Hi Chris, Well, the torch didn't bother me at first, but now that you've mentioned it, every time I come back to the pic it bothers me. So here's my solution. No need to damage the picture with a crop.
Marc, I didn't say that the D800 looks oversharp when viewed on the screen. What I said is that people aren't used to the results you get from the D800. One result people aren't used to is the incredible color rendition, which tends to make the output look sharper than, say, the output I get from my D3. As I said, you might want to try calibrating your monitor. On my own calibrated top-of-the line Dell Ultra-Sharp I don't see any sign of oversharpening. I do see some small and annoying artifacts caused by converting to jpeg. You'll have to take my word for it that there's no sign of over-sharpning in the 4912 x 7360 pixel PSD version. There is a tiny bit of noise since the shot was made at ISO 1200.
But none of this technical crap deals with my original question. I see far too many people shooting things that are pretty simply because they're pretty. I do it too, but I don't keep the results and I certainly don't post the results. This one stopped me because there seemed to be something there beyond pretty, though I couldn't, and still can't, get a grip on it. It may be something that appeals only to me because of some experience way back there that I've forgotten. That's why I asked the question.