Edward Wellen

“ Apart from these calls from the rating services, I keep receiving calls on my home phone from people who set out to dial a certain undertaker—I beg his pardon, funeral director. We have the same exchange, in fact his number differs from mine only in that the first of his last four digits is a zero while my corresponding one is a nine.
Of course by now you've put your finger on it. These people are dialing the under—funeral director because, in the current colloquialism, someone's number's up. They misdial because they're unconsciously saying nein to the zero of death. ”

“ Or at least what I think is a good thing—and for the time being what I think is a good thing is what the world thinks is a good thing.
Now, in order for you to get the picture you must understand that the New York metropolitan area fashions the literary and musical fads of the United States and the United States by example and by infiltration via writings and movies and recordings fashions the fads of the world. ”

“ But I've seen much the same sort of thing in my work as a CPA. Someone possessing relatively few shares in a holding company may exercise an inordinate amount of power over the national economy.
An analogous set of operations makes it possible for me to be an esthetic shot of digitalis in the body politic. That's why Bartok's Mikrokosmos is at this writing the top tune and why archaeology professor Dr. Loob is high man on the polls with his TV show Dig This! and why the world has taken such a turn that you may very likely be calling this the Day of the Egghead. ”