“So does my grocer stigmatize me when I complain of the quality of his sultanas, and he answers in one breath that they are the best sultanas, and how can I expect the best sultanas at that price?”

“[H]e was soon to be head clerk; it was time to settle down. So he gave up his flute, exalted sentiments, and poetry; for every bourgeois in the flush of his youth, were it but for a day, a moment, has believed himself capable of immense passions, of lofty enterprises. The most mediocre libertine has dreamed of sultanas; every notary bears within him the debris of a poet.”

“I will do my best: it is a pity that doing one's best does not always answer.”

“When I told the therapist that the “me” that I am now is the best me I can be, I was truthful. I’ve always given you my best, so when you say it's not enough, it chips away at the “best me.”

“Only when I hold onto nothing can I be the best, only then can I be what they expect me to be.”

“The ethics of eating people are blurry at best in the fog of my undead amnesia, but I expect more for such a high price. What I want are the moments I will never have. The warm ones. The living ones.”