last night, professor winter's advice to a student going to oxford:

the first thing you get there buy a bicycle. pat it on the back and treat it like a person. do everything you can to make it your own. it will be your only friend for a while.

that reminds me of penelope fitzgerald's the gate of angels, the only fitzgerald with a happy ending.

i have lately been told that edith wharton's glimpses of the moon is the only of her books that doesn't make you miserable.