I was out of the war because men like this were too scared to talk about dick.

They looked at me, in my hippie garb, with horror and disgust, the Decline of Western Civilisation suddenly plopped in their midst.

That Damon Matthews,” Linda spat. “You know, take one letter out of his name and it spells ‘ damn’ as in ‘damn, that kid’s a worthless sonovabitch’.

When you got right down to it, my dick was the one organ that hadn’t presented itself to my consciousness through pain, only pleasure. Modest but robust, it had always served me faithfully. Or, you could argue, I had served it – if so, its yoke had been easy. It never gave me orders. It sometimes encouraged me to get out more, but it encouraged me humbly, without bitterness or anger. This past evening, I knew, it had interceded on Myriam’s behalf. It had always enjoyed good relations with Myriam, Myriam had always treated it with affection and respect, and this had given me an enormous amount of pleasure. And sources of pleasure were hard to come by. In the end, my dick was all I had.

Quilty grimaces. “I don’t like what comes after ‘dicker.’ ” “What is that?” Quilty sighs. “Dickest. I mean, really: it’s not a contest!

These men are not appreciated. They went through a lot. If we had lost the (Revolutionary) war, these men would have been No. 1 on the British list to hang.