“'What say you, Mary? For you are a young lady of deep reflection, I know, and read great books and make extracts.' Mary wished to say something sensible, but knew not how.” 〜Jane Austen's “Pride and Prejudice.” I am always Mary . . .
Feet, what do I need you for when I have wings to fly? -Frida Kahlo It's kind of fun to do the impossible -Walt Disney When his life was ruined, his family killed, his farm destroyed, Job knelt down on the ground and yelled up to the heavens, 'Why god? Why me?' and the thundering voice of God answered, 'There's just something about you that pisses me off.' -Stephen King. These are just a few. I have tons more.
Never be afraid to laugh at yourself, after all, you could be missing out on the joke of the century. (Dame Edna Everage) Perfection is achieved, not when there is nothing more to add, but when there is nothing left to take away. (Antoine de Saint-Exupéry) Never be afraid to laugh at yourself, after all, you could be missing out on the joke of the century. (Dame Edna Everage)
"I believe that the lion will lie down with the lamb. But the lamb won't get much sleep." -- Woody Allen
Rather like John Prine's verse in Angel From Montgomery:" There's flies in the kitchen I can hear 'em there buzzin' And I ain't done nothin' Since I woke up today. How the hell can a person Go to work in the morning Come home in the evening And have nothing to say?
"But there is also the question on a far lower level: "granted the quarrel . . . did you fight fair?" Or did we not quite unknowingly falsify the whole issue? Did we pretend to be angry about one thing when we knew, or could have known, that our anger had a different and much less presentable cause? Did we pretend to be "hurt" in our sensitive and tender feelings (fine natures like ours are so vulnerable) when envy, ungratified vanity, or thwarted self-will was our real trouble? Such tactics often succeed. The other parties give in. They give in not because they don't know what is really wrong with us but because they have long known it only too well, and that sleeping dog can be roused, that skeleton brought out of its cupboard, only at the cost of imperilling their whole relationship with us. It needs surgery which they know we will never face. And so we win; by cheating. But the unfairness is deeply felt. Indeed what is commonly called "sensitiveness" is most powerful engine of domestic tyranny, sometimes a lifelong tyranny. How we should deal with it in others I am not sure; but we should be merciless to its first appearances in ourselves." —C.S. Lewis
Just saw this on Charles Stross's blog: "imagine a time traveller from 1917 trying to follow a discussion about viewing youtube videos of cruise missile strikes on ISIS positions in Syria on iPhones: the grammatical structure is accessible but a lot of the noun parts cannot be clarified without a dizzying deep dive into unimagined-in-1917 new technologies." edited because HTML has made proper use of English punctuation impossible
Daniel Salazar, Fear the Walking Dead: "When I was young, these men…these men were from the [Salvadoran] government, they came to our town. They took some people away. My father was someone of certain importance in the community, so he went to speak to the captain and ask when will they return. And the captain told my father 'Miguel, don’t worry. They always come home.' And they did. I was standing in the river. Fishing. Just a boy. And I found them. All of them. All at once. All around me in the water. My father told me not to have hatred in my heart. He said that men do these things not because of evil. They do evil because of fear. And, at that moment, I realize my father is a fool for believing there is a difference."
"Life is like a safe, for which there is a combination. Unfortunately, the combination is locked up in the safe." --Author unknown
I'd wager that quote's on a note in that there safe too, signed at the bottom. Anyway... along the same lines, a fave of mine: "Innocence does not find near so much protection as guilt." ~ Francois De La Rochefoucauld
Spoiler: The Setup George: "That was a UFO, beamin' back at ya. Me and Eric Heisman was down in Mexico two weeks ago - we seen forty of 'em flying in formation. They-they-they've got bases all over the world now, you know. They've been coming here ever since nineteen forty-six - when the scientists first started bouncin' radar beams off of the moon. And they have been livin' and workin' among us in vast quantities ever since. The government knows all about 'em.Oh, yeah, that's right. That's what's it's all about, all right. But talkin' about it and bein' it, that's two different things. I mean, it's real hard to be free when you are bought and sold in the marketplace. Of course, don't ever tell anybody that they're not free, 'cause then they're gonna get real busy killin' and maimin' to prove to you that they are. Oh, yeah, they're gonna talk to you, and talk to you, and talk to you about individual freedom. But they see a free individual, it's gonna scare 'em.Well, they are people, just like us - from within our own solar system. Except that their society is more highly evolved. I mean, they don't have no wars, they got no monetary system, they don't have any leaders, because, I mean, each man is a leader. I mean, each man - because of their technology, they are able to feed, clothe, house, and transport themselves equally - and with no effort...Why don't they reveal themselves to us is because if they did it would cause a general panic. Now, I mean, we still have leaders upon whom we rely for the release of this information. These leaders have decided to repress this information because of the tremendous shock that it would cause to our antiquated systems. Now, the result of this has been that the Venutians have contacted people in all walks of life - all walks of life. [laughs] Yes. It-it-it would be a devastatin' blow to our antiquated systems - so now the Venutians are meeting with people in all walks of life - in an advisory capacity. For once man will have a god-like control over his own destiny. He will have a chance to transcend and to evolve with some equality for all." Wyatt: "How's your joint, George?"
"There is always some madness in love. But there is also always some reason in madness." - Friedrich Nietzsche
“Don't say another goddamn word. Up until now, I've been polite. If you say anything else--word one--I will kill myself. And when my tainted spirit finds its destination, I will topple the master of that dark place. From my black throne, I will lash together a machine of bone and blood, and fueled by my hatred for you this fear engine will bore a hole between this world and that one. When it begins you will hear the sound of children screaming--as though from a great distance. A smoking orb of nothing will grow above your bed, and from it will emerge a thousand starving crows. As I slip through the widening maw in my new form, you will catch only a glimpse of my radiance before you are incinerated. Then, as tears of bubbling pitch stream down my face, my dark work will begin. I will open one of my six mouths, and I will sing the song that ends the Earth.” Jerry Holkins
I think that is how one gets hit with a liquor bottle through the internet, so keep your eyes peeled.
Here's one (brought here on the back of, and by way of whim from, a post on another thread): From this distant vantage point, the Earth might not seem of any particular interest. But for us, it's different. Consider again that dot. That's here, that's home, that's us. On it everyone you love, everyone you know, everyone you ever heard of, every human being who ever was, lived out their lives. The aggregate of our joy and suffering, thousands of confident religions, ideologies, and economic doctrines, every hunter and forager, every hero and coward, every creator and destroyer of civilization, every king and peasant, every young couple in love, every mother and father, hopeful child, inventor and explorer, every teacher of morals, every corrupt politician, every "superstar," every "supreme leader," every saint and sinner in the history of our species lived there—on the mote of dust suspended in a sunbeam. Carl Sagan
Which reminds me of another quote, this one by Edgar Allan Poe: "There is no exquisite beauty without some strangeness in the proportion."
