Jack: (changing the subject) Is it erotic?

Jane: Not at all, really. In fact, most of the time it's anti-erotic. It's about the things you were thinking about when you should have been paying attention. Personally, I would think that at least one of these couples might be portrayed as actually communicating and enjoying themselves. But that's not the point he's making.

Jack: How can you call it Intercourse if it's not erotic?

Jane: I suppose he means that other sort of intercourse: conversation.

Jack: (losing interest) Oh.

From the archive, a selection:

The perceived lack of time becomes real: We are not stressed because we have no time, but rather, we have no time because we are stressed.

In the 1920's and 30's, before the age of air-conditioning, my father once told me that New Yorkers used to leave their apartments to sleep in the park on summer nights. Was America any safer then, or did people take more care of one another during those days?

Lisa: Uh, are you sure that's safe?
Kearny: Well it ain't gettin' any safer.

On Friday, a deeply divided House rebuffed President Bush's demand for retroactive immunity, then defiantly left Washington for a two-week spring break.

Republicans said the secret session proved to be deflating, not because of the quality of the evidence, but because of Democrats' unwillingness to listen.

This book earned a starred review from Publishers Weekly.

Intercourse: Stories by Robert Olen Butler