"'God, I miss Allechka,' I said to Misha. 'Can you smell her?' I asked, holding the skirt up to his nose.

He leaned in and smelled the proffered green corduroy. 'I never knew her,' he said, shaking his head in regret."

from "Alechka" by Deborah Kaple, runner-up in the first round of NPR's Three-Minute Fiction series

"Barney. Doogie. Average names elude me."

Six word memoir by Neil Patrick Harris

"Now that we've made it through the experience of the last decade, we can wonder how that experience shaped us."

introduction to a piece on Morning Edition featuring book recommendations from Tina Brown of The Daily Beast

"I will, no doubt, be taken to task for for criticizing the work of children, but as any pathologist will agree, if there's a cancer, it's best to treat it as soon as possible.

If you happen to stand over 4 feet tall, the agony awaiting you at Sacred Heart Elementary began the moment you took your seat. These were mean little chairs, corralled into a "theater" haunted by the stench of industrial strength lasagna.

My question is not why they chosen to stage the production in a poorly disguised cafeteria, but why they chose to stage it at all."

David Sedaris on This American Life's A Very Sedaris Christmas

“Dangers await only those who don't react to life.”

Mikhail Gorbachev in Berlin in 1989, as quoted in an interesting piece on On the Media this week

"You should want the moon. Don't do it. Don't go for a 40 watt bulb just because it looks pretty. You'll get stuck with it when it goes out."

The Man in the Wooden Hat by Jane Gardem, reviewed on Fresh Air

"What did your mom teach you about gender roles?"

Terry Gross interviewing Michael Chabon on Fresh Air

"[Diane] Rehm asked [Julia] Child how she managed to maintain a schedule that would tire a great many people. 'Well,' Child quipped, 'that's because I eat properly — red meat and gin.'"

celebrating 30 years of the Diane Rehm Show on Weekend Edition Saturday

"B got underneath the dishwasher and he was pawing out through the crack out into the kitchen meowing trying to go forward. All he had to do to get out was to just back up and come out from underneath the sink, and he couldn't figure out how to do that. So I had to slowly, very, very slowly push the dishwasher in and very slowly let him back up and get out."

Temple Grandin as heard on Fresh Air

"I think that's pretty sad. People that is alone, they has water in their eyes."

Angelo, a kindergarten student quoted in You Can't Say You Can't Play by Vivian Paley as heard on This American Life