Getting Better In The Off Season Quotes

He adopted his standard mocking approach. "Having trouble getting out of the pool, Lily? There's a ladder on the side for the old ladies who come and do aqua aerobics."
Everything inside her stilled. That condescending wretch. She felt him come closer, and was careful not to stir an inch, not even a hair.
"You should get out of the pool and take a long hot shower. It'll make you feel better," he suggested, not ungently. His brow furrowed with worry.
She ignored the thread of concern in his voice and concentrated on not moving too suddenly. Slowly, as if in unbearable agony, she lifted her head. He was dressed once more in his khakis and shirt, his sneakers were in one hand, his gear bag in the other. Good. She let her face crumble, her expression slip into wretchedness. Her lower lip trembled, a special added effect. "I - I'm not sure I can even make it to the ladder," she confessed haltingly. "My whole body's shot."
Damn, she must be hurting worse than he'd imagined. Trying not to stare at her lush lower lip quivering helplessly, Sean dropped his gear bag and stepped forward. "Here," he said, leaning over, stretching out his hand. "Grab my hand. I'll pull you out."
She'd braced her feet against the wall of the pool, knowing she'd have to strike fast. They grasped hands. The second his tightened about her forearm, she jerked backward with all her strength.
Physics were on her side.
Caught off balance, Sean somersaulted through the air, with ~ Laura Moore

I used to have a crow named Albert. Bertie, when I got to know him better. I got him when he was just a little guy and had him for years. A young crow doesn't navigate well and they'll sometimes crash-land. They're called branchers at that age-that's about all they can do, lumber awkwardly from branch to branch. Sometimes they get stuck and they wail like babies until you get 'em down. Bertie must have bitten off a bit more than he could chew and he'd tumbled to the ground. I had a cat named Little John who brought him in, squawking hellishly. LJ and I had a tussle to see who was going to take possession. Fortunately for Bertie, I won the contest. He and the cat became friends later, but it was touch-and-go for a while there. LJ was pissed off because he thought this was Thanksgiving dinner and I was getting in his way (Dietz) ~ Sue Grafton

When it passes us, the driver tips his cap our way, eying us as if he thinks we're up to no good-the kind of no good he might call the cops on. I wave to him and smile, wondering if I look as guilty as I feel. Better make this the quickest lesson in driving history. It's not like she needs to pass the state exam. If she can keep the car straight for ten seconds in a row, I've upheld my end of the deal.
I turn off the ignition and look at her. "So, how are you and Toraf doing?"
She cocks her head at me. "What does that have to do with driving?"
Aside from delaying it? "Nothing," I say, shrugging. "Just wondering."
She pulls down the visor and flips open the mirror. Using her index finger, she unsmudges the mascara Rachel put on her. "Not that it's your business, but we're fine. We were always fine."
"He didn't seem to think so."
She shoots me a look. "He can be oversensitive sometimes. I explained that to him."
Oversensitive? No way. She's not getting off that easy. "He's a good kisser," I tell her, bracing myself.
She turns in her seat, eyes narrowed to slits. "You might as well forget about that kiss, Emma. He's mine, and if you put your nasty Half-Breed lips on him again-"
"Now who's being oversensitive?" I say, grinning. She does love him.
"Switch places with me," she snarls. But I'm too happy for Toraf to return the animosity.
Once she's in the driver's seat, her attitude changes. She bounces up and down like she's ma ~ Anna Banks

Every peasant cuisine has incredible ingenious tricks for getting a lot of nutrition out of a small amount of ingredients. There are people who don't have the money to invest in better food, but perhaps they have the time. There's a trade-off: The more time you're willing to put into food preparation, the less money you have to spend. ~ Michael Pollan

Getting back to Audrey, though, I should really feel complimented that she won't ever touch me because she likes me more than anyone else. It makes perfect sense, really, doesn't it?
If she ever gets down or depressed, i can make out the figure of her through the front window of the shack. She comes in and we drink cheap beer or wine and watch a movie or all three. Something old and long like Ben-Hur that stretches into the night. She'll be next to me on the couch in her flannel shirt and jeans that have been cut into shorts,and eventually, when she's asleep, I'll bring a blanket out and cover her up.
I kiss her cheek.
I stroke her hair.
I think of how she lives alone, just like me, and how she never had any real family, and how she only has sex with people. She never lets any love get in the way. I think she had a family once, but it was one of those beat-the-crap-out-of-each-other situations. There's no shortage of them around here. I think she loved them and all she ever did was hurt her.
That's why she refuses to love.
Anybody.
I guess she feels better off that way, and who can blame her?
When she sleeps on my couch, I think about all that. Everytime. I cover her up, then go to the bed and dream.
With my eyes open. ~ Markus Zusak

Love isn't easy, but it shouldn't be this complicated. I hate the fact that I'm falling in love with him. I hate the fact that once this is over with, I will be just a memory to him, and he will live for thousands of years." Sarah

"Sarah deserves better; a human, not a ghoul who has all these problems. It's pathetic to depend on magic to get rid of your demons." Eric

"Every time I am around Eric, I feel more acutely attracted to him. I don't know if that's part of his powers, but I don't want him having that effect on me." Sarah

"Death affects us in so many ways. When you want to move on from the person you mourn, it feels like you are trying to forget about them." Sarah

"I miss Sarah's laugh, the scent of her, the dimples in her cheeks, her drilling me with questions about everything, and I even miss her getting mad at me for trying to get her to try new stuff. I remember the first night we spent together when I made her jump off the cliff with me. I knew she was mine; I knew I wanted to bond with her. I just regret the fact I didn't do it sooner." Eric ~ J.M. Stoneback

By the end of the seventies, some nights I was so out of it our road manager, Joe Baptista, would have to carry me onstage. The promoter would be sitting there in the dressing room with a look of horror on his face. I'm almost comatose, he's hyper-ventilating. He thinks he's presenting the legendary cash cow Aerosmith, and now he's going to lose his shirt because the lead singer's down for the count. Is he dead or alive? What am I going to do? "You'd better get him on that stage. I don't know how he's going to do this how, but we've got too many kids out there."

Not to worry. The minute my feet hit the stage, I'm off and running. I don't know how it happens, but hey, you get up there in front of twenty thousand people and it's a high in itself, it's a charged space.

Still, the train kept a rollin' and we kept getting high until one night in late '78, I don't know where we were, maybe in Springfield, Illinois, I blacked out in the middle of "Reefer Headed Woman."

I got a reefer headed woman
She fell right down from the sky
Well, I gots to drink me two fifths of whiskey
Just to get half as high
When the -

And then I hit the stage like a fish out of water. ~ Steven Tyler

The calamities that are constantly being reported - battles, massacres, famines, revolutions - tend to inspire in the average person a feeling of unreality. One has no way of verifying the facts, one is not even fully certain that they have happened, and one is always presented with totally different interpretations from different sources. Probably the truth is discoverable, but the facts will be so dishonestly set forth in almost any newspaper that the ordinary reader can be forgiven either for swallowing lies or for failing to form an opinion. The general uncertainty as to what is really happening makes it easier to cling to lunatic beliefs. Since nothing is ever quite proved or disproved, the most unmistakable fact can be impudently denied. Moreover, although endlessly brooding on power, victory, defeat, revenge, the nationalist is often somewhat uninterested in what happens in the real world. What he wants is to feel that his own unit is getting the better of some other unit, and he can more easily do this by scoring off an adversary than by examining the facts to see whether they support him. ~ George Orwell

May be, Churchill had pointed out, I should stop trying so hard not to love Hardy, and accept the some part of me might always want him. "Some things," he said, "you just have to learn to live with."
"But you can't love someone new without getting over the last one."
"Why not?"
"Because then the new relationship is compromised."
Seeming amused, Churchill said that every relationship was compromised in one way or the other, and you were better off not picking at the edges of it.
I disagreed. I felt I needed to let Hardy go completely. I just didn't know how. I hoped someday I might meet someone so compelling that I could take the risk of loving again. But I had serious doubts such a man existed. ~ Lisa Kleypas

I missed you," I said.
"Missed you, too. Welcome home."
We moved in to hug each other, then I sprang back seconds before getting smushed against his still-sopping-wet sweater.
"Ben!"
"Ooh, poor form on my part," he said, and peeled off his sodden sweater. He wore a thin white T-shirt underneath. The coffee spill had left the shirt a bit damp, and it clung slightly to his chest in a way that made me stare and caught my voice in my throat.
That was ridiculous, of course. Ben and I had the kind of friendship where we talked about things like that. I could tease him about his suddenly well-toned body; he'd make some kind of self-effacing joke and parry by bringing up something absurd he'd seen about me in a magazine...
But I didn't say a word. And I didn't stop looking. Clearly I was in a sleep-deprived haze.
"You could still try the coffee," he offered. "There's plenty in the sweater. I can just wring it right into the mug."
I shook off my reverie. "Tempting offer, but no thanks. You really need to give up on the coffee thing. I'm never converting from tea."
"We'll see," he said. He set the wet sweater on the hand towel, then turned to me with his arms out. "Better?"
"Much," I said, and closed the distance between us so he could fold me into his arms.
"Hel-lo! Please tell me I'm interrupting something!" It was Rayna, and at the sound of her voice, Ben and I sheepishly pulled apart. Again, ridiculous. Hugging was nothing unus ~ Hilary Duff

Last night felt good." He chuckled. "Not watching you jerk off, though that was fucking hot, but before that, when you were sleeping between me and Boris. I liked that."
A knot formed in Hans's chest, making it difficult to speak.
"So did Boris," Thomas insisted. "I know he did. Then he started worrying about you getting between me and him. He did what he did because he needed to prove I still belonged to him."
"I already fucking know that!" Hans snapped. He lowered his voice. "I know you have your special things I can't be a part of, like speaking to each other in Russian, and kissing and hugging, and all the things I wish I could do with you…." He stopped himself. He was overstepping again. "I shouldn't have said that. I've only known you guys for like two months. But I like being here. I'm lucky you haven't fired me for what I did last night, considering how much it upset Boris."
He tried to turn pull away, embarrassed, but Thomas wouldn't let go. "Boris and I have things that tie us together - things that do make me his - but despite all that, I think we both want to build something with you too."
Hans huffed out a breath. "I'm not sure how I feel about him now."
"Like I said, there will be bad days. He can't help it, other than to keep taking his meds and going to therapy. He's so much better than he was, when I met him in Russia. You have no idea!"
Hans settled into the embrace, reveling in the feel of Thomas's warm, soft skin. ~ Jamie Fessenden

Real consciousness is touch. Thought is getting out of touch.

The crux of the whole problem lies here, in the duality of man's consciousness. Touch, the being in touch, is the basis of all consciousness, and it is the basis of enduring happiness. Thought is a secondary form of consciousness, Mind is a secondary form of existence, a getting out of touch, a standing clear, in order to come to a better adjustment in touch.

Man, poor man, has to learn to function in these two ways of consciousness. When a man is in touch, he is non-mental, his mind is quiescent, his bodily centres are active. When a man's mind is active in real mental activity, the bodily centres are quiescent, switched off, the man is out of touch. The animals remain always in touch. And man, poor modern man, with his worship of his own god, which is his own mind glorified, is permanently out of touch. To be always irrevocably in touch is to feel sometimes imprisoned. But to be permanently out of touch is at last excruciatingly painful, it is a state of being nothing, and being nowhere, and at the same time being conscious and capable of extreme discomfort and ennui. ~ D.H. Lawrence

He took the soap from me, and turned it in his hand to capture its lather. Then he ran his fingers up and down my scarred arm, gentle. It was, in some ways, even better than being kissed by him. He had no fragile illusions about my goodness, destined to shatter when he found out the truth. But he accepted me anyway. Cared about me anyway.
"Okay," I said. "I'm done, I think."
Akos stood, holding my hands, and lifted me as I came to my feet. Water ran down my legs and back. As I fastened the armor around my forearm again, he found a towel in one of the cabinets, then pieced together clothes for me--the pants from Isae, underwear from Cisi, one of his own shirts and a pair of his socks, my still-intact boots. I looked at the pile of clothes with some dismay. It was one thing for him to see me in my underwear, but to help me take it off…
Well. If that was going to happen, I wanted it to be under different circumstances.
"Cisi," Akos said. He was also staring at the pile of clothes. "Maybe you should help with this part."
"Thank you," I said to him.
He smiled. "It's getting really hard to keep my eyes on your face."
I made a face at him as he left. ~ Veronica Roth

I am realizing people hurt in different ways. No pain looks the same. They don't laugh at the same jokes. They stop tending to the garden. Leave all the lights off. Pick at their fingernails.
I try not to focus on what their hurt looks like so much anymore, but what still remains the same; their perfume, their favorite colors and hiding places, and what it means to feel better. Getting out of bed. A good, warm lunch at the diner. Curling their hair or doing the dishes.
Regardless of what sadness looks like, wearing their body like old clothes, I watch the way they come back to themselves, every time. Granting what time they need for themselves. Undressing the loneliness. Filling the absence.
How gorgeous it is to watch someone be well. ~ Schuyler Peck

Design is not limited to fancy new gadgets. Our family just bought a new washing machine and dryer. We didn't have a very good one so we spent a little time looking at them. It turns out that the Americans make washers and dryers all wrong. The Europeans make them much better – but they take twice as long to do clothes! It turns out that they wash them with about a quarter as much water and your clothes end up with a lot less detergent on them. Most important, they don't trash your clothes. They use a lot less soap, a lot less water, but they come out much cleaner, much softer, and they last a lot longer. We spent some time in our family talking about what's the trade-off we want to make. We ended up talking a lot about design, but also about the values of our family. Did we care most about getting our wash done in an hour versus an hour and a half? Or did we care most about our clothes feeling really soft and lasting longer? Did we care about using a quarter of the water? We spent about two weeks talking about this every night at the dinner table. We'd get around to that old washer-dryer discussion. And the talk was about design. We ended up opting for these Miele appliances, made in Germany. They're too expensive, but that's just because nobody buys them in this country. They are really wonderfully made and one of the few products we've bought over the last few years that we're all really happy about. These guys really thought the process through. They did such a great job ~ Steve Jobs

I would rather have come to Baltimore than the Yankees. You look at their situation, they're the kingpin and you want to be that underdog that knocks them off the top. That's pretty much the situation I've been in my whole career. It just makes for a better season when you knock the big guys off the top. ~ Albert Belle

I didn't understand at the time why Vince was so interested in teaching me life lessons when all I was trying to do was get my video played. But now I think it's because he saw a little bit of himself in me. Just like me, he was a rebel who listened to no one and did whatever it took to get the job done, pissing people off with his stubbornness and drive in the process. Therefore, he was trying to teach me how to better myself instead of repeatedly getting into trouble by rubbing people the wrong way. ~ Chris Jericho

I suppose you have a perfectly good reason for destroying my sign?" Jericho appeared beside me. "I had to paint the bloody thing myself," he said pissily. "There's not a sign-maker left in the city. I have better things to do than paint."
I gaped. Jericho Barrons was standing beside me.
Inside my head.
I shook it, half expecting him to be knocked off his feet and go rattling around.
He remained standing, urbane and implacable as ever.
"This isn't possible," I told him. "You can't be here. This is my head."
"You push into mine. I merely projected an image with the push this time, to give you something to look at." He gave me a faint smile. "Wasn't easy getting in. You give a whole new meaning to 'rock head.'"
I laughed. I couldn't help it. He invaded my thoughts and gave me guff even here.
"I found you standing in the street, staring at the sign over the bookstore. Tried talking to you but you didn't respond. Thought I'd better take a look around. What are you doing, Mac?" he said softly - Barrons at his most alert and dangerous.
My laughter died and tears sprang to my eyes. He was in my head. I saw little point in hiding anything. He could take a good look around and see the truth for himself.
"I didn't get the spell." My voice broke. I'd failed him. I hated myself for that. He'd never failed me.
"I know."
My gaze flicked to his face, bewildered. "You . . . know?"
"I knew it was a lie the moment you said it."
Karen Marie Moning

If Scientologists are happy in the church, I say God bless. Honestly, it's probably better for them to keep getting jerked off in the church, because they will never experience that kind of validation in the real world. ~ Leah Remini

The rain beat against the windows and against the tin roof of the hotel. It came down in hissing roars, then in whispers, then in loud shishes like sandpaper rubbed against wood. She drank the second glassful, climbed off the bed and began undressing, and then we were together, the cheap naked bulb still blazing down on the bed.

Thinking back, I remember the stupidest things; the way there was a taut crease just above her hips, in the small of her back. The way she smelled like a baby's breath, a sweet barely there smell that retreated and retreated, so that no matter how close you got to it you weren't sure it was there. The brown speckles in the lavender-gray eyes, floating very close to the surface when I kissed her, the eyes wide open and aware. But not caring. The eyes of a gourmet offered a stale chunk of bread, using it of necessity but not tasting it any more than necessary.

I remember getting up and coming back to her, and of throwing a shoe at the light bulb, later, when the whisky was gone. I remember the smell of rain-darkness in the room and her telling me I'd cut my feet on the light-bulb glass on the floor. And how she said I was no better than a tramp myself, that I made love to the cadence of the raingusts on the roof, and it was true I was doing just that, but it seemed the natural thing then. And I felt so marvelously clean and soaped and so in tune with the whole damned universe that I had the feeling I could have clouded up and rai ~ Elliott Chaze

Because I made a promise. A promise to my friend that I would see her kingdom freed." She shoved her scarred palm into his face. "I made an unbreakable vow. And you and Maeve - all you gods-damned bastards - are getting in the way of that." She went off down the hillside again. He followed.
"And what of your own people? What of your own kingdom?"
"They are better off without me, just as you said."
His tattoo scrunched as he snarled. "So you'd save another land, but not yours. Why can't your friend save her own kingdom?"
"Because she is dead!" She screamed the last word so loudly it burned in her throat. "Because she is dead, and I am left with my worthless life!"
He merely stared at her with that animal stillness. When she walked away, he didn't come after her. ~ Sarah J. Maas

And yeah, put out as I can be with Mama 'bout a lotta things, I gotta admit she gets all the credit for getting me interested in cooking when I was just knee-high to a grasshopper. Gladys never seemed to give a damn about it when we were kids, which I guess is why she and that family of hers nourish themselves today mainly on KFC and Whoppers and junk like that. But me, I couldn't keep my eyes off Mama when she'd fix a mess of short ribs, or cut out perfect rounds of buttermilk biscuit dough with a juice glass, or spread a thick, real shiny caramel icing over her 1-2-3-4 cakes. And I can remember like it was yesterday (must have been about 4 years old at the time) when she first let me help her bake cookies, especially the same jelly treats I still make today and could eat by the dozen if I didn't now have better control.
"Honey, start opening those jars on the counter," she said while she creamed butter and sugar with her Sunbeam electric hand mixer in the same wide, chipped bowl she used to make for biscuit dough. Strawberry, peach, and mint- the flavors never varied for Mama's jelly treats, and just the idea of making these cookies with anything but jelly and jam she'd put up herself the year before would have been inconceivable to Mama. ~ James Villas

How could Digital's collapse be so precipitous? It's because, in many ways, financial performance data is misleading. As you move up to the top of the market, you're getting rid of the less profitable products at the low end and adding business with more attractive margins at the high end. The rate of unit volume growth might be tapering off as you pursue these smaller markets, but your margins actually look better. So Wall Street rewards your stock price until you hit the ceiling. ~ Clayton Christensen

Oh, this was getting better and better. Beau was making a valiant effort to remain stoic, but his face betrayed the long-suffering look of someone who had to listen to something patently idiotic.
"What happened next?" an older female voice asked.
"We got up to leave, and the girl wanted to come with us, and the first black guy, he, like, got up and he was all, 'You're not leaving!' and we were all like, 'Yes we are,' and then I threw some chicken at them so they'd know we meant business, and the white kid who was with them, he picked up Chad and threw him through the window."
Drunk knights in shining armor, protecting the hapless female from the clutches of scary black guys. Give me a break.
"Then what happened?" the older female asked.
"Then they left and went up the street. And Chad was like, 'We can't let them get away with this shit,' so we followed them. And I said, 'Hey! What do you think you're doing with that throwing people through windows and shit.' And the white guy said, 'You must like going through windows.' And I told him 'Fuck you' in a polite voice and he threw me through the window."
Beau clicked the recorder off.
"It's good that he used his polite voice," I said. "Otherwise no telling what would've happened. ~ Ilona Andrews

You're out there, Lespere. It's all over. It's just as if it had never happened, isn't it?"
"No."
"When anything's over, it's just like it never happened. Where's your life any better than mine, now? Now is what counts. Is it any better? Is it?"
"Yes, it's better!"
"How?"
"Because I got my thoughts, I remember!" cried Lespere, far away, indignant, holding his memories to his chest with both hands.
And he was right. With a feeling of cold water rushing through his head and body, Hollis knew he was right. There were differences between memories and dreams. He had only dreams of things he wanted to do, while Lespere had memories of things done and accomplished. And thus knowledge began to pull Hollis apart in slow, quivering precision.
"What good does it do you?" he cried to Lespere. "Now? When a thing's over it's not good any more. You're no better off than me."
"I'm resting easy," said Lespere. "I've had my turn. I'm not getting mean at the end, like you. ~ Ray Bradbury

I have never felt comfortable around people who talk about their feelings for Jesus, or any other deity for that matter, because they are usually none too bright ... Or maybe "stupid" is a better way of saying it; but I have never seen much point in getting heavy with either stupid people or Jesus freaks, just as long as they don't bother me. In a world as weird and cruel as this one we have made for ourselves, I figure anybody who can find peace and personal happiness without ripping off somebody else deserves to be left alone. They will not inherit the earth, but then neither will I. ~ Hunter S. Thompson

(About importance of focusing on one sport at a time) I've never tried to do that, we have more of a holistic approach. We want to become better decathletes and better competitors. I think for us that means just toeing the line at whatever it is we're doing that day and being confident in preparing as best as we can. Later in the year, late in the season when we have all of the thousands of reps under our belt, we can try to maybe focus on one or two things and leave some stuff off one week. Really, we like to keep everything inside the routine and part of the process. ~ Trey Hardee

From: "Chris Kyle"
Date: December 25, 2010 at 12:55:57 AM EST

I appreciate your upbringing and your respect. My dad would have kicked my ass if I didn't call everyone sir or Mr. until they notified me otherwise. So I am telling you, my name is Chris. Please no more sir bullshit.
I went to college right out of high school, but did not finish. Sometimes I regret that. Now that I am out, I could really use the degree. Even if you think you will retire from the service, like I did, there is life after the military. I joined at 24 years old. I had some mental maturity over my teammates due to joining later. I also got to enjoy my youth. One thing about being a SEAL, you age fast. I was only in for eleven years, but I spent over half that time in a combat zone. Unlike other combat units, SEALs in a combat zone are operating. That means getting shot at on a daily basis. I had a baby face when I joined, and within two years, I looked as if I had aged 10 years. I am not in any way talking you out of joining. I loved my time, and if I hadn't gotten married and had two kids, I would still be in. Unforeseen events will come at you in life. Your plants today will not be the same in four years. I am just trying to prep you for what is to come. I sit in an office or train other people on a range all day, every day. I would much rather be in Afghanistan being shot at again. I love the job and still miss it today. There is no better friendship than what the teams will off ~ Taya Kyle

And her. What would she do without him?

She's not special, not like BB and Ghostly, who awe her with their intelligence and the things they're capable of, all their humbling potential. All she does is write - a lot - because it's fun. She's under no illusions, she's popular through quantity not quality, she's not bad but she is not Blackbindings and she never will be. She writes because it's fun. And she thinks about him, and what he does.

She works three jobs she hates, just to keep the bills paid. She wanted to get into journalism but she can't afford the internships. She already sees what her life will be like, she sees the path ahead, she knows there's no way off; she'll never not be working three dead end jobs she hates, she'll marry her boyfriend and unless there's an accident they'll decide almost too late that fuck it they'd better have those kids now or never, because they never will be able to afford them; she'll never do anything amazing, never be anything amazing, just a person in a world full of people, getting by.

But there's him. And every time she faces life and thinks she can't bear it, there's him. If he can be so brave, can't she manage the littlest bravery? Because - because her little pointless life that will never mean anything, that will have vanished beyond notice within hardly more than a hundred years if she has those kids to remember her, her dragging, struggling life of bills and broken pipes and fuck it it's anothe ~ Rainjoy

What happened to you?" she asked.
"Bullets hurt," he said. "It missed the artificial arm by two inches, damn the marksman. I hate people who can't shoot straight."
"How many this time?" she asked with a smile.
"Just one," he said. "In the shoulder. It's much better now." He shook his head. "I'm getting too old for this. I've got so many broken bones that I can't move fast enough anymore."
She smiled wider. "Someday you'll find a woman who's worth giving up the danger for." The smile faded. "You're like Tate. He loves his work. He probably lives on adrenaline. Funny. I never understood that before. Now suddenly everything is clear. I was living on pipe dreams."
He sighed. "It was more than his heritage that kept him away from you," he said. "I knew, but I couldn't explain it to you. Work like ours demands sacrifice. Any loved one can become a hostage. Any relationship can take away the edge we need when we're under fire. A man with something to lose isn't a man to send on a potential suicide mission. Take your mind off the objective for one minute, and you're dead. ~ Diana Palmer

I fear that I can no longer travel without technology. Twenty years ago, I loved getting on a bus in West Africa and taking off for a city I'd never been to before, relying on advice from out-of-date travel books and fellow passengers on the bus. Now, I end up using TripAdvisor, Yelp, and Google Maps. I probably eat and sleep better when I'm on the road, but I miss the mystery of travel when it was more random and unpredictable. ~ Ethan Zuckerman

Today, these doormen, they wear body armour, armoured gloves, stab proof vests and all sorts; it's totally changed, you get shot at the door you are paid to stand at, never mind getting stabbed. Druggies go away, get a gun, return and start shooting at you! Yeah, times are changing fast and there are some nice kids out there and some of them are fucking wild. I can't see it getting better with these drug mugs because they get on them and they can't get off them again. ~ Stephen Richards

History favors the bold. Compensation favors the meek. As a Fortune 500 company CEO, you're better off taking the path often traveled and staying the course. Big companies may have more assets to innovate with, but they rarely take big risks or innovate at the cost of cannibalizing a current business. Neither would they chance alienating suppliers or investors. They play not to lose, and shareholders reward them for it - until those shareholders walk and buy Amazon stock. Most boards ask management: "How can we build the greatest advantage for the least amount of capital/investment?" Amazon reverses the question: "What can we do that gives us an advantage that's hugely expensive, and that no one else can afford?" Why? Because Amazon has access to capital with lower return expectations than peers. Reducing shipping times from two days to one day? That will require billions. Amazon will have to build smart warehouses near cities, where real estate and labor are expensive. By any conventional measure, it would be a huge investment for a marginal return. But for Amazon, it's all kinds of perfect. Why? Because Macy's, Sears, and Walmart can't afford to spend billions getting the delivery times of their relatively small online businesses down from two days to one. Consumers love it, and competitors stand flaccid on the sidelines. In 2015, Amazon spent $7 billion on shipping fees, a net shipping loss of $5 billion, and overall profits of $2.4 billion. Crazy, no? No. Amazon is going ~ Scott Galloway

Autumn calls the forest to rest, to exhale in a flood of colors rubbed to a fiery warmth on the hearth of both hill and plain before nodding off to a winter's slumber. And what better way to turn the page of a season than to celebrate it in a manner such as this? ~ Craig D. Lounsbrough

Tom felt that it was time to wake up; this sort of life might be romantic enough, in his blighted condition, but it was getting to have too little sentiment and too much distracting variety about it. So he thought over various plans for relief, and finally hit pon that of professing to be fond of Pain-killer. He asked for it so often that he became a nuisance, and his aunt ended by telling him to help himself and quit bothering her. If it had been Sid, she would have had no misgivings to alloy her delight; but since it was Tom, she watched the bottle clandestinely. She found that the medicine did really diminish, but it did not occur to her that the boy was mending the health of a crack in the sitting-room floor with it.

One day Tom was in the act of dosing the crack when his aunt's yellow cat came along, purring, eying the teaspoon avariciously, and begging for a taste. Tom said:

"Don't ask for it unless you want it, Peter."

But Peter signified that he did want it.

"You better make sure."

Peter was sure.

"Now you've asked for it, and I'll give it to you, because there ain't anything mean about me; but if you find you don't like it, you mustn't blame anybody but your own self."

Peter was agreeable. So Tom pried his mouth open and poured down the Pain-killer. Peter sprang a couple of yards in the air, and then delivered a war-whoop and set off round and round the room, banging against furniture, upset ~ Mark Twain

The idea of going back to basketball drills made her stomach tighten, but she stood up on her tiptoes and leaned into Jay, whispering against his cheek. "I got your note last night. Would've been better if I'd have found you in my bed instead."
Jay groaned and grabbed her by the shoulders. There was the hint of accusation buried behind his breathy chuckle as he set her away from him. "You're playing with fire, Vi. You shouldn't tease me at school. Besides, I think if I hid in your room, your father - check that, your mother - would skin me alive."
Violet heard the coach shouting her name, and she knew she'd be getting a demerit for slacking off. But she didn't care.
She flashed him her most wolfish smile. "Next time, you should totally take that chance. It could've been fun," she promised before sauntering away. ~ Kimberly Derting

This is why they don't want women here. These guys spend years getting trained to become Green Berets, they test themselves physically, mentally, and every place in between, and someone thinks that a couple weeks of training is any kind of equivalent - that we deserve anything close to the accolades that these guys get? We are no better than fresh-off-the-boat privates right now. No way in hell we are even close to what they do." And ~ Gayle Tzemach Lemmon

You're a freak. But I really can't accept these-'
Were you raised in a barn? Don't be ruuuuuude, my boy. They're a gift.'
Blay shook his head. 'Take them, John. You're just going to lose this argument, and it will save us from the theatrics.'
Theatrics?' Qhuinn leaped up and assumed a Roman oratory pose. 'Whither thou knowest thy ass from thy elbow, young scribe?'
Blay blushed. 'Come on-'
Qhuinn threw himself at Blay, grasping onto the guy's shoulders and hanging his full weight off him. 'Hold me. Your insult has left me breathless. I'm agasp.'
Blay grunted and scrambled to keep Qhuinn up off the floor. 'That's agape.'
Agasp sounds better.'
Blay was trying not to smile, trying not to be delighted, but his eyes were sparkling like sapphires and his cheeks were getting red. With a silent laugh, John sat on one of the locker room benches, shook out his pair of white socks, and pulled them on under his new old jeans. 'You sure, Qhuinn? 'Cause I have a feeling they're going to fit and you might change your mind.
Qhuinn abruptly lifted himself off Blay and straightened his clothes with a sharp tug. 'And now you offend my honor.' Facing off at John, he flipped into a fencing stance.
Touché.'
Blay laughed. 'That's en garde, you damn fool.'
Qhuinn shot a look over his shoulder. 'ça va, Brutus?'
Et tu?'
That would be tutu, I believe, and you can keep the cross-dressing to yourself, ya perv.'
Qhuinn flashed a b ~ J.R. Ward

You do get to a certain point in life where you have to realistically, I think, understand that the days are getting shorter, and you can't put things off thinking you'll get to them someday. If you really want to do them, you better do them. There are simply too many people getting sick, and sooner or later you will. ~ Nora Ephron

You ever have the feeling you were in the wrong place? That if you could just get over the next hill, cross the next river, look down into the next valley, it'd all ... fit. Be right."
"All my life, more of less"
"All your life spent getting ready for the next thing. I climbed a lot of hills now. I crossed a lot of rivers. Crossed the sea even, left everything I knew and came to Styria. But there I was, waiting for me at the docks when I got off the boat, same man, same life. Next valley ain't no different from this one. No better anyway. Reckon I've learned ... just to stick in the place I'm at. Just to be the man I am. ~ Joe Abercrombie

Write poorly. Suck. Write awful. Terribly. Frightfully. Don't care. Turn off the inner editor. Let yourself write. Let it flow.
Let yourself fail.
Do something crazy.
Write fifty thousand words in the month of
November.
I did it.
It was fun, it was insane, it was one thousand six
hundred and sixty-seven words a day.
It was possible.
But you have to turn off your inner critic.
Off completely.
Just write. Quickly. In bursts. With joy. If you can't write, run away for a few.Come back. Write again.
Writing is like anything else.
You won't get good at it immediately.
It's a craft, you have to keep getting better.
You don't get to Juilliard unless you practice.
If you want to get to Carnegie Hall, practice, practice, practice.
...Or give them a lot of money.
Like anything else, it takes ten thousand hours to master.
Just like Malcolm Gladwell says.
So write. Fail. Get your thoughts down. Let it rest. Let it marinate. Then edit.
But don't edit as you type,
that just slows the brain down.
Find a daily practice,
for me it's blogging every day.
And it's fun.
The more you write, the easier it gets. The more it is a flow, the less a worry. It's not for school, it's not for a grade, it's just to get your thoughts out there.
You know they want to come out. So keep at it. Make it a practice. And write poorly, write awfully, write with abandon and it m ~ Colleen Hoover

I don't understand hospital chaplains that try to rob my patients of their anger. Sometimes anger is a key motivator that gets people to take action. Anger can push a cancer patient to jump out of his hospital bed, walk down to the nurses station and scream, "I am getting the hell out of here!". There is a misconception that God is simply sweet and passive. Actually, God can be quite cunning, manipulative and relentless with his children. What we consider as negative traits are actually helpful in molding us. He will use a negative emotion if needed to push people to do things that will change them for the better. He will allow people or situations to derail us if there is a chance that those interactions will push us forward. Personally, I don't want a God that is going to send some church member to my deathbed with a plate of cookies and tell me to have faith. Actually, I rather have a God that screams, "Get the hell off your ass, stop feeling sorry for yourself. Walk down the hall with that Physical Therapist so you can get on with your life!" A little anger in a person can push them to do amazing things. ~ Shannon L. Alder

She had hit rock-bottom. She had given a blow job to a man who for all intents and purposes, was a bum. He had smelled so bad, she forced him to spray on some of the perfume she always carried in her purse. Her favorite perfume. After tonight, she was quitting. Yeah, she'd have to go back home with her two kids, grovel to her mama and work a dead-end job, but anything was better than getting down on your knees to give a guy as disgusting as Lenny a one-off. ~ A.T. Hicks

She thought she was getting out of the Water Rising clean, because she didn't see her father anywhere around: there was only Ash and Lillian sitting at a table, and a few other patrons at as much of a distance from Ash and Lillian as they could get. She made for the door, at which point Lillian caught her arm.

"Where are you going?"

"Uh," said Kami, eyeballing her wildly. "I'm going to buy some drugs."

Lillian stared. "I beg your pardon?"

"This is a really stressful time for everyone," said Kami. "So I thought maybe I could buy a little weed, take the edge off. I might be a while. This is a very clean-living town, apart from all the murders, so I don't actually know any drug dealers. I realize Jared kind of looks like one, but he's not, which is a shame because I think the drug dealer's girlfriend gets her drugs free."

"I realize you are attempting to be humorous," said Lillian, after a pause during which she stared some more. "I don't understand it."

"Hey, you're not the only family with a legacy. 'Glass' rhymes with 'sass.' Have you met my dad?"

"I have had that dubious pleasure," said Lillian. "He is, in fact, meant to be meeting me in order to, and I quote, 'teach me to integrate better with society, display leadership skills, win over the populace, and stop acting like a robot princess from space.' I admit that the humor in his humor escapes me as well." She paused and suddenly looked determined ~ Sarah Rees Brennan

Obama!" the President said, shaking my hand. "Come here and meet Laura. Laura, you remember Obama. We saw him on TV during election night. Beautiful family. And that wife of yours - that's one impressive lady."

"We both got better than we deserve, Mr. President," I said, shaking the First Lady's hand and hoping that I'd wiped any crumbs off my face. The President turned to an aide nearby, who squirted a big dollop of hand sanitizer in the President's hand.

"Want some?" the President asked. "Good stuff. Keeps you from getting colds."
Not wanting to seem unhygienic, I took a squirt.

"Come over here for a second," he said, leading me off to one side of the room. "You know," he said quietly, "I hope you don't mind me giving you a piece of advice."

"Not at all, Mr. President."

"He nodded. "You've got a bright future," he said. "Very bright. But I've been in this town awhile and, let me tell you, it can be tough. When you get a lot of attention like you've been getting, people start gunnin' for ya. And it won't necessarily just be coming from my side, you understand. From yours, too. Everybody'll be waiting for you to slip, know what I mean? So watch yourself."

"Thanks for the advice, Mr. President."

"All right. I gotta get going. You know, me and you got something in common."

"What's that?"

"We both had to debate Alan Keyes. That guy's a piece of work, isn't he?"

I la ~ Barack Obama

I mean, we don't have to worry about it until winter, anyway," she said. "I was just wondering if you felt cured."
I didn't know what to tell her. I didn't feel cured. I felt like what Cole said - almost cured. A war survivor with a phantom limb. I still felt that wolf that I'd been: living in my cells, sleeping uneasily, waiting to be coaxed out by weather or a rush of adrenaline or a needle in my veins. I didn't know if that was real or suggested. I didn't know if one day I would feel secure in my skin, taking my human body for granted.
"You look cured," Grace said. Just her face was visible at the end of the shower curtain, looking in at me. She grinned and I yelled. Grace reached in just far enough to shut off the tap.
"I'm afraid," she said, whipping the shower curtain open all the way and presenting me with my towel, "this is the sort of thing you'll have to put up with in your old age." I stood there, dripping, feeling utterly ridiculous, Grace standing opposite, smiling with her challenge. There was nothing for it but to get over the awkwardness. Instead of taking the towel, I took her chin with my wet fingers and kissed her. Water from my hair ran down my cheeks and onto our lips. I was getting her shirt all wet, but she didn't seem to mind. A lifetime of this seemed rather appealing. I said gallantly, "That better be a promise. ~ Maggie Stiefvater