" Can you help me with my notes? I said. But through the phone’s overseas hiss, I heard another phone start ringing, and he said, Maybe this other flight came through— Then the dial tone went retreating across the Asian oceans, and I resisted the impulse to pound the phone receiver on the first solid surface. Toward dawn in the hotel room, I pick up the legal pad and try to envision my solo presentation. Standing at the grease board, I’ll draw a horizontal line—an X axis—saying, This line represents your spending. It goes from spending zero on the left to shelling out shitloads of money on the right. My vertical Y axis measures returns on that money—from getting back zero at the bottom to making zillions at the top. I’m gonna tell the president of Company X and his minions that they need to spend as little as possible while making shitloads in return. The question is, how to stretch this expensive advice into a nine-hour meeting? "

― Mary Karr , Lit