Waters' relationship with Montgomery was disintegrating, and she returned to Baltimore halfway through the summer. He moved in with Sique, who lived in a tree fort owned by Prescott Townsden. The tree house had no roof or running water, and trees grew up out of the living room floor. The fort was partly made from an old submarine suspended in branches of a large oak. There were seperate units, connected by gangplanks and reached by a rope ladder. Waters lived in one "apartment" with Sique and her friend Flo; Mink lived in another with Channing Wilroy, a friend from Baltimore whom Waters had admired when Wilroy was a regular on The Buddy Deane Show, Baltimore's version of American Bandstand.

Robrt L. Pela, Filthy: The Weird World of John Waters (31)

Look. Folks. It's simple. If you have poor taste in decorating, don't go nuts in the entryway. Wait until your guests are inside before you spring something unusual on them. But, you say, doesn't that fabulous statuary look so right over by the door? It's an ancient Belgian God of Fertility or something. You can hang hats on the erection. Or use it for umbrellas! That's not the point. Most people don't want to encounter this sort of thing right away, if ever. Especially one that's been handpainted in such a unique fashion. Put it in the spare bedroom; it'll keep houseguests from lingering.

James Lileks, Interior Desecrations: Hideous Homes from the Horrible '70s (20)

This is why God made alcohol. Though plenty of people, the guests at Bentham's, maybe Len - and Sherrie, for all he knows - probably think Swenson has had a drinking problem for quite some time, Swenson disagrees. But now is when a drinking problem would solve a lot of more serious problems. This is the moment for which God created drinking problems. Swenson watches the cases of wine empty, wrapping the world around him in Styrofoam, cushioning voices and objects as if for the shock of a move, a spongy buffer zone between Swenson and his life. Alcohol keeps him numb and paradoxically energized with an oddly pleasurable anger: white noise that drowns out the dangerous whispers of pain and fear and sorrow.

Francine Prose, Blue Angel (257-258)

Luckily, Lesbian Couple was angrier with Lesbian Single than they were with me. Lesbian Couple had let it be known on the Lesbian Grapevine that they had approached me about my sperm. Apparently, Lesbian Single knew they had dibs on my balls and had approached me anyway, fully aware that my balls had been spoken for. Add to this psychodrama the fact that Lesbian Single had once attempted to seduce half of Lesbian Couple away from the other half, and soon we were having meetings to process our anger and hurt feelings around those secondary issues, which delayed any further progress on processing our feelings around the primary issue, which was, as I understood it, the production of a human infant sometime before all three lesbians hit menopause.

Dan Savage, The Kid (31)

A few steps from the top, Swenson's able to read the title of her paperback, which is not, as he expected, the work of some trendy child author, but rather, Jane Eyre. She grasps the novel with talons lacquered eggplant purple, curling from fingerless black leather gloves studded with silver grommets. Her tiny hands - or perhaps their proximity to Charlotte Bronte's novel - give the gloves a prim Victorian decorousness. Otherwise her outfit is pure sci-fi unisex shitkicker. A streaked green and orange ponytail, spraying straight up from the top of her head, makes her look like a garish tasseled party favor.

Francine Prose, Blue Angel (33)

While much effort has been expended in the third world countries educating women into a range of options that does not limit their role merely to bearing children, well-off, educated, and indulgent American women are clamoring for babies, babies, BABIES to complete their status. They've had it all, and now they want a baby. And women over thirty-five want them NOW. They're the ones who opt for the aggressive fertility route; they're impatient; they're sick of being laissez-faire about this. Sex seems such a laborious way to go about it. At this point they don't want to endure all that intercourse over and over and maybe get no baby. What a waste of time! And time's awasting. A life with no child would be a life perfecting hedonism, a forty-something infertile woman said, now the proud owner of pricey twins. Even women who have the grace to submit to fate can sound wistful. It's not so much that I wish that I had children now, a travel writer said, but that I wish I had had them. I hate to fail at anything. Women are supposed to wish and want and not fail.

Joy Williams, "The Case Against Babies," from Ill Nature (94-95)

The work of a moment. And now, tonight, while Terence gamely grunts, while Miranda cracks him in her dappled thighs: I'll be up here chuckling about the things I didn't tell him, about her raw-liver kisses and her sweet-sherry tongue, about the ghostly smells that issue from her pouches and vents, about the underworld effluvia she leaves glistening on your sheets.

Martin Amis, Success (17)