Monday, December 3, 2007

She Said, He Said

I'm declaring this Share-a-Quote Day, which means if you've got a funny, wise, inspiring, thoughtful, educational, encouraging, supportive, comforting, beautiful , or any other kind of quote to share with your blog buddies, you've come to the right place on the right day.

I'll start. . .

I have not a shadow of a doubt that any man or woman can achieve what I have, if he or she would make the same effort and cultivate the same hope and faith. Gandhi

That cracks me up, at the same time as I take it seriously. Oh, so that's all there is to it! Just make the same effort and cultivate the same hope and faith as Gandhi. Nothin' to it. :) We can probably achieve that by noon.

Got something funny or inspirational to share?

43 comments:

AndiF said...

Inspiring words from the inimitable Fran Leibowitz:

No animal should ever jump up on the dining room furniture unless absolutely certain that he can hold his own in the conversation.

Anonymous said...

Boy you get up early, andi!

I'll add a quote when my brain shifts into gear and I can remember one.

An aside: I visited the place where Gandhi taught, and was killed. His bench still sits in a sheltered spot in the garden. It's an oasis of peace in a chaotic country.

Back when I have something relevant to say.

Anonymous said...

I like this quote from Woody Allen:

Those who can't do, teach. And those who can't teach, teach phys ed.

So, so true!

Paul Lamb
http://www.paullamb.wordpress.com

GhostFolk.com said...

It took me fifteen years to discover I had no talent for writing, but I couldn't give it up, because by that time I was too famous. - Robert Benchley

GhostFolk.com said...

All I need is room enough to lay a hat and a few friends. -Dorothy Parker

katiebird said...

(goggle eyed) Me? Think?

Nancy P said...

G'morning!
We don't have anybody here (that we know of)living in Ore. or Wash, do we? Have you read about the storms they're having there? Whoa. And you can quote me.
Need coffee.

katiebird said...

Hi Nancy,
I've got 3 siblings in the Seattle area. What's up?

GhostFolk.com said...

I had an ex-wife in Seattle. But not my ex-wife.

Nancy P said...

ghost, I'd spit coffee if I had it.

Kb, flooding AND snow. Hurricane winds, 10 inches of rain some places, main highways closed due to either high water or snowslides. This is the second day of it, I think. I read about it on MSNBC just now.

Anonymous said...

Twenty years from now you will be more disappointed by the things you didn't do than by the ones you did. - Mark Twain

Anonymous said...

Same thing happened this time last year, Nancy. And we had huge surf in Mexico a week later as it wandered its way down the coast.

They have flooding problems along the coast regularly. Especially when warm fronts come through and melt the snowpack, PLUS bring rain.

Thanks for the heads-up. I need to check in with my Seattle friends.

Larry Kollar said...

Ghost, I am SO glad I wasn't drinking my coffee when I read that — it would have taken all day to clean up the laptop!!!

Quotes: I'm drawing a blank on famous quotes, so I'll share a few from my Techcomm buddies:

"The first thing I learned about doing technical documentation with Word was that I had to lower my expectations."

"Nothing in Word works right if you're wearing the wrong kind of shoes or whatever."

Oh, here's a real quote that turned up when I was hunting the above:

"The problem with defending the purity of the English language is that English is about as pure as a cribhouse whore. We don't just borrow words; on occasion, English has pursued other languages down alleyways to beat them unconscious and rifle their pockets for new vocabulary." -- James D. Nicoll

Cathy C said...

One of my favorites came from French writer Hilaire Belloc. I found it in one of those books of snarky quotations for all occasions. It makes me feel not-so-bad about my less than stellar cooking.

"Be content to remember that those who can make omelets properly can do nothing else."

GhostFolk.com said...

And, Cathy, those who can eat omelets properly prefer to do nothing else. :-)

Sorry everyone, there must be something in my coffee. I hope nothing serious happens today. When you start the morning with Fran Leibowitz (thank you, Andif)you'll end up saying the wrong thing to the arresting officer. Who wasn't so arresting to begin with.

Larry Kollar said...

oooo, I was making the blog-rounds this morning and Carnacki had posted a link to this (YouTube vid). Looks like an innnnnteresting way to promote a book…

Nancy P said...

far, I don't know who James D. Nicoll is, but he's sure funny in that quote.

Omelet. Mmmmm.

Nancy P said...

Far, that video is hilarious! And just creepy enough to be interesting. Is this the new way to promote books? I wonder what that cost to do. I'm going back to see how many people have viewed it and then I'm going to Amazon to check her ranking--not that anybody really knows what that means. :)

Kelly McCullough said...

I'm pretty fond of this one: I have sworn upon the altar of God eternal hostility against every form of tyranny over the mind of man. Thomas Jefferson.

And for completely different reasons, this one: Not only does the English Language borrow words from other languages, it sometimes chases them down dark alleys, hits them over the head, and goes through their pockets. Eddy Peters.

And for yet another set of reasons, how about this: My candle burns at both ends; it will not last the night; but ah my foes, and oh my friends—it gives a lovely light. Edna St. Vincent Millay

Nancy P said...

Oh, we have a mystery! Essentially the same quote, one version from James D. Nicoll and the other from Eddy Peters. Anybody have a clue?

You know, this is just the sort of thing to give a writer an idea for a story. Far and Kelly get first dibs, of course.

Kelly McCullough said...

I haven't found an answer, though I did find someone who claims (without evidence, %@#%&#$@) that the Peters is the original.

More importantly, I found this apropos of both today's topic and yesterday's: Ever tried. Ever failed. No matter. Try again. Fail again. Fail better. Samuel Becket

In general, Becket irritates me, and I find his Endgame to be one of the most awful things it has ever been my displeasure to read, but this makes me think more highly of him.

Larry Kollar said...

L2TP support is available for Wireless Mesh Networking through the CLI (including remote provisioning). — ah crap, wrong fiction.

Rick Bylina said...

Three in the morning. Two underfried eggs bordered by limp bacon stared at me. A slab of butter sat on an slice of cold, burnt toast. My stomach rumbled out of disgust, but my hunger overruled. Lots of salt, pepper, and ketchup helped it along. Kim had oatmeal thicker than concrete mix. We had talked through the night, but now our trip to nowhere had turned silent in a backbooth with dim lighting. Three spoonfuls of oatmeal later, she slipped low in the seat and slept. She needed it. Our gabbing didn't keep her from writing on the laptop. "The habit of discipline to finish each story is the difference between a hobby and a profession," she said, somewhere between there and here. "Who said that?" I asked. "Raymond Carver," she mumbled. I nodded.

The blond waitress grabbed my empty plate, ripping me from the memory. The tab fluttered to the table, and she walked away with a sexy sway betraying the weariness of small town witnessing I could only imagine. Without the dripping nose ring and raccoon make-up, she could pass for a young Marilyn Monroe. Scrap away the grimy exterior, I could get excited. Inexplicably, a fortune cookie came with the tab. I cracked it open. "A trip of a thousand miles begins with the first step." I grinned the grin of a man who hadn't slept much lately, whose fingers hadn't spent enough time at the keyboard, whose feet were as tired as the waitresses, but I nudged my traveling partner. "Let's go. We've got miles to go before we sleep, miles to go before we sleep."

I paid the waitress and gave her a big tip. She smiled, and beyond the window behind her outside in the dark, I saw a ghostly image of a man who didn't exist walking a dog. The next writing journey had begun.

Kelly McCullough said...

On further searching, I'm going to have to go with Far's source. As far as I can tell "Eddy Peters" isn't actually a real figure, but rather a name arbitrarily attached to the slightly different variation I am more familiar with. What particularly baffles me is that despite having read Far's post, I still produced the second version without noting (externally or internally) that Far had preceded me. I have to put it down to posting something before I wake up. I am so incredibly not a morning person.

Kimberly Frost said...

Hee hee hee. Ha ha ha. This list is great!! What a wonderful way to start the morning.

I love quotes. Here are a couple...

"No matter how cynical I get, I can't keep up." Lily Tomlin

There's an exchange between Winston Churchill and a titled lady whose name I can't remember, which went roughly:

"Sir, if you were my husband, I'd put poison in your [tea]."

"Madam, if you were my wife, I'd drink it."

Jen said...

I keep a word processor file of quotes I like. It's now at 49 pages. I shall try to exercise some restraint.

Beliefs are great, cherish them, just don't go around passing them off as the truth.
--Bill Hicks

Anything may be accidentally the cause of joy, sorrow, or desire.
--Spinoza

America is at that awkward stage; it's too late to work within the system, but too early to shoot the bastards.
--Claire Wolfe

The truth will set you free. But first, it will piss you off.
--Gloria Steinman

Homer: Stupid God, sometimes I think He's teasing me, like He teased Moses in the desert.
Marge: Tested, Homer; God *tested* Moses in the desert.

--The Simpsons

No person is your friend who demands your silence.
--Alice Walker

A computer lets you make more mistakes faster than any other invention in human history, with the possible exception of handguns and tequila.
--Mitch Ratcliffe, ratcliffeblog.com

It's never too late to be who you might have been.
--George Eliot

You obey all the rules, you miss all the fun.
--Katherine Hepburn

When we remember that we are all mad, the mysteries disappear and life stands explained.
--Mark Twain

Yes, lol, that was restraint.

Jen said...

ACK!

Gloria Steinman = Gloria Steinem

Nancy P said...

Kelly,I've managed to drive you bonkers and it's not even noon yet. :)

Kimberly, I wish I could have been there to see her face.

Jen, my fav--at least at this moment, having spent some of the morning catching up on the NIE report about Iran--is the Claire Wolfe quote.

Nancy P said...

Nice, Rick. Very very nice.

Damn that Raymond Carver, though. The man only wrote short stories and poems didn't he? What does he know. Grumble grumble.

Nancy P said...

far, lol! We're driven you bonkers already, too?

Unknown said...

"Every moment is an organizing opportunity, every person a potential activist, every minute a chance to change the world." - -Dolores Huerta

“Today we all speak, if not the same tongue, the same universal language. There is no one center, and time has lost its former coherence: East and West, yesterday and tomorrow exist as a confused jumble in each one of us. Different times and different spaces are combined in a here and now that is everywhere at once.” - Octavio Paz

Good mornoonevenight, everyone!

AndiF said...

Jeanette Rankin: If I had my life to live over, I would do it all again, but this time I would be nastier.

GhostFolk.com said...

LOL.

Andif!

Nancy P said...

I just realized that in the best passive-aggressive fashion, I have managed to get you guys to do my work for me. Namely, to give me quotes for my Quote of the Day at the bottom of the front page, which I rarely remember to change. Nelson Mandela has been there for months. I'll change it to Quote of the Week, and use yours, giving you credit, of course. Thanks. Tee hee. ; }

: }

Larry Kollar said...

far, lol! We're driven you bonkers already, too?

Oh, no no no. I've been skating that wet pavement for years.

(If you've never skated, those little wheels get no grip on wet pavement. Or leaves. Or whatever. Makes cornering rather… challenging.)

Nancy P said...

Well, good, I'm glad you were already nuts. :)

Anonymous said...

Aw, he's just a widdle bit nuts...

Larry Kollar said...

Tee hee… The Boy read my short and figured out that he's Old Guy. And he caught a typo!

His comment: "That story was kind of weird."

Me: "Yeah, well Old Guy is kind of weird."

Him: (grin) "I know. You think I'm stupid?"

Me: LOL!!!

Anonymous said...

Hey, good for him! And he even caught a typo? You're right, there's hope for him yet.

dada said...

today l've got to go with the great blues bard BB King:

Nobody loves me but my mother,
And she could be jivin' me too


kinda fits my frame of mind.

later

Nancy P said...

Lol, Dada, I love that.

boran2 said...

More wisdom from Woody Allen:

I don't want to get married. I just want to get divorced.

Nancy P said...

b2, I think that was running through my mind when I said, "I do."