“Not wanting anyone to pop my bubble by speaking to me, I immediately began reading Lesbian Nuns, and that did the trick. No one attempted small talk.”

“You want a drink?” he (Brady) offered.“My friend’s getting one.” She gestured toward Susan, who approached.“Your date?”“My-no! No, I’m not—” God, did he think she was a lesbian? Boy, talk about seduction fail.”

“....he began to speak to me, not in the jocular way of visitors to the menagerie but rather as one speaks to the wind or to the waves crashing on a beach, uttering that which must be said but which must not be heard by anyone.”

“The first thing I saw was the pink bubble gum, four feet lower than it should have been, inches above the ground, and framed by a set of perfectly painted lips.It was one of those huge bubbles you just know is going to pop and cover the girl's face, and she'll shriek and yell and whine that her makeup is ruined, blah, blah, blah. But the bubble didn't pop—she did that thing where you suck all the air back into your mouth, and the bubble deflated into a little pink heap.”

“Even if you are eighty years old, or a lesbian, or a strident feminist, or a nun, or an eighty-year-old strident feminist lesbian nun who has never been married and never intends to get married, the politest possible answer is still:"Not yet.”

“She taught me I should never do anything in private I did not want talked about in public, and cautioned me not to talk in my sleep.”