Reality is greater than the sum of its parts, also a damn sight holier. - Ken Kesey

A bluetick hound bays out there in the fog, running scared and lost because he can’t see. No tracks on the ground but the one’s he’s making, and he sniffs in every direction with his cold red-rubber nose and picks up no scent but his own fear, fear burning down into him like steam.

I will be a sonofabitch if he ain't in here at eleven-thirty at night, fartin' around in the dark with a pair of scissors and a paper sack.

"What worries me, Billy," she said — I could hear the change in her voice — "is how your mother is going to take this."