brought to you by Michael
msf2z@maxwell.acc.virginia.edu
"War is a profane thing."
- Norman Schwarzkopf
"There's a war out there, old friend. A world war! And it's not about who
has the most bullets. It's about who controls the information. What we see,
what we hear, how we work, how we feel... it's all about who controls the
INFORMATION."
- Ben Kinsley, _Sneakers_
"Yeah, well, excuse me, dying has kind of fucked up my social calendar also."
- Dexter Cornell, _D.O.A._
"If it was EASY, EVERYONE would do it! It's the HARD that makes it GREAT!"
- Jimmy Dugan, _A League of Their Own_
"You'll remember me when the West Wind moves
Upon the fields of barley
You'll forget the sun in his jealous sky
As we walk in fields of gold."
- Sting, "Fields of Gold"
"On your knees, every rascal of you, and salute the King! Who fails shall
sup in Hell tonight!"
- The Connecticut Yankee
"Nitrogen, methane, neon gas, surface temperature of negative 290 degrees
Celsius, winds of up to 310 meters per second."
"Not exactly a vacation planet, huh?"
"Not unless you like ammonia tornadoes."
- Geordi Laforge and Will Riker
"The system of slavery is like holding a wolf by its ears: you don't like
it, but you don't dare let go."
- Th. Jefferson
"That which is not just is not law."
- William Lloyd Garrison, Boston abolitionist
"I can now march 25 and 30 miles a day, survive on short rations of nothing
but hardtack, rancid bacon, and cold water, sleep in the woods in the cold
and heavy dew under nothing but an overcoat, and enjoy myself capitally."
- Union soldier, during training
"Well Grant, we've had the devil's own day, haven't we?"
"Yes, lick 'em tomorrow, though."
- Sherman and Grant, at Shiloh
"'You're a drunken vagabond,' said I,'and I shall ring the bell and order
my footman to kick you out into the street.'"
- E.A. Poe, "The Angel of the Odd"
"...there are few men of extraordinary profundity who are found wanting in
an inclination for the bottle. Whether this inclination be an exciting
cause, or rather a valid proof, of such profundity, it is a nice thing to
say."
- E. A. Poe
"Down the hall came the wife. She was glorious, burning. She didn't know
yet that her husband was dead. We knew. That's what gave her such power
over us.... What a pair of lungs! She shrieked as I imagined an eagle would
shriek. It felt wonderful to be alive to hear it! I've gone looking for the
feeling everywhere."
- Denis Johnson, "Car Crash"
"It's a peculiarity of the Norwegian culture and of the English and
American, too, that men are not supposed to cry. Stiff upper lip and all
that. But the Vikings cried like women in public or privately. They soaked
their beards with tears and were not one bit ashamed about it. Yet, they
were as quick to draw their swords as they were to shed tears. So, what's
all this crap about men having to hold in their sorrow and grief and
disappointment?"
- Philip Jose Farmer, _Red Orc's Rage_
"'Goodbye,' says the dying man to the mirror they hold in front of him. 'We
won't be seeing eachother anymore.'"
- Valery
"The journey of a thousand leagues begins from beneath your feet."
- Lao Tzu
"Geniuses and supergeniuses always make their own rules about sex as on
everything else; they do not accept the monkey customs of their lessers."
- R. A. Heinlein, _Friday_
"There are no rules for great souls: rules are only for people who have
merely the talent that can be acquired."
- Delacroix
"Put your talent into your work, but your genius into your life."
- Oscar Wilde
"But in the case of human beings, friendship is a transitory art, subject
to discontinuance without further notice."
- O. Henry, "Telemachus, Friend"
"I was a good marksman when I was a young man, a good actor on the stage.
And now I am a good vampire. So much for our understanding of the word
'good'."
- The Vampire Lestat
"Any player unaware of the fool in the market probably IS the fool in the
market."
- Warren Buffett
"Salesmen, traders, and managers swarmed over the floor, and at first I
could not tell them apart. Sure, I knew the basic differences. Salesmen
talked to investors, traders made bets, and managers smoked cigars. But
other than that I was lost. Most of the men were on two phones at once.
Most of the men stared at small green screens full of numbers. They'd shout
into one phone, then into the other, then at someone across the row of
trading desks, then back into the phones, then point to the screen and
scream 'FUCK!'"
- Michael Lewis, _Liar's Poker_
"At other places management says, 'Well, gee, fellas, do we really want to
bet the ranch on this deal?' Lewie was not only willing to bet the ranch.
He was willing to hire people and let them bet the ranch, too. His attitude
was: 'Sure, what the fuck, it's only a ranch.'"
- senior trader at Saloman Brothers for Lew Ranieri,
creator of mortgage securities
"You can only drink 30 or 40 glasses of beer a day, no matter how rich you are."
- Colonel Adolphus Busch
"They drink with impunity, or anyone who invites them."
- Artemus Ward
"Hell is other people."
- Jean-Paul Sartre
"L is for Liberty - the right to obey the police."
- Bertrand Russell
"Freedom is not worth having if it does not connote freedom to err. It
passes my comprehension how human beings, be they ever so experienced and
able, can delight in depriving other human beings of that precious right."
- Ghandi, 1931
"If particular care and attention is not paid to the ladies, we are
determined to foment a rebellion, and will not hold ourselves bound by any
laws in which we have no voice, or representation."
- Abigail Adams, to John Adams, 1776
"Never bet the devil your head."
- E.A. Poe
"Business and industry - trade and manufacture - are inherent in
civilization. Every human society, no matter how wholesomely primitive,
practices as much trade and manufacture as it can figure out. For good
reason. It is the fruits of trade and manufacture that raise us from the
wearying muck of subsistence and give us health, wealth, education,
leisure, and warm dry rooms with Xerox machines that allow us to be the
ecology-conscious, selfless, committed, splendid individuals we are....
Contempt for material progress is not only unfair but dangerous. The
average Juan and the average Chang and the average Mobutu out there in the
parts of the world where every day is Earth Day, or Dirt and Squalor Day,
anyhow, would like to have a color television, too. He'd also like some
comfy Reeboks and a Nintendo Power Glove and a Jeep Cherokee. And he means
to get them. I wouldn't care to be the skinny health-food nut waving a copy
of Fifty Simple Things You Can Do To Save the Earth who tries to stand in
Juan's way."
- P.J. O'Rourke, _Parliment of Whores_
"We knew the Japanese were going to strike that night - the intelligence
reports were dead on. I remember the breeze from the island brought in the
scent of flowers. And I just didn't feel like going into battle."
- Stuart Murdock, USS Atlanta, off of Guadalcanal
"You don't have to be faster than the bear, you just have to be faster than
the slowest guy running from the bear."
"...Beware
Of Good Samaritans - walk to the right
Or hide thee by the roadside out of sight
Or greet them with the smile that villains wear."
- R.C. Dunning
"I'd like to meet you
In a timeless placeless place
Somewhere out of context
And beyond all consequences."
- Suzanne Vega
"When there is no enemy within, the enemies outside cannot hurt you."
- African proverb
"I think I'll take this opportunity to remove my ears."
- Capt. Picard, in a Romulan disguise
"If you ever drop your keys into a river of molten lava, let 'em go,
because, man, they're gone."
- Jack Handey
"Lomhlaba Unzima, Lohmhlaba."
["This world is a harsh place, this world."]
- Zulu saying
"Old man sits in the shade of a thorn tree
He says, 'These thorns are all that is true
Life is Suffering, Suffering is Life
Be happy with the small things that come to you.'"
- Johnny Clegg
"Wish in one hand and shit in the other, and see which fills up first."
- traditional
"I don't want to achieve immortality through my work - I want to achieve
immortality by not dying."
- Woody Allen
"Here comes a candle to light you to bed
Here comes a chopper to chop off your head."
- English nursery rhyme
"I'm sorry, pal, it's a cold cruel world. And state-sanctioned,
premeditated murder is even colder and crueler."
- Wayne DeLong, condemned killer
"What you own is your own kingdom
What you do is your own glory
What you love is your own power
What you live is your own story...
You don't get something for nothing
You can't have freedom for free
You won't get wise with the sleep still in your eyes
No matter what your dream might be."
- N. Peart
"Besides, we don't make mistakes here, we just have happy accidents."
- Bob Ross, _Joy of Painting_
"My God, I am a dead man!"
- Sir Richard Francis Burton, last words
"...and we could continue to make love and there'd be no reason to stop,
until one of us had to stop from exhaustion, or dizziness, of just to go
get the mail."
- Daniel, _Julia Has Two Lovers_
"Who's to say the way a man should spend his days?"
- J. Mellencamp
"Being in a minority, even a minority of one, did not make you mad. There
was truth, and there was untruth, and if you clung to the truth even
against the whole world, you were not mad. 'Sanity is not statistical.'"
- G. Orwell, _1984_
"But it's hard to tell the poison from the cure
Harder still to know the reasons why, why, why
The only thing I really know for sure
Is that another day, another day's gone by."
- Sting, "Another Day"
"Money's only important when you don't have any."
- Sting
"Millions of people longing for immortality, and most of them can't figure
out what to do with themselves on a rainy Sunday afternoon."
- ?
"Always break up slowly with someone on Prozac."
- Wahoo Delerious
"Bummed is what you are
When you go out to your car
And it's been towed."
- Phish
"Be polite to all, but intimate with few."
- Th. Jefferson
"Guns don't kill people - I DO!!!"
- anonymous NRA redneck
"An armed society is a polite society."
- R.A. Heinlein
"I'll drop my hammer on you so fast, you'll be dead before you got here."
- Jason Patrick, _Rush_
"I was cuttin' the rug at a place called the Junction
With a girl named Linda Lou
Well in walked a man with a gun in his hand
And he was lookin' for you-know-who
He said hey there, fella with the hair colored yellow,
Whatcha trying to do?
'Cause that's my woman there, and I'm a man who cares
And this might be all for you."
- Lynard Skynard
"The Pope? How many divisions does he have?
- Joseph Stalin
"Until he extends his circle of compassion to include all living things,
man will not himself find peace."
- Albert Schweitzer
"Tread softly, for this is holy ground. It may be, could we look with
knowing eyes, this spot we stand on is Paradise."
- Christina Rossetti
"Feh...!"
- traditional
"My old man taught me two things: 'Mind own business' and 'Always cut cards.'"
- R.A. Heinlein, _The Moon is a Harsh Mistress_
"As it says in Bible, God fights on side of heaviest artillery."
- ibid
"...revolutions are not won by enlisting the masses. Revolution is a
science only a few are competent to practice.... How does one design an
electric motor? Would you attach a bathtub to it, simply because one was
available? Would a bouquet of flowers help? A heap of rocks...? So it is
with revolution. Organization must be no larger than necessary - never
recruit anyone merely because he wants to join. Nor seek to persuade for
the pleasure of having another share your views."
- ibid
"Seems to be deep instinct in human beings for making everything compulsory
that isn't forbidden."
- ibid
"TANSTAAFL - There ain't no such thing as a free lunch."
- ibid
"No matter how fast your computer system runs, you will eventually come to
think of it as slow."
- traditional
"Want to make your computer go really fast? Throw it out the window."
- anonymous
"Let me live beneath your spell
When you do that voodoo that you do so well."
- Cole Porter
"Great Spirit and Creator of all Life: a warrior goes to you now, swift and
straight as an arrow shot into the sun. Welcome him, and let him take his
place at the Council Fire of my people. He is Uncas, my son. Tell them to
be patient, and to pray for death's speed, for they are all there now but
one... I, Chingchagook, Last of the Mohicans."
- obvious
"The enumeration in the Constitution of certain rights shall not be
construed to deny or disparage others retained by the people."
- Amendment IX, U.S. Constitution
"A Bill of Rights is what the people are entitled to against every
government on Earth... and what no just government should refuse."
- Th. Jefferson
"How can you say to me, 'Yo, my nigger'?
Cursin' up a storm with your finger on the trigger
Feelin' all the girls like a big gold digger
Take a small problem, make a small problem bigger
Say 'Yo, I ain't po', I got dough,'
You don't consider me your brother no mo'?
Goddamn!, Kilogram, how do you figure?
I don't wanna be called 'Yo niga'."
- Public Enemy
"Hewlett Packard at one point had only three private offices. One belonged
to Hewlett, one to Packard, and the third to a guy named Paul Ely who
annoyed so many coworkers with his bellowing on the phone that the company
finally extended his cubicle walls to the ceiling."
- Robert Cringley, _Accidental Empires_
"Close quarters air combat is like a knife fight in a phone booth - quick,
brutal, and no room for error."
- WWII pilot
"My armor is like ten-fold shields,
My teeth are swords
My claws are spears
The shock of my tail a thunderbolt
My wings a hurricane
And my breath - death!"
- Smaug
"We apologize again for the fault in the subtitles. Those responsible for
sacking the people who have just been sacked... have been sacked."
- Monty Python
"Sometimes the Earth trembles; sometimes you can feel it breathe."
- Jean Rhys
"Stop the car - I want to get off!"
- Knoll, admiring a pedestrian
"One who contends with immortals lives a very short life."
- Homer, Book V of the _Iliad_
"Poe tried alcohol, and any drug he could lay his hands on. He also tried
any human being he could lay his hands on."
- D.H. Lawrence
"I'm hung like a baby - 14 inches, 8 1/2 pounds."
- Charlie Shields
"Your balls must be as big as Yogi's to ride this ride."
- adapted from King's Dominion by Dan Shriver
"The scab is a traitor to his God, his mother, and his class."
- Jack London
"Good... bad... I'm the guy with the gun."
- Ash, _Army of Darkness_
"Once while I was in college, I spent an entire summer tarring roofs,
during which time I learned three things: 1) It takes a lot of tar to cover
a roof, 2) There are a lot of damned fine people who tar roofs for a
living, and 3) Education is the key to improving your prospects."
- CEO of some large firm or other
"Let's face it: all radio stations in Indianapolis suck. We just suck less."
- promo, Indianapolis radio station
"When doing business with religious types, always get it in writing. You
can't trust those people, not with God Almighty telling them how to fuck
you on the deal."
- William S. Burroughs
"Know the score."
- ibid
"The people who are dragging American bodies [through Somalia] don't look
very hungry to the people of Texas."
- Senator Phil Gramm, R Texas
"[The waiter] brings around these dead animals and shows them to you, which
one do you want? And how do you want it further desecrated by fire?"
- Representative Andy Jacobs, D Indiana, vegetarian,
on dining at Morton's in Georgetown
"It would be unfair to judge all of them by the behaviour of most of them."
- said of college students in the '60s
"In Cyberspace, the First Amendment is a local ordinance."
- John Perry Barlow
"It is the fire that lights itself
But it burns with a restless flame...
It it the engine that drives itself
But it chooses the uphill climb...
It's the motor of the Western world
Spinning off to every extreme
Pure as a lover's desire
Evil as a murderer's dream."
- N. Peart, _Counterparts_
"So you can make me cum - maybe you are Jesus."
- adapted from T. Amos by A. J. Moore
"Just what God needs - one more victim."
- T. Amos
"The first duty of a revolutionary is to get away with it."
- Abbie Hoffman
"Point of parlimentary procedure: Drink, motherfucker, drink, motherfucker,
drink, motherfucker, drink!!!"
- Knoll, demonstrating Student Council the Drinking Game
"I will not eat them on a cot,
I do not like them - out damn spot!!"
- M. Pitely, rendering Green Eggs & Hamlet
"Gentlemen - we are history."
- Rufus, _Bill & Ted's Excellent Adventure_
"You're either for us or a Guiness."
- anonymous
"Flapping your arms can be flying."
- Robert K. Hall
"We don't play drinking games because we're more serious about drinking
than that."
- Mark Miles, deputy fire chief, Rotunda Burning Society
"Late to rise and later to bed makes a man tired, wired, and dead."
- French saying
"Words, words, words."
- Hamlet
October, 1993