An Quotes

I like my films to have a certain amount of realism - something that's thought provoking and intelligently written. More than the amount on the pay cheque, I look for a level of respectability as an actor. ~ Arjun Rampal

The car is not a rabbit or a deer that jumps around in sweeping lines, but it is a man-made work of technology in need of an appropriate roadway. ~ Fritz Todt

I'm not really much of an actor, so when I started on 'The Daily Show,' I was just trying to adopt the faux authority of a newsperson. Having a British accent definitely gave me a sonic leg up on that because there is a faux authority to the British accent in and of itself. ~ John Oliver

From the writer's perspective, audience is always an act of the imagination. ~ Billy Marshall Stoneking

Intern will resonate not only with doctors, but with anyone who has struggled with the grand question 'What should I do with my life?' In a voice of profound honesty and intelligence, Sandeep Jauhar gives us an insider's look at the medical profession and also a dramatic account of the psychological challenges of early adulthood. ~ Akhil Sharma

Our own State Department polls say that 80 percent of Iraqis view the United States as an unpopular occupier. ~ Marty Meehan

I knew I wanted to be an actress when I was 9 years old. ~ AnnaLynne McCord

I trained like an animal, but the thing is focus and concentration. When the bell rings it's like when the little red light goes on over the camera. And I can usually nail my lines on the first or second take because I'm right there. ~ Mickey Rourke

Where there is a lesson to be learned there is always an opportunity of change to be gained. Change comes by learning, help us Lord Jesus to learn something from every lesson. ~ Euginia Herlihy

In 1969 the Khmer Rouge numbered only about 4,000. By 1975 their numbers were enough to defeat the government forces. Their victory was greatly helped by the American attack on Cambodia, which was carried out as an extension of the Vietnam War. In 1970 a military coup led by Lon Nol, possibly with American support, overthrew the government of Prince Sihanouk, and American and South Vietnamese troops entered Cambodia.

One estimate is that 600,000 people, nearly 10 per cent of the Cambodian population, were killed in this extension of the war. Another estimate puts the deaths from the American bombing at 1000,000 peasants. From 1972 to 1973, the quantity of bombs dropped on Cambodia was well over three times that dropped on Japan in the Second World War.

The decision to bomb was taken by Richard Nixon and Henry Kissinger and was originally justified on the grounds that North Vietnamese bases had been set up in Cambodia. The intention (according to a later defence by Kissinger's aide, Peter W. Rodman) was to target only places with few Cambodians: 'From the Joint Chiefs' memorandum of April 9, 1969, the White House selected as targets only six base areas minimally populated by civilians. The target areas were given the codenames BREAKFAST, LUNCH, DINNER, SUPPER, SNACK, and DESSERT; the overall programme was given the name MENU.' Rodman makes the point that SUPPER, for instance, had troop concentrations, anti-aircraft, artillery, rocket and mortar positions, ~ Jonathan Glover

The difference between an ordinary life and an extraordinary life is only a matter of perspective. Pull the blinds. Look around you. It is a mad, mad world and you do not require ten digit bank accounts to immerse yourself in it. Travel down dusty roads without a destination in mind. Climb a mountain and scream out into the void. Kiss the hell out of a stranger. Skinny dip in a lake. Get lost and lose yourself (they are two separate things). Explore the wilderness (especially the one within). Think less of destiny and more of the moment right here. Because when you are old and ill with your loved ones around you, fame won't matter, nor will the extent of your wealth. You are the sum of the stories you can tell. ~ Beau Taplin

He kissed her a little more deeply and was happy to hear her gasp of pleasure. The sound brought his erection back to life, and he brushed his fingertips over her collarbone.
"How 'bout you hop on up here with me?"
"I don't think you're quite ready for that yet."
"Wanna bet?" He took her hand and put it under the hospital sheets.
The throathy laugh as she gripped him gently was yet another marvel. Just like her constant presence in his room, her fierce protection of him, her love, her strength.
She was everything to him. His whole world. He'd gone from being blasé about his death to being desperate to live. For her. For them. For their future.
"What do you say we give it another day?" she said.
"An hour."
"Until you can sit up on your own."
"Deal."
Thank God he was a fast healer.
(..............)
Wrath struggled on the bed, trying to force himself upright so that he bore the weight of his upper body on his hips.
Beth watched him the whole time, refusing to help.
When he was steady, he rubbed his hands together in anticipation. He could feel her skin already.
"Wrath," she said with warning as he beamed at her.
"Come up here, leelan, A deal's a deal. ~ J.R. Ward

American official policy is that Egypt is an ally of the United States. ~ Mitt Romney

Are we not plunging continually? Backward, sideward, forward, in all directions? Is there still any up or down? Are we not straying, as through an infinite nothing? Do we not feel the breath of empty space? Has it not become colder? Is not night continually closing in on us? ~ Friedrich Nietzsche

Most Englishmen are convinced that God is an Englishman, probably educated at Eton. ~ E.M. Delafield

In an effort to address the rampant joblessness among black men labeled criminals, a growing number of advocates in recent years have launched Ban the Box campaigns. ~ Michelle Alexander

The greatest moment of your life is now.
Not because it's pleasant or happy or easy, but because this moment is the only moment you've got. Every past moment is irretrievably gone. It's never coming back. If you live there, you lose your life.
And the future is always out there somewhere. You can spend an eternity waiting for tomorrow, or worrying about tomorrow. If you live there, you likewise will lose your life.
This moment is God's irreplaceable gift to you. ~ John Ortberg

Without God, the universe is an empty space, and emptiness is the most terrible feeling you can have." – Ernesto. ~ Paul Alkazraji

Very often with an American movie, the end is very happy and you just feel good when you go out. When you go to a French movie, it's kind of like, oh!, and you can't go out; you're stuck in your chair. It goes so deeply inside of the heart. ~ Emmanuelle Beart

I think, as an actor, and particularly if you are playing the lead in something, you have to view yourself as the head of department for the cast. All of the other departments are accountable and have somebody at the helm who is leading them all the time, and I don't think that the actors should be any different. ~ Daniel Radcliffe

To stand up on the stage is to say to many people: Look at me. How can you do that without speaking the only truth you know? There is no such thing as an uncommitted actor. ~ Judith Malina

Stereotype threat, then, is one way our national history seeps into our daily lives. That history leaves us with stereotypes about groups in our society that can be used to judge us as individuals when we're in situations where those stereotypes apply - in the seat next to a black person on an airplane or interacting with minority students, for example. The white person in that situation will not want to be seen in terms of the stereotype of whites as racially insensitive. And the black person, for his or her part, will not want to be seen in terms of the stereotypes about blacks as aggressive, or as too easily seeing prejudice, and so on. Fighting off these possible perceptions on a long airline flight - or more famously, perhaps, in a school cafeteria - could be more than either party wants to take on. They just want to have lunch or get to Cleveland. Avoidance becomes the simplest solution. ~ Claude M. Steele

For man to be able to live he must either not see the infinite, or have such an explanation of the meaning of life as will connect the finite with the infinite. ~ Leo Tolstoy

I don't think the label cares about an album ... People just want their number-one record. ~ Peter Tosh

He was free, free for everything, free to act like an animal or like a machine. ~ Jean-Paul Sartre

In short, we would discover, as we should already, that logic is in the eye of the logician. (For instance, here's an idea for theorists and logicians: if women are supposed to be less rational and more emotional at the beginning of our menstrual cycle when the female hormone is at its lowest level, then why isn't it logical to say that, in those few days, women behave the most like the way men behave all month long? I leave further improvisation up to you.) ~ Gloria Steinem

Of course you have always been an idealist, and filled with your optimistic dreams; but reality must at some time obtrude, and you are now turned thirty. ~ Margaret Atwood

They make life unnecessarily difficult for themselves by looking for deep thoughts and ideas everywhere and putting them into everything. just have the courage to
give yourself up to first impressions..don't think all the time that
everything must be pointless if it lacks an abstract thought or idea ~ Johann Wolfgang Von Goethe

I could not hold my breath for seven minutes. I couldn't even make it to one. I once tried to run a mile in seven minutes after hearing some athletes could do it in four but failed spectacularly when a side stitch crippled me about halfway in.
However, there was one thing I managed to do in seven minutes that most would say is quite impressive: I became queen.
By seven tiny minutes I beat my brother, Ahren, into the world, so the throne that ought to have been his was mine. Had I been born a generation earlier, it wouldn't have mattered. Ahren was the male, so Ahren would have been the heir.
Alas, Mom and Dad couldn't stand to watch their firstborn be stripped of a title by an unfortunate but rather lovely set of breasts. So they changed the law, and the people rejoiced, and I was trained day by day to become the next ruler of Illéa. ~ Kiera Cass

He wondered for an idle moment if he'd ever see her again, but it didn't look likely. You have to be realistic, after all, and getting through tomorrow seemed like quite the ambition. ~ Joe Abercrombie

The dinosaur's eloquent lesson is that if some bigness is good, an overabundance of bigness is not necessarily better. ~ Eric Johnston

Dessert is my reward for having met my goals during the day. Really, dessert is an event rather than a specific item. ~ Jen Lancaster

Forgiveness is not an easy chore to undertake, nor is it for the weak. I forgive you, God, for leaving me out here to figure out all of this on my own. Yet forgiveness is the daily minimum requirement for a healthy, fulfilling, and meaningful life. I forgive my mind for believing that what was is what always has to be. ~ Iyanla Vanzant

There was with her a feeling of having descended in the social scale, with a corresponding sense of having risen in the spiritual. Every step which she took toward relieving herself from obligations added to her strength and expansion as an individual. She began to look with her own eyes; to see and to apprehend the deeper undercurrents of life. No longer was she content to "feed upon opinion" when her own soul had invited her. ~ Kate Chopin

What is seen and called the picture is what remains - an evidence. Even as one travels in painting toward a state of 'unfreedom' where only certain things can happen, unaccountably the unknown and free must appear. ~ Philip Guston

There are people, primarily women!
who are what I call 'conduits of emotion.' In their company, the half dead can come alive. They need not be beautiful women or girls. It's a matter of blood warmth. The integrity of the spirit." He turned the page of his sketch pad and began anew, whistling thinly through his teeth.
"Thus an icy-cold soul, in the presence of one so blessed, can regain something of his lost self. Sometimes! ~ Joyce Carol Oates

Everybody says: the Kremlin, the Kremlin. They all go on about it, but I've never seen it. The number of times (thousands) I've been drunk or hung over, traipsing round Moscow, north-south, east-west, end to end, straight through or any old way - and I've never once seen the Kremlin.

For instance, yesterday - yesterday I didn't see it again, though I was buzzing round that area the whole evening and it's not as if I was particularly drunk. I mean, as soon as I came out onto Savyelov Station, I had a glass of Zubrovka for starters, since I know from experience that as an early-morning tipple, nobody's so far dreamed up anything better.

Anyway, a glass of Zubrovka. Then after that - on Kalyaev Street - another glass, only not Zubrovka this time, but coriander vodka. A friend of mine used to say coriander had a dehumanizing effect on a person, i.e, it refreshes your parts but it weakens your spirit. For some reason or other it had the opposite effect on me, i.e., my spirit was refreshed, while my parts all went to hell. But I do agree it's dehumanizing, so that's why I topped it up with two glasses of Zhiguli beer, plus some egg-nog straight from the bottle, in the middle of Kalyaev Street.

Of course, you're saying: come on, Venya, get on with it - what did you have next? And I couldn't say for sure. I remember - I remember quite distinctly in fact - I had two glasses of Hunter's vodka, on Chekhov Street. But I couldn't have made it across th ~ Venedikt Erofeev

ANIMAL, n. An organism which, requiring a great number of other animals for its sustenance, illustrates in a marked way the bounty of Providence in preserving the lives of his creatures. ~ Ambrose Bierce

We made four feature films with Sherwood Baptist. The wonderful thing was the church (members) volunteered. It was an awesome atmosphere of attitudes. The hard part was (that) all four of the first feature films we made take place in modern-day Albany, Georgia. We know that not all of our films going to be (set in) modern-day Albany, Georgia. ~ Alex Kendrick

It's an unnecessary burden to try to think of words and also worry at the same time whether they're the right words. ~ Peter Elbow

Eugenie, you're a woman without equal, and no matter how much you annoy the hell out of me and no matter how much I try to get you out of my head - and believe me, both occur regularly - I can't stay away from you. Even if you were barren, I'd take you as my consort in an instant and spend the rest of my life with you - childless, so long as it meant you'd be by my side. I would gladly bring you to my bed with no other thoughts than taking joy from your body. It would be enough.
- Dorian ~ Richelle Mead

Consider the cattle, grazing as they pass you by. They do not know what is meant by yesterday or today, they leap about, eat, rest, digest, leap about again, and so from morn till night and from day to day, fettered to the moment and its pleasure or displeasure, and thus neither melancholy nor bored. [ ... ] A human being may well ask an animal: 'Why do you not speak to me of your happiness but only stand and gaze at me?' The animal would like to answer, and say, 'The reason is I always forget what I was going to say' - but then he forgot this answer too, and stayed silent. ~ Friedrich Nietzsche

Now the way that the book winds up is this: Tom and me found the money that the robbers hid in the cave, and it made us rich. We got six thousand dollars apiece - all gold. It was an awful sight of money when it was piled up. Well, Judge Thatcher he took it and put it out at interest, and it fetched us a dollar a day apiece all the year round - more than a body could tell what to do with. The Widow Douglas she took me for her son, and allowed she would sivilize me; but it was rough living in the house all the time, considering how dismal regular and decent the widow was in all her ways; and so when I couldn't stand it no longer I lit out. I got into my old rags and my sugar-hogshead again, and was free and satisfied. But Tom Sawyer he hunted me up and said he was going to start a band of robbers, and I might join if I would go back to the widow and be respectable. So I went back. ~ Mark Twain

She put Randy Travis on the CD player and sang at the top of her lungs. She found that the wine bottle made an excellent fake microphone and she wondered if anyone would love her forever and ever, amen. ~ Melissa Ecker

You and I are the remains of an unfulfilled legacy, heirs to a kingdom of stolen identities and ragged confusion. ~ Susan Abulhawa

- Sorry, it's just... and odd choice.
- Well you don't choose who you fall for. It just happens.
- I don't think that's true. You should be in control of your emotions.
- Control, maybe, but that doesn't stop them from happening. I figure, sometimes you don't have to deny them.
- A friend of mine said keeping an emotion buried deep inside makes you stronger.
- Huh. Would you describe this friend as a *happy* person? ~ Thomas Siddell

'Attack The Block' is an alien invasion film set in South London. It's about a group of kids who are some petty thugs, who have to find the hero in themselves, when they attack. ~ John Boyega

Anyone can take an adventure even if it's only in your own backyard. Let your imagination be your adventure and see where it takes you. ~ Carmela Dutra

I'm an executioner, Leta, hence my Demon nickname. They send me in to take the heads off people and gods who've stepped over the line, usually only because someone has PMS. You want justice, Themis's office is down the hall on the left. You want death and dismemberment, I'm your man ... or rather god. (Deimos) ~ Sherrilyn Kenyon

An abundance of peer-reviewed science is showing that a whole foods, plant-based diet prevents most heart attacks, strokes, and even many kinds of cancer. It gets you to your ideal weight easily and sustainably, reverses Type 2 diabetes, and even fixes erectile dysfunction (because it greatly improves circulation!). ~ Kathy Freston

What I've always seen in writers and artists is the courage it takes to make an original work of art. I think the real risks in literature are linguistic and intellectual, and I hope we can highlight those, as well as political courage. ~ Salman Rushdie

There's a certain freedom to being an ~ Sophia Amoruso

I miss the Bay Area - the kind of laid-back lifestyle. Because in Hong Kong, you're going, like, 90 miles an hour, which is fun when you're young. ~ Daniel Wu

Even in my dreams, I'm an idiot who knows he's about to wake up to reality. ~ Tom Cruise

Like certain faces among the people I see on the street every day, certain words, for some reason, stand out, and leave an impression on me. Others remain in the background, negligible. After ~ Jhumpa Lahiri

Memories, so sweet and bitter.. they had both nourished and devoured him for so many years. Until a time came when they began to fade, turning faint and blurred, only an ache to be quickly pushed away because it went to your heart. For what was the use of remembering all you had lost? ~ Cornelia Funke

Definitely, there is a sense in my writing that people now know me in a personal way. And to an extent, that's true because I write about very personal things, and I use the personal often to contextualize some of these sociopolitical issues that we're dealing with. And to an extent, they're right. They know something about me. ~ Roxane Gay

Genius is when an idea and the execution of that idea are simultaneous. ~ Albert Einstein

The pilot channel is doing what was expected. It is abating dust and giving us an inkling of what the area will look like when it is restored . ~ John Wallace

I suspect that LaGuardia is an elaborate prank, and New York has a real airport nearby that only locals know about. ~ Dave Barry

He surveyed me, his eyes half closed, as if wondering if I were a delicious snack. I had an image of a massive dragon circling me slowly, eyes full of magic fixed on me as he moved, considering if he should bite me in half.
"Dragons." Rogan snapped his fingers.
Oh crap.
"I wondered why I kept getting dragons around you." He leaned forward. His eyes lit up, turning back to their clear sky blue. "You think I'm a dragon."
"Don't be ridiculous." My face felt hot. I was probably blushing. Damn it.
His smile went from amused to sexual, so charged with promise that carnal was the only way to describe it. I almost bolted out of my chair.
"Big powerful scary dragon."
"You have delusions of grandeur."
"Do I have a lair? Did I kidnap you to it from your castle?"
I stared straight at him, trying to frost my voice. "You have some strange fantasies, Rogan. You may need professional help."
"Would you like to volunteer?"
"No. Besides, dragons kidnap virgins, so I'm out." And why had I just told him I was not a virgin? Why did I even go there?
"It doesn't matter if I'm the first. It only matters that I'll be the last."
"You won't be the first, the last, or anything in between. Not in a million years."
He laughed.
"Rogan," I ground out through my teeth. "I'm on the clock. My client is in the next room mourning his wife. Stop flirting with me."
"Stop? I haven't even started. ~ Ilona Andrews

My understanding of God is an experience. God is. That's all I know. In the Biblical tradition, it would be expressed as, "Be still and know that I am God." God is the "I am" energy. Something huge is at play here - cosmic creativity, consciousness, God, whatever you want to call it. I do believe that it's a guided ride. We're on a guided tour of the universe. ~ Elizabeth Lesser

Too much reality can be a dazzle, a surfeit;Too close immediacy an exhaustion ~ Theodore Roethke

Vel once told me that the heart isn't like a cup of water. You can't drain it. It's more like an endless well, and the more you love, the more it pumps out. ~ Ann Aguirre

We in the press like to say we're honest brokers of information, and it's just not true. The press does have an agenda. ~ Bernard Goldberg

I write because I admire the act of rationalization, of seeking clarity in one's understanding of the complexities of life, and I'm bad at it. I'm slow. Writing, which is an arduous and slow process, proceeds at the same rate as my sloth-like mind. ~ Gregory Maguire

Just when I despaired -- she was there, filling me as a melody fills a cottage. I was with her, running beside the Acis when we were a child. I knew the ancient villa moated by a dark lake, the view through the dusty windows of the belvedere, and the secret space in the odd angle between two rooms where we sat at noon to read by candlelight. I knew the life of the Autarch's court, where poison waited in a diamond cup. I learned what it was for one who had never seen a cell or felt a whip to be a prisoner of the torturers, what dying meant, and death.

I learned that I had been more to her than I had ever guessed, and at last fell into a sleep in which my dreams were all of her. Not memories merely -- memories I had possessed in plenty before. I held her poor, cold hands in mine, and I no longer wore the rags of an apprentice, nor the fuligin of a journeyman. We were one, naked and happy and clean, and we knew that she was no more and that I still lived, and we struggled against neither of those things, but with woven hair read from a single book and talked and sang of other matters. ~ Gene Wolfe

[I]t seems to me that a lot of the stranger ideas people have about medicine derive from an emotional struggle with the very notion of a pharmaceutical industry. Whatever our political leanings, we all feel nervous about profit taking any role in the caring professions, but that feeling has nowhere to go. Big pharma is evil; I would agree with that premise. But because people don't understand exactly how big pharma is evil, their anger gets diverted away from valid criticisms - its role in distorting data, for example, or withholding lifesaving AIDS drugs from the developing world - and channeled into infantile fantasies. "Big pharma is evil," goes the line of reasoning; "therefore homeopathy works and the MMR vaccine causes autism." This is probably not helpful. ~ Ben Goldacre

He was beautiful.
Whatever else he was, Sage was by far the most magnetic man I had ever seen. I had felt it in my dreams, and it was even more true in real life. I welcomed the chance to study him without his knowledge.
He glanced up, and I quickly closed my eyes, feigning sleep. Had he seen me? The scratching stopped. He was looking at me, I knew it. I held my breath and willed my eyes not to pop open and see if he was staring.
Finally the scratching started up again. I forced myself to slowly count to ten before I opened my eyelids the tiniest bit and peeked through my lashes.
Good-he wasn't looking at me.
I opened my eyes a little wider. What was he doing? Moving only my eyes, I glanced down at the dirt floor in front of him…
…and saw a picture of me, fast asleep.
It was incredible. I could see his tools laid out beside the picture: rocks in several sizes and shapes, a couple of twigs…the most rudimentary materials, and yet what he was etching into the floor wouldn't look out of place on an art gallery wall. It was beautiful…far more beautiful than I thought I actually looked in my sleep. Is that how he saw me?
Sage lifted his head again, and I shut my eyes. I imagined him studying me, taking careful note of my features and filtering them through his own senses. My heartbeat quickened, and it took all my willpower to remain still.
"You can keep pretending to be asleep if you'd like, but I don't see a career for you as an actres ~ Hilary Duff

Today the strategies of many companies in the real estate industry are premised on low interest rates, an assumption that has resulted in the rapid expansion of the real estate securitization business. This trend could be regarded as a risk factor, as it exposes the real estate sector to at least three potential problems: first, interest rate hikes; second, revisions to securitization business accounting standards; and third, overheating in the real estate market. ~ Akira Mori

All lives are difficult; what makes some of them fulfilled as well is the manner in which pains have been met. Every pain is an indistinct signal that something is wrong, which may engender either a good or bad result depending on the sagacity and strength of mind of the sufferer. Anxiety may precipitate panic, or an accurate analysis of what is amiss. A sense of injustice may lead to murder, or to a ground-breaking work of economic theory. Envy may lead to bitterness, or to a decision to compete with a rival and the production of a masterpiece. As ~ Alain De Botton

I won't close down a business of subnormal profitability merely to add a fraction of a point to our corporate returns. I also feel it inappropriate for even an exceptionally profitable company to fund an operation once it appears to have unending losses in prospect. Adam Smith would disagree with my first proposition and Karl Marx would disagree with my second; the middle ground is the only position that leaves me comfortable. ~ Warren Buffett

It's a little-known secret, and it should probably stay that way: attempting suicide usually jump-starts your brain chemistry. There must be something about taking all those pills that either floods the brain sufficiently or depletes it so completely that balance is restored. Whatever the mechanism, the result is that you emerge on the other side of the attempt with an awareness of what it means to be alive. Simple acts seem miraculous: you can stand transfixed for hours just watching the wind ruffle the tiny hairs along the top of your arm. And always, with every sensation, is the knowledge that you must have survived for a reason. You just can't doubt it anymore. You must have a purpose, or you would have died. You have the rest of your life to discover what that purpose is. And you can't wait to start looking. ~ Terri Cheney

Writing is an adventure. ~ Winston Churchill

CHARACTER of the HAPPY WARRIOR. Who is the happy Warrior? Who is he Whom every Man in arms should wish to be? - It is the generous Spirit, who, when brought Among the tasks of real life, hath wrought Upon the plan that pleased his childish thought: Whose high endeavours are an inward light That make the path before him always bright: Who, with a natural instinct to discern What knowledge can perform, is diligent to learn; Abides by this resolve, and stops not there, 10 But makes his moral being his prime care; Who, doom'd to go in company with Pain, And Fear, and Bloodshed, miserable train! ~ William Wordsworth

It's time to step back and reexamine our hatred and let wrath subside. Are we striking out against the real problems: ignorance, fear, want, greed, and political disenfranchisement or just trying to find the most immediate scapegoat on which to lay the blame? Are we so busy blaming our fellow Hobbits that we've forgotten who is really behind the fouling of our Shire? Are we personally guilty of greed? Most of us are, to an extent. We need to reexamine our own desires, and make sure they are really needs instead of just wants. Poverty could be wiped out world wide, if enough modern Hobbits just said, "No! We will not stand for it anymore," or if those at the top of the economic ladder really wanted to do so. ~ Steve Bivans

And something else came back, from that later first morning at Kensington Park Gardens: a sense that the house was not only an enhancement of Toby's interest but a compensation for his lack of it. ~ Alan Hollinghurst

Love is Not an illusion. It's a Rarer Find & Harder to Cultivate. ~ Matthew Edward Hall

You're not a priority if you're an option, you are a percentage. A percentage of that other person's time and effort. The size of the pie never changes, the slices do. ~ Tyconis D. Allison Ty

Irony serves as an alibi for a fetish. ~ Nathaniel Wing

Looking at morning dew serenading on the petals of flowers is an ecstatic moment! This makes us realise that it is the simple pleasures of life that give us the most happiness! ~ Avijeet Das

Must the Earth forever be arranged like an ocean steamer, with large, luxurious rooms and luxurious food for a select few, and underneath in the steerage, where the great mass can barely breathe from dirt and the poisonous air? ~ Various

The contents of this letter threw Elizabeth into a flutter of spirits in which it was difficult to determine whether pleasure or pain bore the greatest share. The vague and unsettled suspicions which uncertainty had produced of what Mr. Darcy might have been doing to forward her sister's match which she had feared to encourage as an exertion of goodness too great to be probable and at the same time dreaded to be just from the pain of obligation were proved beyond their greatest extent to be true He had followed them purposely to town he had taken on himself all the trouble and mortification attendant on such a research in which supplication had been necessary to a woman whom he must abominate and despise and where he was reduced to meet frequently meet reason with persuade and finally bribe the man whom he always most wished to avoid and whose very name it was punishment to him to pronounce. He had done all this for a girl whom he could neither regard nor esteem. Her heart did whisper that he had done it for her. But it was a hope shortly checked by other considerations and she soon felt that even her vanity was insufficient when required to depend on his affection for her - for a woman who had already refused him - as able to overcome a sentiment so natural as abhorrence against relationship with Wickham. Brother-in-law of Wickham Every kind of pride must revolt from the connection. He had to be sure done much. She was ashamed to think how much. But he had given a reason for ~ Jane Austen

Unfortunately, there is no rule saying a city must be a nice place to live in order to attract fast population and economic growth. Parks, good governance, and smoothly flowing traffic are optional, not required. Sometimes cities grow at an astonishing rate, despite being hell on Earth. ~ Laurence C. Smith

The distinction of being without an honour is becoming a rare and valuable one and should not become extinct. ~ Robert Peel

A lot of people say, 'I always knew Lucky Luciano as a very smooth, very elegant, very powerful man.' All the accounts of him as an older man were that he was very genteel but he still had the look of smothered violence behind his eyes. ~ Vincent Piazza

I'm part of an industry that everybody wants to be a part of. I do hang out with a lot of sort of powerful, interesting people like Bella Freud or Jay Joplin or Tracey Emin. I'm part of that group of people. Brit artists who are doing things. That's what I do. Some of them happen to be aristocrats. ~ Duncan Roy

As we have throughout this century, we will lead with the power of our example, but be prepared, when necessary, to make an example of our power. ~ William J. Clinton

an eyebrow. "No worries, man. I wouldn't miss it for the world. ~ Melissa Foster

It's an open horizon before us, as far as the eye can see: no angst and no games, just mutual delight. So simple, but so rich. Like chocolate. Not a gold-dusted truffle or a foofy pastry tower teetering on a crystal platter, but a plain, honest bar of the best chocolate in the world. ~ Laini Taylor

I snagged a golden paper crown from one of the bags, and idly joined it into a circle and put it on my head. Susan blinked at me and let out a brief laugh. 'I am' I intoned with an imperious narrowing of my eyes, 'the burger king. ~ Jim Butcher

Xav sprinkled olive oil on his lettuce. 'Lola was very particular that it all had to fit properly.'
'Lola?' squeaked Diamond. I wanted to warn her not to rise to the bait Xav was dangling in front of her but it was too late.
Xav added some Parmesan and pepper. 'Suspicious, Diamond? You should be. This is a bachelor party I'm organizing, not a school outing, and it is going to tick all of Trace's boxes. Lola is either a very efficient water sports instructor or an exotic dancing girl; I'll leave it your imagination.'
I rolled my eyes at Diamond. 'Myabe she's both. I mean the guys will really go for that, I guess. Don't worry,Di, Luigi and his crew will not disappoint us girls.' Luigi was in fact Contessa Nicoletta's little bespectacled chef with whom I had been consulting about the menu for Friday, but the Benedicts weren't to know that. 'He has promised to provide something suitably spicy for our tastes. ~ Joss Stirling

I've always believed that the director does whatever the hell he wants. That's what you sign on for as an actor - I can't stand it when you have actors who are trying to leverage directors into doing things they don't want to do. ~ Christian Bale

I have heard it said
There is an art which in their piedness shares
With great creating nature. ~ William Shakespeare

I think that the resistance against Darwin is not just the difficulty of seeing the power of a spectacularly beautiful explanation: it is the fear of realizing the extraordinary power that such an explanation has in shattering rests of old world views. ~ Carlo Rovelli

I tilted my head up and asked, "What would you do if I kissed you right now?"
He pretended to think about it for an obnoxious amount of time before saying, "I would kiss you back. ~ Michelle Hodkin

Apology Letter from the Brain
Hey there. I'm sorry. OK? But can I say something? Look. I admit I wasn't perfect. No one is perfect. That's a fact. Speaking of facts, don't you think we all need to take a minute and decide who is right and who is wrong? Every side is different; it's just that my side seems more right. I'm not just saying that because it's my side. I think a lot of other people would agree with me, given the chance. If I upset you in some way, please know that wasn't my intention. I didn't know how sensitive you were. It's obvious I can set you off very easily. That's not an insult; it's just an observation. I think it would help if we talked about this more and argued about who was telling the truth. I would like to see you in person and tell you how the situation has affected me. I may use this opportunity to bring up other times you have hurt me in the past. If possible, I would like to hurt you back. Either way, I want to be in control. Until then, take care. And please, remember I reached out first.
I remain,
THE BRAIN

Apology Letter from the Heart
Hey there. I'm sorry. I've found it hard to tell you this, and I realize my apology may be too little or come too late. It is important for me to let you know that I am sorry for what I did or said or didn't do or say. I was wrong. I make mistakes. I HATE that I made one with you. I'm reaching out because life goes by so fast and I just don't want my one life to go by without expr ~ Amy Poehler

By the way, I haven't heard an 'I'm sorry' from you yet." My sense of grievance had overwhelmed my sense of self-preservation.
I am sorry that the maenad picked on you."
I glared at him. "Not enough," I said. I was trying hard to hang on to this conversation.
Angelic Sookie, vision of love and beauty, I am prostrate that the wicked evil maenad violated your smooth and voluptuous body, in an attempt to deliver a message to me."
That's more like it. ~ Charlaine Harris

He gave me a wink and a crooked smile, and I was left there, grinning like an idiot. ~ Kiera Cass

No matter how much women prefer to lean, to be protected and supported, nor how much men desire to have them do so, they must make the voyage of life alone, and for safety in an emergency they must know something of the laws of navigation. ~ Elizabeth Cady Stanton