Khaled Kassem

“I mean, d'you know what eternity is? There's this big mountain, see, a mile high, at the end of the universe, and once every thousand years there's this little bird-"
-"What little bird?" said Aziraphale suspiciously.
-"This little bird I'm talking about. And every thousand years-"
-"The same bird every thousand years?"
-Crowley hesitated. "Yeah," he said.
-"Bloody ancient bird, then."
-"Okay. And every thousand years this bird flies-"
-"-limps-"
-"-flies all the way to this mountain and sharpens its beak-"
-"Hold on. You can't do that. Between here and the end of the universe there's loads of-" The angel waved a hand expansively, if a little unsteadily. "Loads of buggerall, dear boy."
-"But it gets there anyway," Crowley persevered.
-"How?"
-"It doesn't matter!"
-"It could use a space ship," said the angel.
Crowley subsided a bit. "Yeah," he said. "If you like. Anyway, this bird-"
-"Only it is the end of the universe we're talking about," said Aziraphale. "So it'd have to be one of those space ships where your descendants are the ones who get out at the other end. You have to tell your descendants, you say, When you get to the Mountain, you've got to-" He hesitated. "What have
they got to do?"
-"Sharpen its beak on the mountain," said Crowley. "And then it flies back-"
-"-in the space ship-"
-"And after a thousand years it goes and does it all again," said Crowley quickly.

There was a moment of drunken silence.

-"Seems a lot of effort just to sharpen a beak," mused Aziraphale.
-"Listen," said Crowley urgently, "the point is that when the bird has worn the mountain down to nothing, right, then-"

Aziraphale opened his mouth. Crowley just knew he was going to make some point about the relative hardness of birds' beaks and granite mountains, and plunged on quickly.

-"-then you still won't have finished watching The Sound of Music."

Aziraphale froze.

-"And you'll enjoy it," Crowley said relentlessly. "You really will."
-"My dear boy-"
-"You won't have a choice."
-"Listen-"
-"Heaven has no taste."
-"Now-"
-"And not one single sushi restaurant."

A look of pain crossed the angel's suddenly very serious face.”
― Neil Gaiman, Good Omens: The Nice and Accurate Prophecies of Agnes Nutter, Witch

“I love deadlines. I love the whooshing noise they make as they go by.”
― Douglas Adams, The Salmon of Doubt: Hitchhiking the Galaxy One Last Time

“Nobody realizes that some people expend tremendous energy merely to be normal.”
― Albert Camus

“Perhaps the greatest faculty our minds possess is the ability to cope with pain. Classic thinking teaches us of the four doors of the mind, which everyone moves through according to their need.

First is the door of sleep. Sleep offers us a retreat from the world and all its pain. Sleep marks passing time, giving us distance from the things that have hurt us. When a person is wounded they will often fall unconscious. Similarly, someone who hears traumatic news will often swoon or faint. This is the mind's way of protecting itself from pain by stepping through the first door.

Second is the door of forgetting. Some wounds are too deep to heal, or too deep to heal quickly. In addition, many memories are simply painful, and there is no healing to be done. The saying 'time heals all wounds' is false. Time heals most wounds. The rest are hidden behind this door.

Third is the door of madness. There are times when the mind is dealt such a blow it hides itself in insanity. While this may not seem beneficial, it is. There are times when reality is nothing but pain, and to escape that pain the mind must leave reality behind.

Last is the door of death. The final resort. Nothing can hurt us after we are dead, or so we have been told.”
― Patrick Rothfuss, The Name of the Wind