limits and rituals: need versus strong desire — "Like as in is there a…"
Like as in is there a clear line, a quantifiable difference between need and just strong desire.
Context
The question the whole theme turns on, surfacing in Hal's own idle end-of-session brooding as he decides whether to nip down for one more before dinner: is there a clean line between needing a thing and merely wanting it badly. He can pose it abstractly and still, in the same breath, be weighing whether to go — which is itself the answer he can't quite reach.