She had of course been lucky I was available, but luck is a fickle mistress that is powerless unless intelligently exploited.

The reader feels shortchanged if he does not occasionally feast his eyes on a line like this: "He'd already met the fickle mistress called Fame.

"But I seem to recall that destiny is a fickle mistress and it is best not to place too much trust in her."

A universal Tobin tax, great idea in principle, but with international agreement being a fickle mistress, its unlikely to be universaly adopted.

But I caution you: fame is a fickle mistress.

But he knows that politics is a fickle mistress.

But Picard knew that fortune was a fickle mistress; he could not sustain this chase for long.

If so that is my fickle mistress too.

What I took from the show is that several participants threw away loyal families in pursuit of the fickle mistress of fame.

Fame is a very fickle mistress.