Head In The Game Quotes & Sayings

No incident, however seemingly trivial, is unimportant in the scheme of things. One event leads to another, which triggers something else and before you know where you are, the ramifications spread far and wide throughout history, echoing down the ages; getting fainter and fainter but never completely dying away. They talk of the harmony of the spheres, but history is a symphony of echoes, every little action has huge consequences. They're not always apparent and sometimes, in our game, sometimes effect comes before cause, not after. It makes your head ache. — Jodi Taylor

My friend Simon managed only sixteen of the seventeen League games - he smashed his head on a bookshelf in London a few hours before the Grimsby game on the 28th of Decemebr; his girlfriend had to take his car keys away from him because he kept making dazed attempts to drive from Fulham up to the Abbey. — Nick Hornby

'Minute to Win It' is a variation on a game show from the 1950s called 'Beat the Clock,' in which contestants won washing machines and fox stoles by doing such pointless stunts as catching a tennis ball in a paper cup or knocking a hat off one's wife's head with a whipped-cream spritzer. — Tom Shales

Head. "We've got enough starfish," he said and then went on, "Look, Hazel, I know you've got six or seven undersized abalones in the bottom of your sack. If we get stopped by a game warden, you're going to say they're mine, on my permit - aren't you?" "Well - hell," said Hazel. "Look," Doc said kindly. "Suppose I get an order for abalones and maybe the game warden thinks I'm using my collecting permit too often. Suppose he thinks I'm eating them." "Well - hell," said Hazel. "It's like the industrial alcohol board. They've got suspicious minds. They always think I'm drinking the alcohol. They think that about everyone. — John Steinbeck

I feel like I'm in The Crying Game right now, Dad mutters with a sad shake of his head. — Tara Sivec

I had spent many nights in the jungle looking for game, but this was the first time I had ever spent a night looking for a man-eater. The length of road immediately in front of me was brilliantly lit by the moon, but to right and left the overhanging trees cast dark shadows, and when the night wind agitated the branches and the shadows moved, I saw a dozen tigers advancing on me, and bitterly regretted the impulse that had induced me to place myself at the man-eater's mercy. I lacked the courage to return to the village and admit I was too frightened to carry out my self-imposed task, and with teeth chattering, as much from fear as from cold, I sat out the long night. As the grey dawn was lighting up the snowy range which I
was facing, I rested my head on my drawn-up knees, and it was in this position my men an hour later found me fast asleep; of the tiger I had neither heard nor seen anything. — Jim Corbett

I've always had an irrational fear - it's really not an irrational fear, I think - whenever I've been standing at a urinal at a bar, or Giants Stadium or Yankee Stadium. You've got a bunch of drunks behind you, often in a hostile, adrenalized environment like a football game. What's to prevent the guy behind me from slamming my head into the porcelain wall in front of me? — Steve Rushin

It's good to be a little frightened. It's good to respect your opponent. It keeps you sharp. In the fight game, the head rules the heart. But in the end the heart is the boss. — Bryce Courtenay

It's can you, Steve Wozniak, design the same computer - maybe it's a Varian 620i - can you design it on paper with fewer chips than last month? Can you design it with 79 chips instead of 80 chips?I had played this game so long that I had all these little tricks in my head that I can't even explain. Nothing was wasted; absolutely zero waste. I told this story recently to the Resource Recovery Association, recycling, and they loved to hear I didn't believe in waste. — Steve Wozniak

Somebody can say they don't understand why somebody drifts. But I've always found people who drift interesting, 'cause it shows me the game's not stagnant in their own head. They're thinking. — Dennis Miller

When may did so, he found every cup and saucer, plate, vase, and bowl standing arranged across the floor like pieces in a scaled-up chess game.
"The Whitstable family tree," Bryant explained, entering and setting down his tea tray. "It's the only way I could get it sorted out in my head. I had to see them properly laid out, who was descended from whom." He pointed to a milk jug. "Daisy Whitstable is bottom left-hand corner, by the fireguard. Next to her is the egg cup, brother Tarquin ... Now, pass me Marion and Alfred Whitstable over there."
"What's their significance?"
"We need them to drink out of. — Christopher Fowler

Even in the mid-1990s geeks were fair game. One afternoon a colleague and I were standing on either side of one of the narrow aisles between the banks of trading desks on the floor when one of the chief traders walked between us, his head momentarily between ours. At that instant he winced, clutched his head with both hands as though in excruciating pain, and exclaimed, "Aarrggh-hhh! The force field! It's too intense! Let me out of the way! — Emanuel Derman

But seat-back video screens and the hard frames that surround them pose a safety challenge, partly because of the potential for injuries caused by head strikes, and partly because the computers and the electrical systems that serve them have to be both fireproof and fully isolated from the plane's - so that crossed wires in somebody's seat don't allow a ten-year-old playing a video game to suddenly take control of the cockpit. Largely as a result, in-flight entertainment systems are almost unbelievably expensive. The rule of thumb, I was told, is "a thousand dollars an inch" - meaning that the small screen in the back of each economy seat can cost an airline ten thousand dollars, plus a few thousand for its handheld controller. — Anonymous

Hunting is the noblest sport yet devised by the hand of man. There were mighty hunters in the Bible, and all the caves where the cave men lived are full of carvings of assorted game the head of the house drug home. If you hunt to eat, or hunt for sport for something fine, something that will make you proud, and make you remember every single detail of the day you found him and shot him, that is good too. — Robert Ruark

Kuwei poked his head out of the huge stone tomb as they approached.
"What did I tell you?" Kaz growled, pointing his cane at him.
"My Kerch isn't very good," protested Kuwei.
"Don't run game on me, kid. It's good enough. Stay in the tomb."
Kuwei hung his head. "Stay in the tomb," he repeated glumly. — Leigh Bardugo

A bad putter is like a bad apple in a barrel. First, it turns your chipping game sour. Then it begins to eat into your irons and finally it just cleans the head off your driver. — Sam Snead

Are you two done staring longingly in each other's eyes or should we just take a break?"
Now scowling, Dee turned her head and focused on the only idiot really taking the game seriously.
Mitch took a step back, grabbing his brother and yanking him in front of his body. "Take him, Dee. Take him!"
"You bastard!" Brendon yelped. — Shelly Laurenston

To me, my biggest fear is getting a big head, and that is when I get the hammer. Because it's very easy in this game to believe you're something special. — Keith Richards

I would play ball with Catherine, and hide and seek: Not a very challenging game in an open meadow, but she was still at the age where she believed that if she shut her eyes and buried her head under a shawl then she could not be seen. — Philippa Gregory

I like video games, but they are very violent. I want to create a video game in which you have to help all the characters who have died in the other games. 'Hey, man, what are you playing?' 'Super Busy Hospital. Could you leave me alone? I'm performing surgery! This guy got shot in the head, like, 27 times!' — Demetri Martin

But it did not stop her from wishing that it had all been different.
Wishing that she had had the chance to be everything daughters of earls were born to be. Wishing that she'd been raised without a care in the world. Without a doubt in her head that it would someday be her day to sparkle; that she would one day be courted properly - by a man who wanted her for her, not as a spoil from a game of chance.
Wishing that she were not so very alone.
Not that wishing had ever helped. — Sarah MacLean

We are on the edge of economic collapse unless we wake up and
forcibly take back control of our government and economy. Over the
past 100 years, the game has been rigged, slowly and piecemeal at
first, always in the name of serving the greater good, preventing the
next bubble or providing greater transparency and security. It is as if
the American people are suffering from battered spouse syndrome; the
politicians, the greedy bankers, and the Fed all lie to us while they
steal our wealth and our liberty. Every time we call them on it, they
promise to never do it again if we'll just give them one more chance.
So we let it slide and then act shocked when they do it to us again.
Maybe we should have our collective head examined. — Ziad K. Abdelnour

I'm starting to think I'll probably never have a girlfriend, which would be okay too. On those few occasions when a girl has actually flirted with me, tipped her head sideways and laughed at some stupid remark, all it did was make me angry. It seemed like she was playing a game with idiotic rules. First you laugh, then you tell a pretty lie, then you stick your tongue in each other's mouths, then you say something really mean and hurtful to each other, then you go off to find somebody else who wants to play the game. This is an activity for intelligent people? I think not. — Ellen Wittlinger

I don't recommend trying to cram a lot of long opening-move variations into your head. The main idea behind any opening is to get a strong pawn center and give your pieces a lot of scope so that you cramp your opponent's position and can attack weaknesses in his game. — Bobby Fischer

Phrases and images from the game filtered through his head... hitting the sweet spot, working the rosin bag, over the bat, going deep, in the hole, double header, baseball was a filthy, dirty sport! — J.D. Ruskin

For the first time in nearly twenty-five years, our country is having anything to do with the Chinamen, an it is an event far more important than any damn ping-pong game. It is diplomacy, and the future of the human race might be at stake. Do you understand what I am saying?
I shrug my shoulders an nod my head, but something down in me sinkin' fast. I am jus' a po' ole idiot, an now I have got the whole human race to look after. — Winston Groom

When you see people who are really good at game shows, the one common attribute is a cool head under pressure: an ability to perform as well in the studio, surrounded by lights and noise, as you do on your couch. — Ken Jennings

Tennis is all about mental toughness, and you have to keep your head in the game. I make time to relax away from competition pressures, travel and intense training schedules to make sure I'm looking after myself. Taking time out with family and friends helps to maintain the work-life balance everyone needs. — Samantha Stosur

Stop!" She advances on me with the most severe, stern look I've ever seen from her, and she yells in a strong voice. "No more. Get it out of your head, Kai! We are not running. This is happening whether you like it or not. It's time to get your game face on and get ready to kick some ass."
Holy ... I honestly didn't think her capable of this kind of verbal badassery. Even in handcuffs she has taken control, walloped me, and forced my whiney inner child into a corner. — Wendy Higgins

She perks up and smiles. "Are you asking me out on a real, live date?"
I nod my head.
"Well, you suck at it, you know. You always have. Sometimes girls like to be asked and not told."
She's trying to play hard to get, which is pointless. I've already got her ... but I play her game anyway. I kneel down on the floor in front of her and look into her eyes. "Lake, will you do me the honor of accompanying me on a date tomorrow night? "
She leans back into the couch and looks away. "I don't know, I'm sort of busy," she says. "I'll check my schedule and let you know." She tries to look put out, but a smile breaks out on her face. She leans forward and hugs me, but I lose my balance and we end up in the floor. I roll her onto her back and she stares up at me and laughs. "Fine. Pick me up at seven. — Colleen Hoover

I could lie there as long as I wanted, and let all the pictures of things a man might want run through my head, coffee, a girl, money, a drink, white sand and blue water, and let them all slide off, one after another, like a deck of cards slewing slowly off your hand. Maybe the things you want are like cards. You don't want them for themselves, really, though you think you do. You don't want a card because you want the card, but because in a perfectly arbitrary system of rules and values and in a special combination of which you already hold a part the card has meaning. But suppose you aren't sitting in a game. Then, even if you do know the rules, a card doesn't mean a thing. They all look alike. — Robert Penn Warren

Love is like a game of chess. You're white. He's black. You wait for him to make a move, while staring into his handsome, melting-you-on-the-inside eyes, then realize what a dummy he is to not tell you straight out to go first. The beginning is the crush stage. You begin to realize how much you want to defeat him, or make him fall in love with you. By the time you get to the heat of the game, you both moved and are hopefully dating. If you haven't forfeit then because you don't want to be cheated on, you make another move- head on shoulder, hand holding, etc. Black makes another move-he gives you his jacket on a freezing night. By the endgame, he either realizes how stupid he was to play with you and forfeits, or he realizes how smart you are and lets you defeat him (and love you). By the time you win, you're married to him. A happily ever after game of chess. — Amrita Ramanathan

Overall I can fairly safely say Bobby Orr impressed me more than anybody with his tremendous talents. In Bobby's first N.H.L. game he layed the lumber to Gordie's head. Later Howe retalliated and wanted to let the kid know he wasn't washed up yet. — Gordie Howe

She drew herself up and took in a breath, concentrating on her inflection so that she could indulge him in his game. Then she leaned forward and, in her best, most sincerely love-struck voice, breathed, "I love thee."
Sonny's face was just inches from hers. His storm-gray eyes flashed, and the dark silk of his hair drifted across his cheek as he leaned in his head. "Perfect."
So was the kiss.
Perfect.
"I love thee," Sonny murmured, all pretense gone. — Lesley Livingston

The thought processes that go through my head when I'm playing a game compared to the thought processes in real life are very, very different. And they're more interesting to me than what you think about when you're doing the dishes, cleaning the yard, watching TV, driving or watching a movie. — John Romero

I elbowed James as he shot my army guy in the head yet again.
"This game is so sexist," I complained. "I can't believe that there isn't even an option for me to play as a girl."
"Do you think that if you were playing as a busty blonde it would distract me?" James asked, amused.
"It couldn't hurt."
He tossed his controller on the ground. I gave a little embarrassing shriek as he tossed me over his shoulder. "We're done, guys. Buttercup wants to distract me. Consider me distracted. — R.K. Lilley

I've come to believe that what we need is a republic. People need to be run by people who like them, not boxed into a game they can't win by people who can't lose it. We need a head of state who's been on the run. An interior minister who's had the two o'clock knock and done solitary. A minister of agriculture who's seen a spade fired in anger and done twenty years on the land. A health minister who's had his life saved through swift transportation to a well-staffed, properly equipped hospital. An interior minister dedicated to dismantling the state with its futile bureaucratic waste and saving real money. And a police force that would put an end to the Bowmans of this world. — Derek Raymond

Send anyone claiming that their RPG activity is an art form my way, and I'll gladly stick a pin in their head and deflate it just to have the satisfaction of the popping sound that makes.
One might play a game artfully, but that makes neither the game nor its play art. — Gary Gygax

I needed to wander ... whenever and wherever I wanted! I'd found myself at the end of my rope as far as school was concerned; there seemed no particular reason for me to stay. The teachers didn't want to teach, and I didn't want to learn - from them. I wanted my education to come from living life, getting out there in the world, seeing and doing and moving amongst the other vagabonds who had had the same sneaking suspicion that I did, that there would be no great need for high-end mathematics, nope ... I was not going to be doing other people's taxes and going home at 5:37 p.m. to pat my dog's head and sit down to my one meat and two vegetable table waiting for Jeopardy to pop on the glass tit, the Pat Sajak of my own private game show, in the bellybutton of the universe, Miramar, Florida. — Johnny Depp

Baseball is the most intellectual game because most of the action goes on in your head. — Henry A. Kissinger

If you need to improve your focus and learn to avoid distractions, take a moment to visualize, with as much detail as possible, what you are about to do. It is easier to know what's ahead when there's a well-rounded script inside your head. Companies say such tactics are important in all kinds of settings, including if you're applying for a job or deciding whom to hire. The candidates who tell stories are the ones every firm wants. "We look for people who describe their experiences as some kind of a narrative," Andy Billings, a vice president at the video game giant Electronic Arts, told me. "It's a tip-off that someone has an instinct for connecting the dots and understanding how the world works at a deeper level. That's who everyone tries to get." III. — Charles Duhigg

Beware the man who beguiles you, Lori-Angel. Those are the ones who won't commit to you. Oh, they'll show you wonders, to be sure, and they'll spin your head with their pleasurable ways. But in the end, they always leave you and your broken heart far behind. Believe me, 'tis better to have the simple hound than to follow the fox. Though the fox is fairer to behold, the hound knows where his home is and dutifully he stays, while the handsome fox is ever off to find new game. (Anne Bonny) — Kinley MacGregor

You visualize [pitches]. You see it in your head; you think it ... I used to play every pitcher in my mind before I went to the ballpark. I started getting ready for ever game the moment I woke up. — Hank Aaron

All that summer, as I end up in his flat over and over, drinking his wine, having his bad pervy sex, and then lying on the bed, talking about Auden's influence on Morrissey, I feel like we're in a huge, ongoing surreal session of the Post-it Game, in which Rich has stuck a Post-it on my head on which is written either "My girlfriend" or "Not my girlfriend," and I am having to guess which it is with a series of questions that he can only answer yes or no. This whole situation seems like a massive societal problem. Why have we not yet discovered a way to find out if someone's in love with you? Why can't I press a litmus paper to Tony's sweaty brow, when we're fucking, and see if it turns pink for love - or blue for casual fuck? Why is there no information on this? Why has science not attended to this matter? — Caitlin Moran

Need a fourth?' he asked, earning himself a set of strangely satisfying startled glances. The only way the moment might have been better would be if El had taught Marty the game. But that had been his grandfather, years and years ago. The white-haired man smiled. 'You know how to play?'

'I'd need a card.'

'Card?' Then understanding dawned on the white-haired man's face. He shook his head. Again, he looked kind. 'Ah. Of course. Jew Mah Jongg. Entirely different game.'

His companions were nodding, too. The guy with the belt buckle said, 'Completely different. Very frustrating. So few ways to win. So many to lose.'

Yet again, Marty felt tears well in his eyes. His uncle's absence seeping in. 'Yep,' he said. 'Sounds like a Jewish game, alright.'

("Shomer") — Glen Hirshberg

The game's rules were Byzantine, and we had to work them out through trial and error. One rule, which had only gradually become apparent, was that one could only move into another character's head if the move did not involve too big a jump in social status. A peasant could not swap into the head of a king, even if the king knelt down to kiss the peasant. But the peasant could get there by jumping into the head of a blacksmith, and then an armourer, and then an officer in the king's guard, and so on - working their way up by discrete steps. Sometimes it would not be possible to change character between one session and the next, but that was all part of the game's richly involving texture. It was difficult and slow, but because at each step one had access to the memories and personality of the inhabited character, it was seldom boring. — Alastair Reynolds

Poor Quinn."
I glanced at my husband, and found him shaking his head mournfully.
"Why poor Quinn?" Kat asked.
"Dan still has his crush on Nico, and Quinn isn't here to defend his bromance."
I snorted because this was true. Dan had a bit of a crush on Nico. But then, we all did.
As though reading my thoughts, Sandra mock-whispered, "We all have a crush on Nico. Even you, Greg."
He didn't deny it; instead, opting to say, "I'm going to start a rumor that Dan and Nico bought tickets to the Cubs opening game, they're going together, and are hoping to get on the kiss-cam."
I clicked my tongue in mild disapproval. "You are a gossip, Greg Archer."
"Yes. I am. Annoyingly, Alex is worthless at spreading rumors because he's smitten with Drew."
"And you're smitten with no one," I stated.
"Untrue. I'm smitten with you."
This earned him an appreciative grin; I lifted my chin. "Well played, husband. Well played. — Penny Reid

I'm not the sort of person who does my mathematics writing on paper. I do that at the last stage of the game. I do my mathematics in my head. I sit down for a hard day's work and I write nothing all day. I just think. And I walk up and down because that helps keep me awake, it keeps the blood circulating, and I think and think. — Michael Atiyah

Activision was promoting an adventure game called Pitfall Harry and had built a little jungle scene in which passersby could swing on a makeshift vine. In another room, a company called Zombie had a metal sphere that shot blue electric bolts through the air. But the id installation had a bit more in store: an eight-foot-tall vagina. Gwar, the scatological rock band that id had hired to produce the display, had pushed their renowned prurient theatrics to the edge. The vagina was lined with dozens of dildos to look like teeth. A bust of O. J. Simpson's decapitated head hung from the top. As the visitors walked through the vaginal mouth, two members of Gwar cloaked in fur and raw steak came leaping out of the shadows and pretended to attack them with rubber penises. The Microsoft executives were frozen. Then, to everyone's relief, they burst out laughing. — David Kushner

I'm sure there have been guys who didn't realize they had a concussion and just kept playing. It's a violent game. The head injuries are the most dangerous to play with. We're trained to play no matter what. If you can run, and you're able to focus and know your responsibilities, you're usually out there playing. You wouldn't have enough players if no one played hurt. Especially if you're, like, on special teams, you're going to do everything you can to stay in the game. — Mike Brown

Once the game begins, I play to that song in my head. I run to rhythm, and that allows my mind to be free. — Marshall Faulk

There's a head inside the ball?" Surefire turned a shade paler along the edges of her face paint.
"It is good," Coatl responded. "Makes the ball lighter, bounce farther."
"You always want to get a head in the game," Raven added. — J.T. Bock

Lucky!" she shouted. The creature pulled up and pranced excitedly before her, front hooves pawing at the ground. Laughing with happiness, Kelley flung her arms around the kelpie and buried her face in his mane. Lucky nuzzled her shoulder and head-butted at her in delight.
Besides Sonny, Fennrys gestured with his good arm. "Isn't that ... ?"
"The Roan Horse, Harbinger of the Wild Hunt and Fearsome Bringer of Doom. Yeah" Sonny nodded. "Used to be."
"Thought so." Lucky kicked up his back hooves like a frolicking colt, and Fennrys snorted is disgust. "Evil really needs to step up its game. — Lesley Livingston

We used to have a family game, invented by my sister and a friend of hers - it was called 'Agatha's Husbands'. The idea was that they picked out two or at the most three of the most repellent looking strangers in a room, and it was then put to me that i had to choose one of them as a husband, on pain of death or slow torture by the Chinese.
'now then, Agatha, which will you have - the fat young one with pimples, and the scurfy head, or that black one like a gorilla with the bulging eyes?'
'Oh I can't - they're so awful.'
'You must - it's got to be one of them. Or else red hot needles and water torture.'
'Oh dear, then the gorilla. — Agatha Christie

He charged the ranks of the goblins of Mount Gram in the Battle of the Green Fields, and knocked their king Golfimbul's head clean off with a wooden club. It sailed a hundred yards through the air and went down a rabbit-hole, and in this way the battle was won and the game of Golf invented at the same moment. — J.R.R. Tolkien

With domineering hand she moves the turning wheel,
Like currents in a treacherous bay swept to and fro:
Her ruthless will has just deposed once fearful kings
While trustless still, from low she lifts a conquered head;
No cries of misery she hears, no tears she heeds,
But steely hearted laughs at groans her deeds have wrung.
Such is a game she plays, and so she tests her strength;
Of mighty power she makes parade when one short hour
Sees happiness from utter desolation grow.
(A Consolation of Philosophy, Book II, translated by V.E. Watts) — Boethius - Queen Elizabeth I Translation

I shook my head. "You need help. Just like your mom. My little sister kept fossilized lunches under her bed for the dust bunnies she raised there." I picked up a game from the neat stack. "Want to play some Battleship?" I wasn't leaving him alone with that thing in there. Chad armed himself with a notebook, and we went to war. Historically, war has often been used as a distraction for problems at home. Both of us — Patricia Briggs

That's what scares me the most, Paul. That I'll just pass through life and all the people I know will just disappear, without a trace, without me ever telling them how much they mean to me, no matter how small the time spent was or how great the friendship was. That they'll be gone and they'll forget me and I'll end up with nothing."
I saw in my head Charley laughing, Charley sticking his head out the window and screaming, Charley playing a video game so intensely he was a foot from the screen. Moments flashed before my eyes in a quick, unrelenting sequence.
I shook my head. "I know. Believe me, I know. — J.C. Joranco

We are just one of many pieces that are being played out in a strategic and elaborate game. The moves that are made may not always seem logical, but are intended for a reason which we may never understand nor fully are able to accept. When the game has finally reached its conclusion, we then have no other choice but to stand there dumbfounded. Not only are we then scratching our head and wondering how in the hell it happened, but we also wonder how it was we did not see that coming. — Steven F. Deslippe

Consider the problem, "How can I win the game of tick-tack-toe?" It is well known that I cannot, if I assume (in keeping with the conventions of game theory) that my opponent understands the game perfectly. Put another way, there is no "technical solution" to the problem. I can win only by giving a radical meaning to the word "win." I can hit my opponent over the head; or I can drug him; or I can falsify the records. Every way in which I "win" involves, in some sense, an abandonment of the game, as we intuitively understand it. (I can also, of course, openly abandon the game--refuse to play it. This is what most adults do.) — Garrett Hardin

We grow up thinking that the best answer is in someone else's brain. Much of our education is an elaborate game of 'guess what's in the teacher's head?' What the world really needs to know right now is what kind of dreams and ideas are in your head. — Roger Von Oech

Never angrily rant into your web cam. While smashing a keyboard in half over a game of 'World of Warcraft' may seem totally justified in your head, to the rest of the known universe you look like a raging psychopath. — Ray William Johnson

I never win anything," Dolorous Edd complained. "The gods always smiled on Watt, though. When the wildlings knocked him off the Bridge of Skulls, somehow he landed in a nice depp proof of water. How lucky was that, missing all those rocks?"
"Was it a long fall?" Green wanted to know. "Did landing in the pool of water save his life?"
"No," said Dolorous Edd. "He was dead already, from that axe in his head. Still, it was pretty lucky, missing the rocks. — George R R Martin

The tiny Miss Bentford turned her head quickly, looking at Corbin out of the corner of her eye. The two of them played a game each Sunday. Corbin could not recall how it had begun, but he looked forward to it every week. Little Miss Bentford looked at him again, not quite as quickly. Corbin smiled at her, and she turned her head forward once more. Three more times she looked back, and each time, Corbin managed to look surprised to find her looking at him. The third time, the little girl began to giggle. Corbin laid his finger against his lips, reminding her to be quiet in church. She bit her lip and nodded, but her eyes danced with mirth. Corbin smiled, thoroughly pleased. — Sarah M. Eden

The game Rock Band has been haunting me like a bad ring tone. It gets stuck in my head and momentarily effaces all that I love about music. — Carrie Brownstein

She imagined the trade in meanings as a kind of game, in which tokens shaped like mahjong tiles were exchanged and switched. Signs moved from one world to another, clacked together, made new sequences. A man in Bolshevik Russia became virtually Chinese; a world unfolded from a paper envelope. This game existed in the borderless continent of her father's head. She could see how he concentrated: 'cher' in Russian, 'neve' in Italian, 'snow' in English, until he arrived at the sound 'xue', and then the character: the radical symbol for rain, the strokes for frozen, the little block of marks that revealed the transition from alphabets to ideograms. — Gail Jones

At the south-eastern corner of the physical domain, near to the Centre of the Land, is to be found a gaming hall wherein the Master Angles play at Trilliards, this being what their Awe-full game is rightly called. The intricacies of their play determine the trajectories of lives in the First Borough, such lives being subject to the four eternal forces that the Angles represent. These are Authority, Severity, Mercy and Novelty, as symbolised respectively by Castle, Death's-head, Cross and Phallus. The Arch-Builder Gabriel governs the Castle pocket, Uriel the Death's-head, Mikael the Cross and Raphael the Phallus. — Alan Moore

Coach wastes no time delivering one of his brief, post-game speeches. As usual, it sounds like he's talking in point form.

"We lost. It feels shitty. Don't let it get to you. Just means we work harder during practice and bring it harder for the next game." He nods at everyone, then stalks out the door.

I'd think he was pissed at us, if not for the fact that his victory speeches more or less go the same way - "We won. It feels great. Don't let it go to your head. We work just as hard during practice and we win more games." If any of our freshman players are expecting Coach to deliver epic motivational speeches a la Kurt Russell in Miracle, they're in for a grave disappointment. — Elle Kennedy

I understand how much everyone wanted to see a British winner at Wimbledon and I hope everyone enjoyed it. I worked so hard in that last game. It's the hardest few points I've had to play in my life. I don't know how I came through the final three points ... that last game ... my head was kind of everywhere. That last game will be the toughest game I'll play in my career, ever. — Andy Murray

A young girl, a freshman, I met in a bar in Cambridge my junior year at Harvard told me early one fall that "Life is full of endless possibilities." I tried valiantly nog to choke on the beer nuts I was chewing while she gushed this kidney stone of wisdom, and I calmly washed them down with the rest of a Heineken, smiled and concentrated on the dart game that was going on in the corner. Needless to say, she did not live to see her sophomore year.That winter, her body was found floating in the Charles River, decapitated, her head hung from a tree on the bank, her hair knotted around a low-hanging branch, three miles away. — Bret Easton Ellis

I completely take on the risk, the poker game, which being an artist means, and I'm going to try to make a film which honestly reflects what I have in my head. — Antonio Banderas

There has to be a womp on the side of the head that defeats and undercuts this game of performance. It has to fall apart. Now unfortunately, that very often does not happen until what I call the second half of life, when there's been enough death in the family and you start experiencing your own physical deterioration. — Richard Rohr

James Brown hid everything, and in the game of instant information he lost big-time, because the information machine turns a truth into a lie and a lie into the truth, transforms superstitions and stereotypes into fact with such ease and fluidity that after a while you get to believing as I do, that the media is not a reflection of the American culture but rather is teaching it. As long as James Brown was selling records he let that craziness run. He didn't care. The media worked in his favor and helped fuel his success. But it killed his public reputation and once the success was gone once the head disappeared, the body followed. — James McBride

I don't know what game you and geek boy are playing, Gautier. But you get in my way as I leave and I'll wipe my boots on your balls. (Brett)
Before he realized what was happening, Simi had taken Brett's hand and squeezed it so hard Nick heard the bones break.)
Nick is a friend of the Simi's. You threaten him and you make the Simi really unhappy and want to eat your head. Trust me, not something you want me to think about. Now go away mean person or the Simi will tell akri she don't know what happened to you and your masticated form. Not that I like to lie, but there are deceptions to every rule. And you're about to become one. Now get in there and be quiet. (Simi) — Sherrilyn Kenyon

Varys gave a long weary sigh, the sigh of a man who carried all the sadness of the world in a sack upon his shoulders. "The High Septon once told me that as we sin, so do we suffer. If that's true, Lord Eddard, tell me ... why is it always the innocents who suffer most, when you high lords play your game of thrones? Ponder it, if you would, while you wait upon the queen. And spare a thought for this as well: The next visitor who calls on you could bring you bread and cheese and the milk of the poppy for your pain ... or he could bring you Sansa's head. "The choice, my dear lord Hand, is entirely yours. — George R R Martin

You have games on there?" he asks.
"Yeah," I answer for her. "She's become a checkers fanatic. Shelley, show him how it works."
While Shelley slowly taps the screen with her knuckles, Alex watches, seemingly fascinated.
When the checkers screen comes up, Shelley nudges Alex's hand.
"You go first," he says.
She shakes her head.
"She wants you to go first," I tell him.
"Cool." He taps the screen.
I watch, getting all mushy inside, as this tough guy plays quietly with my big sister.
"Do you mind if I make a snack for her?" I say, desperate to leave the room.
"Nah, go ahead," he says, his concentration on the game.
"You don't have to let her win," I say before leaving. "She can hold her own in checkers."
"Uh, thanks for the vote of confidence, but I am tryin' to win," Alex says. He has a genuine grin on his face, without trying to act cocky or cool. — Simone Elkeles

And from the time I was a kid, I've had this internal monologue roaring through my head, which doesn't stop - unless I'm asleep. I'm sure every person has this; it's just that my monologue is particularly loud. And particularly troublesome. I'm constantly asking myself questions. And the problem with that is that your brain is like a computer: If you ask a question, it's programmed to respond, whether there's an answer or not. I'm constantly weighing everything in my mind and trying to predict how my actions will influence events. Or maybe manipulate events are the more appropriate words. It's like playing a game of chess with your own life. And I hate fucking chess! — Jordan Belfort

There is a great deal of illusion in a work of art; one could go farther and say that it is illusory in and of itself, as a "work." Its ambition is to make others believe that it was not made but rather simply arose, burst forth from Jupiter's head like Pallas Athena fully adorned in enchased armor. But that is only a pretense. No work has ever come into being that way. It is indeed work, artistic labor for the purpose of illusion-and now the question arises whether, given the current state of our consciousness, our comprehension, and our sense of truth, the game is still permissible, still intellectually possible, can still be taken seriously; whether the work as such, as a self-sufficient and harmonically self-contained structure, still stands in a legitimate relation to our problematical social condition, with its total insecurity and lack of harmony; whether all illusion, even the most beautiful, and especially the most beautiful, has not become a lie today. — Thomas Mann

Awful first drafts are fine - Agree with this.
If you don't finish something, you'll never get in the game. Just quell the voice in your head that says "Are you kidding? No one is going to want to read this drivel" and keep on going. You're going to revise and revise and then revise again anyway. — Jamie Freveletti

About a minute-and-a-half to go. He goes on a down-and-in pass. As soon as he caught it, I really puffed him, and his head snapped and the ball flew, and Chuck Weber fell on it. I clenched my fist, I turned around, and I closed my eyes and I said, 'This f-in game is over.' — Chuck Bednarik

Sure, equal pay, maternity leaves, and pro sports are important. But a girl can't make a free throw from the foul line if her head's not in the game. — Emma McLaughlin

He slipped his hands around my waist and pulled me against him, tossing the ice cream cone over his shoulder. It landed with a splat on the sidewalk. "So does that mean I have a varsity girlfriend?"
I giggled like a total girl and linked my hands behind his neck. "Yeah I guess it does."
"Sweet." Then he bent his head, and I stood up on my tiptoes and we met in the middle. And it was perfect. — Stephie Davis

I was actually really impressed by how many awkward stories we had, ranging from bad haircuts to one guy told us about being on the beach and he threw a Frisbee and it hit a lady in the head. His immediate reaction was to turn and he found a kid next to him and pointed to the kid, it's those kinds of moments. I was really impressed with the volume of fun stories we got to play with. No one was a loser in this game; they were all winners . — Danny Pudi

What was that all about?" Jay asked in loud whisper.
She still felt like her head was reeling. She had no idea what she was going to tell to Grady when school was out. "I think Grady just asked me to Homecoming," she announced to Jay.
He looked at her suspiciously. "The game?"
Violet cocked her head to the side and gave him a look that told him to be serious.
"No, I'm pretty sure he meant the dance," Violet clarified, exasperated by the obtuse question. — Kimberly Derting

Find your own picture, your own self in anything that goes bad. It's awfully easy to mouth off at your staff or chew out players, but if it's bad, and your the head coach, you're responsible. If we have an intercepted pass, I threw it. I'm the head coach. If we get a punt blocked, I caused it. A bad practice, a bad game, it's up to the head coach to assume his responsibility. — Bear Bryant

A writer never forgets the first time he accepted a few coins or a word of praise in exchange for a story. He will never forget the sweet poison of vanity in his blood and the belief that, if he succeeds in not letting anyone discover his lack of talent, the dream of literature will provide him with a roof over his head, a hot meal at the end of the day, and what he covets the most: his name printed on a miserable piece of paper that surely will outlive him. A writer is condemned to remember that moment, because from then on he is doomed and his soul has a price. — Carlos Ruiz Zafon

Both In and Out of the Game Apart from the pulling and hauling stands what I am, Stands amused, complacent, compassionating, idle, unitary, Looks down, is erect, or bends an arm on an impalpable certain rest, Looking with side-curved head curious what will come next, Both in and out of the game and watching and wondering at it. Walt Whitman — Jed McKenna

It is the same game that Moonlight Graham played in 1905. It is a living part of history, like calico dresses, stone crockery, and threshing crews eating at outdoor tables. It continually reminds us of what was, like an Indian-head penny in a handful of new coins. — W.P. Kinsella

Christ, Elizabeth! Get your head back in the game. You're here to do a job, not drool over a hunky Brit. In my hurry to put some distance between me and the sex god, my knees wobble. I clutch the edge of the conference table to keep from — Magda Alexander

Life is a strange thing. Why this longing for life? It is a game which no man wins. To live is to toil hard and to suffer sore, till old age creeps heavily upon us and we throw down our hands on the cold ashes of dead fires. It is hard to live. In pain the babe sucks his first breath, in pain the old man gasps his last, and all his days are full of trouble and sorrow; yet he goes down to the open arms of death, stumbling, falling, with head turned backward, fighting to the last. And death is kind. It is only life and the things of life that hurt. Yet we love life and we hate death. It is very strange. — Jack London

Gethin Jenkins is one of the best loose-head props in the world. He hits up to 40 rucks a game, makes at least 10 carries and even more tackles. Those are amazing statistics for a prop and he is a very intelligent rugby player. — Warren Gatland

The sailor is frankness, the landsman is finesse. Life is not a game with the sailor, demanding the long head
no intricate game of chess where few moves are made in straight-forwardness and ends are attained by indirection, an oblique, tedious, barren game hardly worth that poor candle burnt out in playing it. — Herman Melville

What was this future world where people aged so slowly? Were they protected in cocoons of silk? "What say ye? Are there no warriors?"
"There are soldiers who join the army - and they learn combat, but most of the fighting is done..." She glanced aside.
"Pardon?"
"You wouldn't believe me."
He snorted. "The fighting is done by banshees and fairies?
She threw back her head with a belly laugh. "Now that would be a good name for a video game. — Amy Jarecki

In sum, do not insult me with the beheadings, finger choppings or the lung-deflations you plan for my works. I need my head to shake or nod, my hand to wave or make into a fist, my lungs to shout or whisper with. I will not go gently onto a shelf, degutted, to become a non-book.
All you umpires, back to the bleachers. Referees, hit the showers. It's my game. I pitch, I hit, I catch. I run the bases. At sunset I've won or lost. At sunrise, I'm out again, giving it the old try.
And no one can help me. Not even you. — Ray Bradbury

It'd be like looking for a needle in a burning haystack.'
'Oh, I've done that,' Mark said airily. 'It's a game we used to play, after we got rid of all our livestock and didn't need our hay no more. You throw a match into the haystack, give the fire a three-second head start, and begin looking. You can find the needle every time if you work quick — Margaret Peterson Haddix

If you have ever seen a dragon in a pinch, you will realize that this was only poetical exaggeration applied to any hobbit, even to Old Took's great-granduncle Bullroarer, who was so huge (for a hobbit) that he could ride a horse. He charged the ranks of the goblins of Mount Gram in the Battle of the Green Fields, and knocked their king Golfibul's head clean off with a wooden club. It sailed a hundred yards through the air and went down a rabbit-hole, and in this way the battle was won and the game of Golf was invented at the same moment. — J.R.R. Tolkien

They'll get it all from you sooner or later 'cause they own this f**kin' place. It's a big club and you ain't in it. You and I are not in the big club. By the way, it's the same big club they use to beat you over the head with all day long when they tell you what to believe. All day long beating you over the head with their media telling you what to believe, what to think and what to buy. The table is tilted, folks. The game is rigged and nobody seems to notice. Nobody seems to care. Good, honest, hard-working people: white collar, blue collar, it doesn't matter what color shirt you have on. — George Carlin

Head into the children's bedroom, where our babysitter, Teri, is presiding over a massive game of Twister. Minnie doesn't understand Twister, but she understands rolling around on the mat, getting in everyone's way, so that's what she's doing. — Sophie Kinsella

Harry was speeding toward the ground when the crowd saw him clap his hand to his mouth as though he was going to be sick-he hit the field on all fours-coughed-and something gold fell into his hand.
'I've got the snitch!' he shouted, waving it above his head, and the game ended in complete confusion.
'He didn't catch it, he nearly swalloed it,' Flint was still howling twenty minutes later, but it made no difference-Harry hadn't broken any rules and Lee Jordan was still happily shouting the results-Gryffindor had won by 170 points to 60. — J.K. Rowling

If you're a creationist reading this, and you want to remark something like, "Well, that's the way he did it," I'll tell you right back, that is just not reasonable, nor is it satisfactory. If we were playing on a team right now, I'd say, "Get your head in the game. — Bill Nye