The Price of Saving a Life: Ink Scrawl Nugget 20

High up in the mountains I crossed a wooden bridge of laughable ricketyness over a deep chasm. It was the sort of bridge on which, in the movies, a slat always breaks, causing the heroine to plunge through up to her armpits with her pert legs wiggling helplessly above the chasm, until the hero dashes back to save her, spears falling all around them. When I was twelve years old, I could never understand why the hero operating from this position of superiority, didn't say to the lady, 'OK, I'll save your life, but later you have to let me see you naked. Agreed?'

—From The Lost Continent by Bill Bryson

Well, great minds (at 12 years of age) think very alike. Then, alas, we grow up.

I have discovered Bill Bryson's travelogues rather late in my life, only about a month or so ago. Since then have been trying to read all his books that I could beg and borrow.

I particularly like the (seeming) ease with which he describes the various places he has traveled to and how often he finds something interesting and funny about them. He is very rarely laugh-out-loud funny but has the ability for that neat turn of phrase that makes you smile.

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