“I may have been a Boy Scout for only two years, but the motto stuck with me forever: Be Prepared. This does not mean ‘Be Prepared to Ask People for Shit,’ but ‘Think Ahead, and Plan Accordingly, Especially in Regard to Your Vices.’” — David Sedaris

Better etiquette advice, I have rarely heard. And very applicable to the holiday season.

“Leonard Bilsiter was one of those people who have failed to find this world attractive or interesting, and who have sought compensation in an ‘unseen world’ of their own experience or imagination — or invention. Children do that sort of thing successfully, but children are content to convince themselves, and do not vulgarize their beliefs by trying to convince others.”

– “The She-Wolf,” Saki (H.H. Munro)

There are an unfortunate number of Leonard Bilsiters in the world, aren’t there, dear readers?

I don’t know why I’m in such short-story mode this week, but if you’ve never read Saki, or perhaps only read one or two of his stories in high school, you ought to go back and take another look. He’s a bit like Jane Austen crossed with Stephen King, only less wordy than either of them.

“Give a woman a compliment, feed her for a day. Teach a woman to fish for compliments, feed her for life.”

– Sassy Curmudgeon

Speaking of tough-guy lines:

“All that doesn’t kill us, only makes us stronger.”
– Friedrich Nietzsche

“All that doesn’t kill us, only makes us stranger.”
– Dariusz Jemielniak

Which version do you like better, and why?

My boss at Harvard Business School used this quote as the opening of his fall syllabus:

Really believe in your heart of hearts that your fundamental purpose, the reason for being is to enlarge the lives of others. Your life will be enlarged also. And all of the other things we have been taught to concentrate on will take care of themselves. – Pete Thigpen

How cool is that? And how lucky am I to have a boss who takes this as his philosophy of life?

And, more to the point: in what ways do you strive to embiggen the lives of others?