Always A Good Time Quotes & Sayings

You're not a gardener, are you? So perhaps you don't know that once a garden is established, much of good gardening is about removal rather than planting, honing what you have to produce a pleasing effect, sacrificing the particular for the good of the whole. Gardening is a creative pastime, but the result is always a work in progress; unlike a painting or a piece of music a garden is never fixed in time. ("In The Garden") — Rosalie Parker

Didn't know anyone could see it," Samuel said. "You know, Lee, I think of my life as a kind of music, not always good music but still having form and melody. And my life has not been a full orchestra for a long time now. A single note only - and that note unchanging sorrow. I'm not alone in my attitude, Lee. It seems to me that too many of us conceive of a life as ending in defeat. — John Steinbeck

Kusanagi had met plenty of good, admirable people who'd been turned into murderers by circumstance. There was something about them he always seemed to sense, an aura that they shared. Somehow, their transgression freed them from the confines of a mortal existence, allowing them to perceive the great truths of the universe. At the same time, it meant they had one foot in forbidden territory. They straddled the line between sanity and madness. — Keigo Higashino

But most of the time, with a contented resignation that comes normally to a man only at the end of a long and busy life, he sat before the keyboard and filled the air with his beloved Bach.
Perhaps he was deceiving himself, perhaps this was some merciful trick of the mind but now it seemed to Jan that this what he had always wished to do. His secret ambition had at last dared to emerge into the full light of consciousness.
Jan had always been a good pianist, and now he was the finest in the world. — Arthur C. Clarke

Coney Island is and always will be 'the people's playground.' It's a place where people of all backgrounds come to have a good time. — Harold Feinstein

It's always harder than you think to make a good film. Feature films are a hell of a marathon to say the least. It's kind of your endurance. How much can I push? How much do I care? How much time it takes is a nice reminder. — Shaul Schwarz

Was it always my nature to take a bad time and block out the good times, until any success became an accident and failure seemed the only truth? — Lillian Hellman

Music should elevate you. You can be raised, or left stranded. You can't be raised all the time, in my experience. This might be a rare moment. You might just go up to that level but that's always good. — Mick Jagger

Each time a new war is disclosed in the name of the fight of the good against evil, those who are killed are all poor. It's always the same story repeating once and again and again. — Eduardo Galeano

The truth is, Rosemary, that you are capable of anything. Good or bad. You always have been, and you always will be. Given the right push, you, too, could do horrible things. That darkness exists within all of us. You think every soldier who picked up a cutter gun was a bad person? No. She was just doing what the soldier next to her was doing, who was doing what the soldier next to her was doing, and so on and so on. And I bet most of them - not all, but most - who made it through the war spent a long time after trying to understand what they'd done. Wondering how they ever could have done it in the first place. Wondering when killing became so comfortable. — Becky Chambers

As for the industry, it has certainly changed. I think with all of these television shows and YouTube and the internet, you have so much less time to develop as an artist and perfect your craft. So many things today are "instant" and, that's not always a good thing. — Olivia Newton-John

Resurrection. In the crude form in which it is preached to console the weak, it is alien to me. I have always understood Christ's words about the living and the dead in a different sense. Where could you find room for all these hordes of people accumulated over thousands of years? The universe isn't big enough for them; God, the good, and meaningful purpose would be crowded out. They'd be crushed by these throngs greedy merely for the animal life.
But all the time, life, one, immense, identical throughout its innumerable combinations and transformations, fills the universe and is continually reborn. You are anxious about whether you will rise from the dead or not, but you rose from the dead when you were born and you didn't notice it. — Boris Pasternak

He felt a strange urge, right then, just to put his head down and walk past, off into the night and never look back. Then he wouldn't have to be the Bloody-Nine again... He could've gone far away, and started new, and been whoever he wanted. But he'd tried that once already, and it had done him no good. The past was always right behind him, breathing on his neck. It was time to turn around and face it. — Joe Abercrombie

"You're wearing your Seduction Hat. Why am I not surprised?"
He offers a pirate's smile. "Did you notice ... I've a new embellishment?" He makes a show of adjusting an owl's tail feather in the band.
I bite back a giggle. "Vegetarian barn owl, I presume?"
"Won't be bothering me again for some time."
"I can guarantee it's not the only one out there."
He loops my arm through his. "Good. I'm always up for a worthy chase." — A.G. Howard

I go to the theatre expecting to have a good time. I want each play and performance to take me somewhere. Naturally, this doesn't always happen. — John Lahr

It's great news. The reality of negotiations today is that they take time. But these have always been conducted in a good spirit and we are very pleased with the outcome. We can now look forward to the future. — Alex Ferguson

Why is it that the bad shit in our lives always seems to take up so much more mental space than the good stuff? I wrote. Is that part of being a person, or just part of being me?

I think about that question all the time.

Do you have an answer?

I don't think that questions like that have answers. An optimistic person would probably say that the bad things stick out because they're not as common as the good things.

Are you an optimistic person?

No. — Tommy Wallach

I had a good, sound upbringing with sensible people around me. I was brought up by intelligent parents. My mother always said to me, "You've got to work at your career and you've got to be good at it. Okay, you've had a bit of success but that's not longevity. You've got to really work for a long time." — Olivia Newton-John

In general, I tend to laugh too much. I always try to tell myself not to, but I think that's just part of getting through the job. It's not rocket science. I want to have a good time! — Zach Woodlee

Procrastination is a way for us to be satisfied with second-rate results; we can always tell ourselves we'd have done a better job if only we had more time...If you're good at rationalizing, you can keep yourself feeling rather satisfied this way, but it's a cheap happy. You're whittling your expectations of yourself down lower and lower. — Richard O'Connor

I prayed as we walked up the hill. I prayed and felt a measure of calm return. No visions. No angels singing. But a feeling of peace flowed over me. Ii took a deep breath, and something hard and tight and ugly in my heart let go. I took it as a good sign that I'd get to Jeff in time. But part of me was skeptical. God doesn't always save someone. Often He just helps you live through the loss. I guess I don't entirely trust God. I never doubt Him, but His motives are too beyond me. Through a glass darkly and all that. Just once I'd like to see through the damn glass clearly. — Laurell K. Hamilton

When you're spending your money for a nice outing, you want to go have a good time. And I always thought comedies, laughing, was something that was made for entertainment on that level. And records and maybe TV and stuff like that is really made to be heavy. — Ice Cube

The abnormally large female cut the sandwich into four pieces and gave one to each before taking one for herself. They all took a bite and she grinned at their appreciative groans. "See?" she said around a mouthful of peanut butter and jelly. "Isn't that good?"
"And so decadent," Berg sighed. "I feel like I'm eating evil. Pure, unadulterated evil."
"But good evil," Finn added. "The finest evil ever."
"Come!" Carl, the unabashed history fan and future historical "re-creator" of the lot - an activity Irene had always thought was an incredible waste of time for any human being with a brain - cried out,"Let us tell the others of this glory and what we have learned here today from the enemy She-wolf!"
"Huzzah!" they all cheered and ran out the kitchen back door. — Shelly Laurenston

I was brought up an atheist and have always remained so. But at no time was I led to believe that morality was unimportant or that good and bad did not exist. I believe passionately in the need to distinguish between right and wrong and am somewhat confounded by being told I need God, Jesus or a clergyman to help me to do so. — Nigella Lawson

When you spend significant amounts of time with someone they offer constant feedback, becoming part of the patterning of your brain. In other words, part of you. But I take your point
constant feedback is not always deep feedback. A good measure of how much of you they've become is your level of distress when they're gone. If they form a large measure of your patterning, then you'll experience a major culling of the self. That's what's known as grief. — Scott Hutchins

Give yourself some credit," he went on, "not a lot of silkies would have made it this far."
"I stopped you from killing Chorda," (...)
"Hey, come one," Rafe said. "It's your first time in the Feral Zone. Of course you made mistakes."
"Like falling for the wrong boy?" I'd said it to be funny, since he was always teasing me about Everson, but Rafe grew still.
He turned his gaze on the dark skyline. "No, you didn't. He's a stiff, but he's a good guy, he won't crawl out of your window after you fall asleep or come on to your sister."
"I don't have a sister."
"Missing the point. — Kat Falls

People always talk about good time rock and roll, Chuck Berry or whatever, like this liberating force for feeling good. But what I need in my life is to be liberated into feeling bad. Not sad. I have plenty of sad. What I need is a place where I can spray anger in sparks like a gnarled piece of electrical cable. Just be mad at stuff and soak in the helplessness. — John Darnielle

I found the concept of hindsight bias fascinating, and incredibly important to management. One of the toughest problems a CEO faces is convincing managers that they should take on risky projects if the expected gains are high enough. Their managers worry, for good reason, that if the project works out badly, the manager who championed the project will be blamed whether or not the decision was a good one at the time. Hindsight bias greatly exacerbates this problem, because the CEO will wrongly think that whatever was the cause of the failure, it should have been anticipated in advance. And, with the benefit of hindsight, he always knew this project was a poor risk. What makes the bias particularly pernicious is that we all recognize this bias in others but not in ourselves. — Richard H. Thaler

On the planet Earth, man had always assumed that he was more intelligent than dolphins because he had achieved so much -the wheel, New York, wars and so on - whilst all the dolphins had ever done was muck about in the water having a good time.But conversely, the dolphins had always believed that they were fat more intelligent than man, for precisely the same reason — Douglas Adams

The art of not reading is a very important one. It consists in not taking an interest in whatever may be engaging the attention of the general public at any particular time. When some political or ecclesiastical pamphlet, or novel, or poem is making a great commotion, you should remember that he who writes for fools always finds a large public. A precondition for reading good books is not reading bad ones: for life is short. — Arthur Schopenhauer

Social scientific research is and always will be tentative and imperfect. It does not claim to transform economics, sociology, and history into exact sciences. But by patiently searching for facts and patterns and calmly analyzing the economic, social, and political mechanisms that might explain them, it can inform democratic debate and focus attention on the right questions. It can help to redefine the terms of debate, unmask certain preconceived or fraudulent notions, and subject all positions to constant critical scrutiny. In my view, this is the role that intellectuals, including social scientists, should play, as citizens like any other but with the good fortune to have more time than others to devote themselves to study (and even to be paid for it - a signal privilege). — Thomas Piketty

Oh Beck, I love reading your e-mail. Learning your life. And I am careful; I always mark new messages unread so that you won't get alarmed. My good fortune doesn't stop there; You prefer e-mail. You don't like texting. So this means that I am not missing out on all that much communication. You wrote an "essay" for some blog in which you stated that "e-mails last forever. You can search for any word at any time and see everything you ever said to anyone about that one word. Texts go away." I love you for wanting a record. I love your records for being so accessible and I'm so full of you, your calendar of caloric intake and hookups and menstrual moments, your self-portraits you don't publish, your recipes and exercises. You will know me soon too, I promise. — Caroline Kepnes

Coming to terms with my feelings of worthlessness isn't always a bad time, but it's rarely a good one. — Dov Davidoff

My dad was a really good surfer, and by the time I was 10, he was dragging me out on some good days at Bells. I'd reckon they were solid, 6-foot days, and he'd tell me to wait on the shoulder. I'd see him coming through the barrel, and he'd just scream at me to go. I'd drop in, and he'd give me a hoot from behind - I've always loved it. — Xavier Rudd

Acting has always been something for me that's been a romp. I just show up and I have a good time, and I hope that I get through the day and I can have lunch in the sun. — George Hamilton

I love coming to Las Vegas. I've always loved it and always had a good time. — Ian Ziering

The whales always fell silent when the throbbing hum of humanity grew overwhelming. Whenever a ship of any size came near, I had to take off the headset to protect my ears. I wondered if a species that had taken millennia to evolve such a delicate and sophisticated sense of hearing could adapt to humanity's sonic onslaught. My notes from the time bear witness to the effect on my own primitive ears: "I have been listening to boats all day; my head is throbbing; the silence of my canvas tent feels good tonight - poor whales." That — Alexandra Morton

My motto has always been "Time enjoyed is never wasted." Except replace "enjoyed" with "drunk" and "never wasted" with "never not a good idea. — Jenny Lawson

Often the reason we won't say no is that we are afraid. We fear disappointing people. We fear being passed by. We fear missing out on a good opportunity. But at some point every leader must come to grips with the fact that there will always be more opportunities than there is time to pursue them. If we don't choose our opportunities carefully, we will dilute our efforts in every endeavor. Refusing to say no eventually robs a leader of his ultimate opportunity - the opportunity to play to his strengths. Choose your opportunities carefully. Many opportunities are worth missing. Just say no. — Andy Stanley

In truly good writing no matter how many times you read it you do not know how it is done. That is beacause there is a mystery in all great writing and that mystery does not dis-sect out. It continues and it is always valid. Each time you re-read you see or learn something new. — Ernest Hemingway,

A good book is always better the second time around. — M.T. Acquaire

That's how the grievin' becomes after a time. You've tossed off the black blanket, but scraps of it fall on you unexpected, your life always a quilt with a dark patch or two. The Good Lord uses those to show off the bright colors, I think. — Lisa Wingate

I always had a philosophy which I got from my father. He used to say, 'Listen. God gave to you the gift to play football. This is your gift from God. If you take care of your health, if you are in good shape all the time, with your gift from God no one will stop you, but you must be prepared.' — Pele

It was the joy of your life to know Clark Gable. He was everything good you could think of. He had delicious humor, he had great compassion, he was always a fine old teddy bear. In no way was he conscious of his good looks, as were most other men in pictures at that time. Clark was very unactorly. — Joan Blondell

It's all a lie. I said to myself. Romance. This notion that some guy is going to swoop and fall madly in love with me and change my life and make everything perfect. It's one big, horrible lie and I bought it. Hook, line, and a ten thousand-pound sinker. Or I guess I should say it's a lie for a girl like me. For Skye, that's another story. The first time Dakota kissed me, down at the hot tub, I remember thinking, this is too good to be true. But if something feels too good to be true, maybe it's not true. Maybe the truth is that Skye deserves him. She'll always be the winner. And I, pathetically, will always be me. — Carolyn Mackler

I would say that I had to change about eating out. I used to love eating out all the time. Eating out isn't always good. I ate a lot of fast food. So I had to slow that down and that's helped me a lot. — Jadeveon Clowney

Remember that all through history, there have been tyrants and murderers, and for a time, they seem invincible. But in the end, they always fall. Always. — Mahatma Gandhi

The young are always coming up with the good ideas; it's because they waste time. They follow their passion and do something, not looking for a payoff, just doing what's interesting. — Kevin Kelly

A challenge always is good. Normal design does not come under the constraints of a small budget and time frame. But it has helped me to make quick and knowledgeable decisions. — Douglas Wilson

I knew it wouldn't always be this easy. But it sure as hell would be a good time. — Alice Clayton

The Men at Work thing is always there, it's always going to be there. It's not something I consciously think that much about anymore. The thing that stays with you is the songs, which is a good thing for me, because the songs are the things that stand the test of time. — Colin Hay

He family motto, after all, is 'To Have and To Hold'. We were always a warrior breed, but we don't fight solely for lands and material wealth. There's an understanding, drummed into all of us from our earliest years, that success-true success-means capturing and holding , something more. That something more is the future-to excel is very well, but one needs to excel and survive. To seize lands is well and good, but we want to hold them for all time. Which means creating and building a family-defending the family that is, and creating the next generation. Because it's the next generation that's our future. Without securing that future, material success is no real success at all. — Stephanie Laurens

It's always made me feel odd when I'd get a Dove Award for an instrumental album that has nothing to do with gospel. When I think of gospel music, I think of spreading the Good News with words. But maybe it's just because I was heralded once upon a time as one of theirs. The category of instrumental music seems sort of important to the big picture, but I felt a little embarrassed at the same time. — Phil Keaggy

There never is a good time for tough decisions. There will always be an election or something else. You have to pick courage and do it. Governance is about taking tough, even unpopular, decisions. — Jairam Ramesh

A cigar," said the altruist, "a cigar, my good man, I cannot give you. But any time you need a light, just come around; mine is always lit. — Karl Kraus

I have a song I wrote called "Autobiography." I came from a very intense living situation, with having a parent on drugs and not having a lot of money. So I always want to talk about the real things. But I think 90 percent of my music, I want it to be 'feel-good music'. I'm already recording tracks for my album, but when it comes time to actually say, 'this is the album,' I may be in a completely different space than I'm in right now. — Nicki Minaj

My friends, if there is one gift in my omniscience, it's the knowledge I have of just how much good is out there. When I'm disappointed in my children near and far who hurt others, I am reminded of the many souls who do not hurt others. I see a smack across the face in one part of the planet at the same time as I see a thousand hugs and kisses somewhere else. Love is everywhere. And if all the forces of good were stacked up against all the forces of evil, it would be a most unfair fight. Good would always win. My dears, good will always win. — Sean Patrick Brennan

Before I finished another level of Scientology auditing, I had a very hard time with being wrong and I always had to have my own way - and not in a good sense. After auditing, I was able to have my thoughts, communicate them and not have to be right all the time. — Danny Masterson

It's my belief that history is a wheel. 'Inconstancy is my very essence,' says the wheel. Rise up on my spokes if you like but don't complain when you're cast back down into the depths. Good time pass away, but then so do the bad. Mutability is our tragedy, but it's also our hope. The worst of time, like the best, are always passing away. — Tony Wilson

I never care what I do, so I always have a good time. — F Scott Fitzgerald

A lot of these roles that I feel like I've had some sort of impact, or that have had an effect on me, have always been with directors who have the time to somehow get to know me. Any good director's going to be curious about who it is that's coming aboard. — Elias Koteas

My unlucky star had destined me to be born when there was much talk about morality and, at the same time, more murders than in any other period. There is, undoubtedly, some connection between these phenomena. I sometime ask myself whether the connection was a priori, since these babblers are cannibals from the start - or a connection a posteriori, since they inflate themselves with their moralizing to a height which becomes dangerous for others.
However that may be, I was always happy to meet a person who owed his touch of common sense and good manners to his parents and who didn't need big principles. I do not claim more for myself, and I am a man who for an entire lifetime has been moralized at to the right and the left - by teachers and superiors, by policemen and journalists, by Jews and Gentiles, by inhabitants of the Alps, of islands, and the plains, by cut-throats and aristocrats - all of whom looked as if butter wouldn't melt in their mouths. — Ernst Junger

I always liked having a good time. I got into this business because I got fired from any job I ever had because I stayed out late playing music. — Jerry Jeff Walker

But in short, the recipe for a growing person is always grace plus truth over time. Give a person grace (unmerited favor) an truth (structure), and do that over time, and you have the greatest chance of this person growing into a person of good character. Grace includes support, resources, love, compassion, forgiveness, and all of the relations sides of God's nature. Truth is the structure of life; it tells us how we are supposed to live our lives and how life really works. — Henry Cloud

Any time you get a chance to do something different or get away from your appearance or get away from what people are used to seeing, I think it's always good. — Mark Consuelos

When all great movements are in their infancy, they are nourished basically on the mother's milk of righteous indignation. It is a time of red-faced screaming and finger pointing. That's a good thing - we need to be angry to move toward any systemic change. But ultimately the fingers have to stop pointing and the hand has got to get down to work - and the work is always messy. — Jackson Galaxy

North Americans as a whole need to embrace having clothes altered to their body. I hear it all the time: why do the Europeans always look so good? They have a relationship with their tailor and spend the time and money to make their clothes look their best. — Michael Kors

I am always saddened by the death of a good person. It is from this sadness that a feeling of gratitude emerges. I feel honored to have known them and blessed that their passing serves as a reminder to me that my time on this beautiful earth is limited and that I should seize the opportunity I have to forgive, share, explore, and love. I can think of no greater way to honor the deceased than to live this way. — Steve Maraboli

I am absolutely certain that generations from now, we will be able to look back and tell our children that this was the moment when we began to provide care for the sick and good jobs to the jobless; this was the moment when the rise of the oceans began to slow and our planet began to heal; this was the moment when we ended a war and secured our nation and restored our image as the last, best hope on earth. This was the moment - this was the time - when we came together to remake this great nation so that it may always reflect our very best selves and our highest ideals. — Barack Obama

Psychopaths have a grandiose self-structure which demands a scornful and detached devaluation of others, in order to ward off their envy toward the good perceived in other people. He will choose you, disarm you with his words, and control you with his presence. He will delight you with his wit and his plans. He will show you a good time but you will always get the bill. He will smile and deceive you, and he will scare you with his eyes. And when he is through with you, and he will be through with you, he will desert you and take with him your innocence and your pride. — Robert D. Hare

People always confuse intelligence with rational thinking and skepticism. I think it's a big mistake to assume anyone that follows a cult, religion, political party we don't like, etc is "stupid." But it's fair to say that if you follow something irrational, you are acting irrationally (at least as it pertains to that one specific act.) People can be smart - even brilliant - without necessarily being rational. Sometimes it's easy for people to be skeptical to most things, but with one or two glaring blind spots. If you don't spend a good portion of time playing devil's advocate with your own dearly held beliefs, odds are that there will be at least a couple of them that are irrational, even if you're one of the smartest people around. — Jon Moore

Had taught him to sharpen his senses - to trust the instincts that had been guiding him south. His homing radar was tingling like crazy now. The end of his journey was close - almost right under his feet. But how could that be? There was nothing on the hilltop. The wind changed. Percy caught the sour scent of reptile. A hundred yards down the slope, something rustled through the woods - snapping branches, crunching leaves, hissing. Gorgons. For the millionth time, Percy wished their noses weren't so good. They had always said they could smell him because he was a demigod - the half-blood son of some old Roman god. Percy had tried rolling in mud, splashing through creeks, even keeping air-freshener sticks in his pockets so he'd have that new car smell; but apparently demigod stink was hard to mask. He scrambled to the west — Rick Riordan

Adults are always telling young people, 'These are the best years of your life.' Are they? I don't know. Sometimes when adults say this to children I look into their faces. They look like someone on the top seat of the Ferris wheel who has had too much cotton candy and barbecue. They'd like to get off and be sick but everyone keeps telling them what a good time they're having. — Erma Bombeck

I've learned that doing what you think is right doesn't always make you feel good. For another, I've learned that sometimes you just have to keep on going when you want to do nothing but drop. And that just doing the everyday things, like keeping a shop running or getting up every morning, will keep the work going until things can straighten out again. And doing those things right every day soon becomes more important than the more pressing issues of the time. — Ann Rinaldi

According to Daddy, that was a time of general lunacy in Neely, but then Daddy has always said there's nothing like a good snowfall to bring out the feeble-mindedness in people. — T. R. Pearson

I've always been a creative speller and never achieved good grades in school. I graduated from high school but didn't have the opportunity to attend college, so I did what young women my age did at the time - I married. — Debbie Macomber

For instance, on the planet Earth, man had always assumed that he was more intelligent than dolphins because he had achieved so much - the wheel, New York, wars and so on - whilst all the dolphins had ever done was muck about in the water having a good time. But conversely, the dolphins had always believed that they were far more intelligent than man - for precisely the same reasons. — Douglas Adams

The world is full of men and women who work too much, sleep too little, hardly ever exercise, eat poorly, and are always struggling or failing to find adequate time with their families. We are in a perpetual hurry-constantly rushing from one activity to another, with little understanding of where all this activity is leading us ... The world has gone and got itself in an awful rush, to whose benefit I do not know. We are too busy for our own good. We need to slow down. Our lifestyles are destroying us. The worst part is, we are rushing east in search of a sunset. — Matthew Kelly

I've always been someone who's really tried to live in the here and now. My memory isn't very good so maybe that's why, but it just seems like I've been living this life, my current chapter, for a really long time and I don't really remember what it was like before. It's just been sort of ingrained in me. What I deal with day to day. — Jude Law

I'm just trying to get as good as I can get, I am still young but there is always room to learn so I spend a lot of time watching players in other leagues to get better. — Steve Purdy

I suppose next time I come home I shall find you wearing false moustaches - or are you doing so now?'
Poirot winced. His moustaches had always been his sensitive point. He was inordinately proud of them. My words touched him on the raw.
'No, no, indeed, mon ami. That day, I pray the good God, is still far off. The false moustaches! Quelle Horreur!'
He tugged at them vigorously to assure me of their genuine character.
'Well, they are very luxuriant still,' I said.
'N'est-ce pas? Never, in the whole of London, have I seen a pair of moustaches to equal mine.'
A good job too, I thought privately. — Agatha Christie

The idea of gas engines was by no means new, but this was the first time that a really serious effort had been made to put them on the market. They were received with interest rather than enthusiasm and I do not recall any one who thought that the internal combustion engine could ever have more than a limited use. All the wise people demonstrated conclusively that the engine could not compete with steam. They never thought that it might carve out a career for itself. That is the way with wise people
they are so wise and practical that they always know to a dot just why something cannot be done; they always know the limitations. That is why I never employ an expert in full bloom. If ever I wanted to kill opposition by unfair means I would endow the opposition with experts. They would have so much good advice that I could be sure they would do little work. — Henry Ford

If time were a bolt of cloth," said Om, "I would cut out all the bad parts. Snip out the scary nights and stitch together the good parts, to make time bearable. Then I could wear it like a coat, always live happily. — Rohinton Mistry

Once upon a time, my government turned my city into a police state, kidnapped me, and tortured me. When I got free, I decided that the problem wasn't the system, but who was running it. Bad guys had gotten into places of high office. We needed good apples. I worked my butt off to get people to vote for good apples. We had elections. We installed the kind of apples everyone agreed would be the kind of apples we could be proud of. They said good things. A few real dirtbags like Carrie Johnstone lost their jobs.
And then, well, the good apples turned out to act pretty much exactly like the bad apples. Oh, they had reasons. There were emergencies. Circumstances. It was all really regrettable.
But there were always emergencies, weren't there? — Cory Doctorow

The reason that the rich were so rich, Vimes reasoned, was because they managed to spend less money.
Take boots, for example. He earned thirty-eight dollars a month plus allowances. A really good pair of leather boots cost fifty dollars. But an affordable pair of boots, which were sort of OK for a season or two and then leaked like hell when the cardboard gave out, cost about ten dollars. Those were the kind of boots Vimes always bought, and wore until the soles were so thin that he could tell where he was in Ankh-Morpork on a foggy night by the feel of the cobbles.
But the thing was that good boots lasted for years and years. A man who could afford fifty dollars had a pair of boots that'd still be keeping his feet dry in ten years' time, while the poor man who could only afford cheap boots would have spent a hundred dollars on boots in the same time and would still have wet feet.
This was the Captain Samuel Vimes 'Boots' theory of socioeconomic unfairness. — Terry Pratchett

Keep your life simple and stylish and earnest. Do good and donate your time and money to something you care about. Make people laugh. Be frank. Always give people a second chance - but rarely a third. Live light, travel light, and be light. Forget shit and move on. Make everyone you love feel loved. Waste not, want not. Reuse stuff. Stop trying to get a tan and straighten your hair - you're just not made that way. Go to the movies, go to the library, go to the park. Try to make every day feel as close to a vacation as possible. Floss. — Judy Greer

For a long time, all the way through to the end of elementary school, Beans was my only friend. Because that's how I've always been. I only need one good friend to see me through. Most people aren't like that. Most people are always looking out for more people to know. In the end, Beans was like most people. After a while she had dozens of friends, and by fifth grade it was pretty obvious that even though she was my best friend, I wasn't hers. — Carol Rifka Brunt

Happy we were then, for we had a good house, and good food, and good work. There was nothing to do outside at night, except chapel, or choir, or penny-readings, sometimes. But even so, we always found plenty to do until bedtime, for if we were not studying or reading, then we were making something out back, or over the mountain singing somewhere. I can remember no time when there was not plenty to be done.
I wonder what has happened in fifty years to change it all ... But when people stop being friends with their mother and fathers, and itching to be out of the house, and going mad for other things to do, I cannot think. It is like an asthma, that comes on a man quickly. He has no notion how he had it, but there it is, and nothing can cure it. — Richard Llewellyn

Moses was good at his job. He was efficient. He was always busy making the room clean. But at the same time, he could read the family's emotions. He never made a medical diagnosis or overstepped the bounds of his position. But he shared a lot of practical, commonsense wisdom gleaned from helping hundreds of families make it through traumatic surgery. Moses reinforced the good: "You're sitting up today; that's a good boy." He offered encouragement: "You're brave. You're strong. You can do it." He gave practical advice: "You've been through a lot, but you're coming through it now. Your body knows what to do. Just rest and let it do it." Matt and Mindi looked forward to visits from Moses because as he made their hospital room clean, he also gave them hope. — David Sturt

He will choose you, disarm you with his words, and control you with his presence. He will delight you with his wit and his plans. He will show you a good time but you will always get the bill. He will smile and deceive you, and he will scare you with his eyes. And when he is through with you, and he will be through with you, he will desert you and take with him your innocence and your pride. You will be left much sadder but not a lot wiser, and for a long time you will wonder what happened and what you did wrong. And if another of his kind comes knocking on your door, will you open it?

-From an essay signed "A psychopath in prison — Robert D. Hare

I have always regarded Paine as one of the greatest of all Americans. Never have we had a sounder intelligence in this republic ... It was my good fortune to encounter Thomas Paine's works in my boyhood ... it was, indeed, a revelation to me to read that great thinker's views on political and theological subjects. Paine educated me, then, about many matters of which I had never before thought. I remember, very vividly, the flash of enlightenment that shone from Paine's writings, and I recall thinking, at that time, 'What a pity these works are not today the schoolbooks for all children!' My interest in Paine was not satisfied by my first reading of his works. I went back to them time and again, just as I have done since my boyhood days. — Thomas A. Edison

As the pretensions of modernity are unmasked today, it is a good time for us to recover our nerve, "always being prepared to make a defense to anyone who asks [us] for a reason for the hope that is in [us]" (1Pe 3:15). By breaking into our history, sharing our history, and transforming that history from the inside out, God has indeed made himself the object of our knowledge. — Michael S. Horton

Even as we grew up, my mother could not help imposing herself between her children and whatever it was they might take it in mind to reach out for in the world. For she would get it for them, if it was good enough for them
she would have to be very sure
and give it to them, at whatever cost to herself: valiance was in her very fibre. She stood always prepared in herself to challenge the world in our place. She did indeed tend to make the world look dangerous, and so it had been to her. A way had to be found around her love sometimes, without challenging that, and at the same time cherishing it in its unassailable strength. Each of us children did, sooner or later, in part at least, solve this in a different, respectful, complicated way. — Eudora Welty

I think most artists will experience a lot of negative people on Twitter but, thank God, I've got so many followers that I'm not able to see them that much. I'll see some from time to time but, for the most part, I always focus on something good. — Nicki Minaj

Take lots of time for yourself, discovering yourself-pursue not only a profession but other life passions, I always make time to rock climb or hike or write a few short stories. Also, find good people and surround yourself with them. Most importantly, always believe you will, unequivocally. — Sarah Silverman

I always say if I'm not good at something it's just because I've not had time to focus on it ... it's just uncrafted, like a slab of rock that contains the statue of David within it. — Michael Sheen

Then he would ask for songs and I would pluck them out for him on a lute I borrowed from my father's wagon. He would even sing from time to time. He had a bright, reckless tenor that was always wandering off, looking for notes in the wrong places. More often than not he stopped and laughed at himself when it happened. He was a good man, and there was no conceit in him. Not long after he joined our troupe, I asked Abenthy what it was like being an arcanist. He gave me a thoughtful look. Have you ever known an arcanist? — Patrick Rothfuss

I couldn't see killing myself if I had a book that was only half-read: Fountainhead, Catcher in the Rye, Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy, One Hundred Years of Solitude? No. I figured that those who killed themselves first had to finish whatever book they were reading...if it were any good, that is. Of course, there's always the occasional book that makes you want to throw yourself off a bridge just for having wasted your time reading it. But I usually finished those ones, too. — Michael Anthony

I've always loved Houdini, not just because of what he did, but also because of what he stood for. He was a self-made man in a time when the idea of celebrity was still new, and he used his celebrity for good. — Michael Redhill

Well, that's it." I said after we had waited for another five minutes and found ourselves still in a state of pleasantly welcome existence. "The ChronoGuard has shut itself down and time travel is as it should be: technically, logically, and theoretically ... impossible." "Good thing, too," reply Landon. "It always made my head ache. In fact, I was thinking of doing self help book for science-fiction novelists eager to write about time travel. It would consist of a single word: Don't. — Jasper Fforde