Insight

The story goes that Mrs Descartes was throwing a New Year's party to
celebrate the arrival of 1630 and had spent weeks preparing. She had
invited all the local jet setters.

Moments before the guests started to arrive she instructed Descartes
that the pastries on the table to the side were not to be eaten until
after midnight to make sure there was enough food to keep the guests
from leaving too soon. To make sure, she tasked Rene with the job of
guarding them until an hour or so after midnight at which time she would
invite the guests to help themselves. Though deep in thought, he agreed
to mind the table.

As the party got into full swing, Descartes found himself in an
absorbing philosophical discussion with Vandyke over why Titian removed
a church from the Venetian background in one of his paintings. To hear
each other better, the two wandered away from the crowd, in the
direction of the forbidden baked goods.

Without Descartes noticing, Vandyke starting munching thoughtfully on a
pastry. Suddenly Descartes snapped out of his thoughts and realised what
Vandyke was doing. His reaction surprised Vandyke who figured that
Descartes surely must have just thought of something of great
significance. Discretely, Descartes wrote a message on a napkin and
handed it to Vandyke so as not to attract his wife's attention. However,
just at that moment they were interrupted, which meant Vandyke could
only stuff the napkin into his pocket for later.

The next morning he removed the napkin to see what profundity his friend
had bequeathed him and, sure enough, there scrawled in Descartes hand
was an expression of timeless insight, "I think they're for 1 am."