether
      the other was worthy.  I have still to be brother to a Prince,
      though I once came near to kinship with what might have been a
      veritable King and was promised the reversion of a Kingdom --
      army, law-courts, revenue, and policy all complete.  But, today,
      I greatly fear that my King is dead, and if I want a crown I must
      go hunt it for myself."

response 17 of 224:

Oct 15 14:00 UTC 2003

Oh. I think I have read that but for the life of me, I cant remember 
what it is or who wrote it. ARGH.

response 19 of 224:

Oct 15 18:21 UTC 2003

Oscar Wilde?

response 23 of 224:

Oct 16 01:58 UTC 2003

Too refined for Kipling, I think.  Still, with no hope of finding a suitable
quote should I be right, I'll guess Rudyard.

response 25 of 224:

Oct 16 02:20 UTC 2003

  re #23:  you shouldn't hedge your bets like that if you're going
  to guess correctly.  It is indeed Kipling (it's the beginning of
  "The Man Who Would Be King.")

response 27 of 224:

Oct 16 03:29 UTC 2003

OK.  Don't know why it felt like Kipling, though.

        I scarely know where to begin, though I sometimes facetiously
        place the cause of it all to Charley Furuseth's credit.  He kept a
        summer cottage in Mill Valley, under the shadow of Mount Tamalpais,
        and never occupied it except when he loafed through the winter
        months and read Nietzche and Schopenhauer to rest his brain.
        When summer came on, he elected to sweat out a hot and dusty
        existence in the city and to toil incessantly.  Had it not been
        my custom to run up to see him every Saturday afternoon and to
        stop over till Monday morning, this particular January Monday
        morning would not have found me afloat on San Francisco Bay.

response 29 of 224:

Oct 16 14:48 UTC 2003

Richard Brautigan?

response 31 of 224:

Oct 16 17:08 UTC 2003

Cool. I havent even read that but it sounded like him and I asked 
myself, "who would write about San Fransisco".

Ok, here is mine....

"The three years that have passed have brought but few changes to the 
quiet family. The war is over, and [NAME DELETED] safely at home, busy 
with his books and the small parish which found in him a minister by 
nature as by grace, a quiet, studious man, rich in the wisdom that is 
better than learning, the charity which calls all mankind `brother', 
the piety that blossoms into character, making it august and lovely. 

These attributes, in spite of poverty and the strict integrity which 
shut him out from the more worldly successes, attracted to him many 
admirable persons, as naturally as sweet herbs draw bees, and as 
naturally he gave them the honey into which fifty years of hard 
experience had distilled no bitter drop. Earnest young men found the 
gray-headed scholar as young at heart as they, thoughtful or troubled 
women instinctively brought their doubts to him, sure of finding the 
gentlest sympathy, the wisest counsel. Sinners told their sins to the 
pure-hearted old man and were both rebuked and saved. Gifted men found 
a companion in him. Ambitious men caught glimpses of nobler ambitions 
than their own, and even worldlings confessed that his beliefs were 
beautiful and true, although `they wouldn't pay'. "

response 33 of 224:

Oct 16 18:06 UTC 2003

Wow. I figured that one would be easy but I didnt figure it would be 
*that* easy ;) You got it, Twila, so it is your turn. 

response 35 of 224:

Oct 19 04:19 UTC 2003

Yeah, it's a record ejaculation time, for you.

response 37 of 224:

Oct 20 02:49 UTC 2003

I canht wait.