I tried to shove an octopus into a drawer. Whenever I pushed in one side of her, the other would pop out, sillyputtied and tentacled, like dough from a biscuit tube.

Reason, however, had soured on the vine. That and civilization itself, which struck me now as rotting ever onward—zombielike. I rejected them both at once and turned to the jungle in favor of a savage’s noble heart. Almost immediately, I was assaulted by a wind of a most disgusting nature—a hot, sulfurous wind, not for the faint of heart. I stuck my nose in it only to draw conclusions, mind you, and came away convinced that all forms of life must have a common ancestry. So much for the jungle.

—from Russell by Daniel Grandbois