Strange are the ways of life, and stranger still, the ways of people.

That stillness, which struck casual observers more than anything else in his character and habit, and seemed so precisely like the rest of inanition, may have been the perfect balance of enormous antagonistic forces — positives and negatives in fine adjustment. His equilibrium disturbed, he was in extremity at once. If an emotion possessed him at all, it ruled him; a feeling not mastering him was entirely latent. Stagnant or rapid, it was never slow. He was always hit mortally, or he was missed. He had no light and careless touches in his constitution, either for good or for evil.

Thomas Hardy describing Boldwood in “Far from the madding crowd”–an image that persists.

Elsewhere:

Loss. And gain.--I wrote this to a friend who was interested in programming computers. Silly, perahps, but heart-felt and honest. Getting proficient at programming computers is difficult. Getting really proficient at programming computers is doubly difficult. Getting really, [...]