Weather matters

    And then, to add to Mr. Merrill's appeal, we pitied him for his family. His wife was from California, the sunny part. My grandmother used to speculate that she had been one of those permanently tanned, bouncy blondes -- a perfectly wholesome type, but entirely too easily persuaded that good health and boundless energy for good deeds were the natural results of clean living and practical values. No one had told her that health and energy and the Lord's work are harder to come by in bad weather. Mrs. Merrill suffered in New Hampshire.

John Irving
A Prayer For Owen Meany (1989)

Not to talk like

    Before the man had a chance to shut him out, Riley said, "May I come in?" He said it carefully, proud of his deep and strong voice, one which was only slightly tainted by his years in the South. He'd worked hard to keep the cracker out of his voice, feeling that he had had enough problems without the added weight of a redneck voice, but there were some things Riley did not know, and one of them was that, even though he no longer talked like a redneck, what he did talk like was a redneck straining hard not to talk like a redneck.

Gordon Eklund
"White Summer In Memphis" (1972?)

The consensus on smiling

"I have researched all the memoranda about smiling," General Toad said, riffling the pages stacked before him, "and the consensus at policy is that smiling is not in accord with national sentiment. So that issue must be ruled closed."

Philip K. Dick
A Little Something for Us Tempunauts (1974)

Intangibles

     "Probably we will take him on an inspection tour of the ship before it takes off and give him, absolutely free, a picture of himself standing in front of it, with the pilot's own signature signed across the bottom by some female clerk."
    "Chiseling from kids. Bah!"
     "Not at all," answered Montgomery, in hurt tones. "Intangibles are the most honest merchandise anyone can sell. They are always worth whatever you are willing to pay for them and they never wear out. You can take them to your grave untarnished."

Robert Heinlein
The Man Who Sold the Moon (1949)

One thing troubles me

"Jabah, I have at last completed all my laboratory experiments. My death by pollen extract is definite. I am ready to exact my tribute from the wealthy of the world. They will either pay tribute to me or die, and yet one thing troubles me..."

--Bob Kane/Bill Finger
"The Batman Meets Doctor Death"
Detective Comics No. 29
July 1939

Generalities

"All generalities are stupid."

--Michael B. Kaye
4.august.1978

Just trying to earn a living

   I got up on my feet and went over to the bowl in the corner and threw cold water on my face. After a little while I felt a little better, but very little. I needed a drink, I needed a lot of life insurance, I needed a vacation, I needed a home in the country. What I had was a coat, a hat and a gun. I put them on and went out of the room.

--Raymond Chandler
Farewell, My Lovely (1940)

Winnie the Pooh 05: The White House Budget Process

   "I just like to know," said Pooh humbly. "So as I can say to myself: 'I've got fourteen pots of honey left.' Or fifteen, as the case may be. It's sort of comforting."
   "Well, let's call it sixteen," said Rabbit.

-- A. A. Milne

Winnie the Pooh 04

   "When you wake up in the morning, Pooh," said Piglet at last, "what's the first thing you say to yourself?"
   "What's for breakfast?" said Pooh. "What do you say, Piglet?"
   "I say, I wonder what's going to happen exciting today? said Piglet.
   Pooh nodded thoughtfully.
   "It's the same thing," he said.

-- A. A. Milne

Winnie the Pooh 03

And all Rabbit's friends-and-relations spread themselves about on the grass, and waited hopefully in case anybody spoke to them, or dropped anything, or asked them the time.

-- A. A. Milne

Colloquy, Pogo style

Owl: Let's start at the beginnin' again an' let's keep our fierce
an' indomidouble tempers under con-trol.
Churchy: Alright--Let's be gentlemens an' considerant of each other's
frailities an' foibobbles.
Owl: Hee hee--How you do go on--I allus was considerant
of yo' faults an' unspeakable habits.
Churchy: An' I is ever been forbearin' 'bout yo' snoopy ways an' turpitoods.
Owl: [taking off his glasses] Long as we's bein' such gent'mens
we kin insult each other freely without fear of hurtin' the other's feelin's.
Churchy: [poking Owl in the chest] Yes an' you is a ball-eyed bull bat.


-- Walt Kelly
Positively Pogo
(c) 1955, -56, -57

Wishing to be...

The human species was given dominion over the earth and took the oportunity to exterminate other species and warm the atmosphere and generally ruin things in its own image, but it paid this price for its privileges: that the finite and specific animal body of this species contained a brain capable of conceiving the infinite and wishing to be infinite itself.

--Jonathan Franzen
The Corrections (2001)
(hardback, p. 465)

Walt Kelly on first tries

"If you're a professional, writer or artist, you can get anywhere from 75 to 85 percent of what you're aiming at in your first try. A lot of artists spend most of their time trying to get the other 15 to 25 percent. I don't. I'd rather go for another 75 to 85 percent."

Walt Kelly
quoted in Phi Beta Pogo, page 25

Theater: the director's role

"My idea of a director is a chap who puts me in the middle of a stage and shines a bright light on me."

-- Sir Ralph Richardson

According to Chekhov...

When you're thirsty, and it seems that you could drink the entire ocean, that's faith. When you start to drink and finish only a glass or two, that's science.
-- Anton Chekhov

Verbing

I seem to be a verb.
-- Buckminster Fuller

This sentence no verb.
-- Douglas Hofstadter

Verbing weirds language.
-- Calvin & Hobbes, by Bill Watterson

Winnie the Pooh 02

Pooh enquires into metaphysics:

"Hallo, Rabbit," he said, "is that you?"
"Let's pretend it isn't," said Rabbit, "and see what happens."

-- A. A. Milne

Winnie the Pooh 01

In which Pooh explains:

Cottleston Cottleston Cottleston Pie,
A fly can't bird, but a bird can fly.
Ask me a riddle and I reply
Cottleston Cottleston Cottleston Pie.

Cottleston Cottleston Cottleston Pie,
Why does a chicken? I don't know why.
Ask me a riddle and I reply
Cottleston Cottleston Cottleston Pie.

Cottleston Cottleston Cottleston Pie,
A fish can't whistle and neither can I.
Ask me a riddle and I reply
Cottleston Cottleston Cottleston Pie.

-- A. A. Milne