I have a friend named Gina-Sue who is a socialist, and Gina-Sue has a favorite saying: “You can’t lock up the barn after the horses are gone.”

A Series of Unfortunate Events: The Wide Window – Lemony Snicket

Just because something is typed–whether it is typed on a business card or typed in a newspaper or book–this does not mean that it is true.

A Series of Unfortunate Events: The Wide Window – Lemony Snicket

“I will thank you not to be impertinent,” Aunt Josephine said, using a word which here means “pointing out that I’m wrong, which annoys me.”  “It is very annoying.”

A Series of Unfortunate Events: The Wide Window – Lemony Snicket

There is a way of looking at life called “keeping things in perspective.”  This simply means “making yourself feel better by comparing the things that are happening to you right now against other things that have happened at a different time, or to different people.”  For instance, if you were upset about an ugly pimple on the end of your nose,  you might try to feel better by keeping your pimple in perspective.  You might compare your pimple situation to that of someone who was being eaten by a bear, and when  you looked in the mirror at your ugly pimple you could say to yourself, “Well, at least I’m not being eaten by a bear.”

You can see at once why keeping things in perspective rarely works very well, because it is hard to concentrate on somebody else being eaten by a bear when you are staring at your own ugly pimple.

A Series of Unfortunate Events: The Wide Window – Lemony Snicket

There are two kinds of fears: rational and irrational–or, in simpler terms, fears that make sense and fears that don’t.  For instance, the Baudelaire orphans have a fear of Count Olaf, which makes perfect sense, because he is an evil man who wants to destroy them.  But if they were afraid of lemon meringue pie, this would be an irrational fear, because lemon meringue pie is delicious and has never hurt a soul.  Being afraid of a monster under the bed is perfectly rational, because there may in fact be a monster under your bed at any time, ready to eat you all up, but a fear of realtors is an irrational fear.

A Series of Unfortunate Events: The Wide Window – Lemony Snicket