“And since that time, the three of them had enjoyed the kind of life that an oriental despot might envy. Peeled grapes, tapestried barges on the Nile, a long line of nubile activists, the lot”
Ecochondriacs, p. 158
Their Favorite Kind of Lazy River
“He had only been a true believer for a couple of years at the beginning because he had been intelligent enough to figure out what was going on with the numbers. But by the time he figured it out completely, he was already floating on an inner tube down a lazy river of cash grants, and he realized that if he told the world what he now knew, that lazy river of cash grants would go flow somewhere else”
Ecochondriacs, p. 157
There’s a Double Meaning in That
“His slip was starting to show, which meant that his slips were starting to show”
Ecochondriacs, p. 157
Like Flammable and Inflammable
“But he also had been around long enough to know that he ought to get some other things set in motion regardless. Or irregardless. He was never sure.”
Ecochondriacs, p. 155
Or Thirteen Maybe
“On the right side was an armchair in which sat one Rocco Williamson, a man who appeared to be about as pleased as a hen with twelve chicks.”
Ecochondriacs, p. 151
Different Thresholds
“Maybe Del Martin wouldn’t want to immolate himself on national television. That was certainly possible. Not everyone can avoid being a sissy”
Ecochondriacs, p. 145
Pronounery
“That had been given to them by an overworked staffer at the DNC who had needed to get a few things off his desk. I use the phrase his desk advisedly because this staffer, now going by Heather, was already transitioning, with fake breasts and everything, and to apply the old pronoun might entail legal difficulties for, as the Victorians would have put it, the present writer. But the legal team for the Satiric Writers Guild is a crackerjack team in every respect, and so I have made the decision to simply proceed. Let it stand. Stet. Whatever the editors may say about it, stet. Where was I?”
Ecochondriacs, p. 132
Discombobulated, In Other Words
“He sat down at his desk. It, like the rest of the office, was in tatters. If decorators had terms for this kind of thing, they would probably narrow it down to a choice between High Disheveled and Early Hand Grenade”
Ecochondriacs, p. 128
A Pleasant Surprise
“Many ordinary folks have noticed that the onset of panic has the unfortunate effect of scattering their wits. Hugh, whose wits were usually scattered already, discovered much to his great surprise that his panic was out there gathering up all his wits, and helping them all to walk in a straight line”
Ecochondriacs, p. 127
A Critique on the Stringent Side
“‘There is a section in my chapter ten where I, um, critique a paper you submitted to The Journal of Climate Change.’ This was a polite way of putting it. Larry had actually gone through her paper with a weed whacker, the kind with metal blades”
Ecochondriacs, p. 118