It Didn't Work Quotes & Sayings

His phone sounded.
He grabbed it off his coffee table and his mouth curled up when he read, Kiss my ass, Merry.
Using his thumb, he returned, You want that, brown eyes, I'll work it in.
She didn't make him wait and shot back, Go fuck yourself.
Now, sweetheart, you know that's not the way it works.
Then came, We're done.
He ignored that and sent, Sleep tight. See you tomorrow. — Kristen Ashley

At Cambridge, it was the weirdest culture. Everyone pretended they didn't do any work, yet it was so competitive. — Naomie Harris

Having deadlines helps because people are constantly breathing down my neck, and tapping their toes waiting for pages. So I just have to work nine to five. If I didn't have deadlines then I might be more of a golden hour kind of guy, writing from eight to noon and calling it a day, but that's just not the way I work right now. — David Lindsay-Abaire

It's impossible that James Joyce could have mentioned "talk-tapes" in his writing, Asher thought. Someday I'm going to get my article published; I'm going to prove that Finnegan's Wake is an information pool based on computer memory systems that didn't exist until a century after James Joyce's era; that Joyce was plugged into a cosmic consciousness from which he derived the inspiration for his entire corpus of work. I'll be famous forever. — Philip K. Dick

So as I'm walking up and down the grocery aisles, I notice this distinct, mildewy, putrid odor following me. And I keep looking around for the responsible party, until I discover that she is me. I stink. When I get home, Craig rolls out of bed to help me with the groceries and I say "Honey, smell me. I stink." And he sniffs my shirt and says without surprise, "Yes, you do." And I say "Well, what IS that? It's disgusting." And he says the following:
"It's mildew. All our clothes smell like that. We always stink." I'll just give you a few seconds to digest that information. I know I needed a little time. "WHAT? WELL WHY DIDN'T YOU TELL ME, HUSBAND?" "I was scared to tell you. You get sensitive about ... . housekeeping stuff." "Oh. So let me clarify here. You'd rather reek all day at work and allow Chase to be THE STINKY KID IN CLASS than risk me getting mad?
"Yes. Yes, I would. Definitely. — Glennon Doyle Melton

I'm a great believer in the hereafter, in karma, in reincarnation. It does make sense. I believe that God is not just a law-giver, but a creative artist. The greatest of all. And what characterises artists is that they want to redo their work. Maybe it didn't come off perfectly, so they want to see it done again, and improved. Reincarnation is a way for God to improve his earlier works. — Norman Mailer

My father offered me a dollar for every pound I would lose as a kid. It didn't work. And it doesn't really work in the long run. Who are you competing against? It's you. You need to be doing this for you and only you. — Richard Simmons

I never doubted myself. It just didn't work. — Rajon Rondo

It's just a shirt. I have no emotional connection to it or the band. I just didn't feel like coming to work topless today."
Camden's hand slammed down on the counter. "Shit, are there days that you come topless? I would like to make sure I'm here for that. — Ashlan Thomas

What NYU tried to teach had no relation whatsoever with the reality of what making a film is like. You cannot teach someone aesthetics. What you can do is say, "If you were in this situation and this is the kind of story you wanted to tell, here are a couple of ways you could try to make things work." But they didn't really do that. I did my three years there, and I have said at times that besides my childhood, going to NYU was the single most destructive experience of my life. It took me eight years to recover.
~Tom Dicillo — Nicholas Jarecki

If you read reviews of concerts, the word 'creative' comes up all the time. However, performers playing music usually aren't creative. Critics might say they are, but they're just playing another persons work. They didn't create it. — Ned Rorem

With 'Interpreter,' I didn't know it was ever going to be a book, that they were going to be published. I was writing them in a vacuum for the most part. They were my apprentice work. Then the stories happened to become a book. — Jhumpa Lahiri

I never got in this business, in cinema, to make horror movies. They arrived on my doorstep and I got typecast. Which was fine, I enjoy it, but I got into this business to make westerns. And the kind of westerns I used to see, they died. So that didn't work out. — John Carpenter

Yes, I'm blonde. When I started as an actor, because of the accent and my body and my personality, it was not what the stereotype of the Latina woman in Hollywood is, so they didn't know where to put me. The blond hair wasn't matching. The moment I put my hair dark, it was better for my work. — Sofia Vergara

But a lot of my training can be done in Aston - a lot of the hard work, so to speak. But a new atmosphere, a new place, and it's good for me because I didn't want to get stuck in one spot, so coming home is good, back and forth, you know, where my roots are. — Elvis Stojko

I didn't love stickers and unicorns and stuff, but just if I were to ride on the back of a beast to work, I want it to be a frickin' unicorn. — Laura Benanti

A month ago, Gavin had given his employer four weeks' notice. "I'll get a job around here," he'd told her. "Something low-stress, part-time, maybe. We're not paying rent, and Dad's left us plenty. You should quit, too." A year earlier this news would have filled her with delicious, full fat, chocolate-coated joy. But now, after a grueling routine of shitty work, shitty- weird home life in a house where the shadow of a dead boy walked more solidly than the grownups, shitty headaches, shitty worry about a husband who couldn't keep his dick out of other women, the golden offer just weirded Laine out. She didn't trust it. — Stephen M. Irwin

I shouldn't be jealous because it's not real
she's like a math problem, the kind where you got the right answer but didn't show any of your work. She is the right answer, but she didn't get there by going through anything difficult, by questioning, by doubting. She landed there by playing a part, but she's never done the work.
I'm still jealous. — Jackson Pearce

Relationships help you learn more about what you want. If one doesn't work out, you just kind of look at it and go, Okay, well, this is what I did like and this is what I didn't like, and this is what I did wrong, and maybe I need to be more like this. And so you learn things, and that's why you grow. And you bring all the stuff that you've changed about yourself to a new relationship until you finally find that person you really, really want. — Ashley Tisdale

Aw, honey - you sound real ready for it. You always get like this? All on edge like this, just about a second away from coming, before we've even started?"

How did he know? She didn't even know and she was the one about to do it.

"You know, most women can't come easy, this way. But it's good to know you can, 'cause baby I'm gonna work you so good on my cock, I swear to God. — Charlotte Stein

I journaled: "Why do I feel like crap after being offered a book deal by one of the best publishers on the planet?" The answer that I came up with surprised me. I knew there were people who would have done anything to get their work out into the world this way. i knew there were people who had worked their butts off and still hadn't made it. I knew there were people who had amazing, life-changing things to say who didn't have the platforms to say it yet. I knew there were people who would have been doing cartwheels in the street if they were me right now. And I felt like because they wanted it more, they should have it instead of me. — Kate Northrup

Out-innovating them is the way to beat China. And to do everything that we do in this country to support innovative policy, that drives innovation and new products and more jobs and creates jobs. You can't - you can't put a wall up around here. We tried that in the '30s. It didn't work. — Jack Welch

If you're poor and ignorant, with a child, you're a slave. Meaning that you're never going to get out of it. These women are in bondage to a kind of slavery that the 13th Amendment just didn't deal with. The old master provided food, clothing and health care to the slaves because he wanted them to get up and go to work in the morning. And so on welfare: you get food, clothing and shelter
you get survival, but you can't really do anything else. You can't control your life. — Joycelyn Elders

On our first record, man, I didn't know what I was doing. I was just playing. I was over playing. You're as green as you can be with no experience in recording or knowing how sometimes a song can work: when it's too much, when it's not enough, when it's not right. — Tommy Lee

I wasn't predicted to be anything. I just followed an inner spirit, and it put me in the right place and the right time. I didn't want to be the mayor of Atlanta. I didn't want to run for Congress. I didn't want to work for Martin Luther King Jr. I wanted to work close to him and be a writer and write about the movement. — Andrew Young

That's why people use terms like flow or effortless to describe writing that they regard as really superb. They're not saying effortless in terms of it didn't seem like the writer spent any work. It simply requires no effort to read it - the same way listening to an incredible storyteller talk out loud requires no effort to pay attention. Whereas when you're bored, you're conscious of how much effort is required to pay attention. — David Foster Wallace

How is it we could have a system where schools could remain lousy for 50 years and yet you do exactly the same thing this year that they did 50 years ago when it didn't work then, and no one feels any pressure to change? — Geoffrey Canada

Whatever this might have been for you before now baby, there is no trying or going slow. I know you felt it; it was all over your face. I feel like I just found a piece of myself that has been lost forever. A piece of the puzzle that I didn't even know was missing until you walked into my life. This, us ... baby, I will work as hard as I can and then some to prove to you that you have nothing to fear. — Harper Sloan

platform. Outside an old man in overalls was working his way along the wagons, undoing padlocks, throwing bolts, hauling the massive panel doors back along their tracks. Apart from him, no one. Could it be this simple? He didn't pause to ask himself the question a second time. Just sprang down from the opening onto the concrete siding and began walking, head lowered and limping at first, until the oxygen started flowing through his bloodstream and the muscles of his legs began to work then, as they did, quickening his pace and striding faster, lifting his head to the seamless pale blue dawn sky and tasting the breath of freedom. He found a covered overpass that seemed to connect the freight platforms with the main terminal. Took the stairs two at a time and started across the bridge towards the massive building at the other side. The station hall was a curiously romantic — Greg Wilson

I have often asked myself whether, given the choice, I would choose to have manic-depressive illness. If lithium were not available to me, or didn't work for me, the answer would be a simple no ... and it would be an answer laced with terror. But lithium does work for me, and therefore I can afford to pose the question. Strangely enough, I think I would choose to have it. It's complicated ... — Kay Redfield Jamison

He did not know how long it took, but later he looked back on this time of crying in the corner of the dark cave and thought of it as when he learned the most important rule of survival, which was that feeling sorry for yourself didn't work. It wasn't just that it was wrong to do, or that it was considered incorrect. It was more than that
it didn't work. — Gary Paulsen

There is no good way to confront a friend who is drinking too much, although doing it when you're not drunk is a good start. Anything you say will cause pain, because a woman who is drinking too much becomes terrified other people will notice. Every time I got an email like the one Charlotte sent, I felt like I'd been trailing toilet paper from my jeans. For, like, ten years. I also burned with anger, because I didn't like the fact that my closest friends had been murmuring behind cupped hands about me, and I told myself that if they loved me, they wouldn't care about this stuff. But that's the opposite of how friendships work. When someone loves you, they care enormously. — Sarah Hepola

I never knew where I was going to end up when I started film. I didn't start film to be famous. Of course, it's a public medium, and of course we chose a public medium because we like people to pay attention to the work that we're doing. But I didn't know what I was going to end up. — Amy Seimetz

I had a stick of CareFree gum, but it didn't work. I felt pretty good while I was blowing that bubble, but as soon as the gum lost its flavor, I was back to pondering my mortality. — Mitch Hedberg

I loved every minute of my time at Microsoft, but I had always envisioned having another phase of life just because I thought that would be interesting. It had never been my plan to work until I literally didn't want to do anything and then hang it up. — Steve Ballmer

I think I copied my style from Louis Armstrong. Because I used to like the big volume and the big sound that Bessie Smith got when she sang ... So I liked the feeling that Louis got and I wanted the big volume that Bessie Smith got. But I found that it didn't work with me, because I didn't have a big voice. So anyway between the two of them I sorta got Billie Holiday. — Billie Holiday

A couple of days after the last time I saw him, I got a typically well-written postcard. He said that after he kissed me goodbye at LAX he was driving away and turned on the radio. Elvis was singing "It's Now or Never." In my personal religion, a faith cobbled together out of pop songs and books and movies, there is nothing closer to a sign from God than Elvis Presley telling you "tomorrow will be too late" at precisely the moment you drop off a girl you're not sure you want to drop off. Sitting on the stairs to my apartment, I read that card and wept. It said he heard the song and thought about running after me. But he didn't. And just as well
those mixed-faith marriages hardly ever work. An Elvis song coming out of the radio wasn't a sign from God to him, it was just another one of those corny pop tunes he could live without. — Sarah Vowell

School didn't work for me. I hated it. — Gary Paulsen

I just think it's fortunate that Sir Isaac Newton didn't share the sense of humor of a member of the public, because had he done so, he would of been so amused by the simple effects of gravity, that he would of never gotten round making a comprehensive study of it's causes.
That's the punchline! 'a comprehensive study of it's courses'! I worked for that! Will you be telling this joke at work? I don't think so!
And yes, I am aware that I say this to you while hanging precariously of this art-deco balcony. And I do so deliberately in the hope that I will fall to my death, and that you will learn about the thin line between slap-stick and tragedy. — Stewart Lee

Soldiering was about fighting. It was about killing people before they killed you. It was about having your way by force and guile in a dangerous world, taking a shit in the woods, living in dirty, difficult conditions, enduring hardships and risks that could - and sometimes did - kill you. It was ugly work. Which is not to say that certain men didn't enjoy it, didn't live for it. Garrison was one of those men. He embraced its cruelty. He would say, this man needs to die. Just like that. Some people needed to die. — Mark Bowden

Writers have to get used to launching something beautiful and watching it crash and burn. They also have to learn when to let go control, when the work takes off on its own and flies, farther than they ever planned or imagined, to places they didn't know they knew. — Ursula K. Le Guin

Paul Broca, for example, was a famous French craniologist in the nineteenth century whose name is given to Broca's area, the part of the frontal lobe involved in the generation of speech (which is wiped out in many stroke victims). Among his other interests, Broca used to measure brains, and he was always rather perturbed by the fact that the German brains came out a hundred grams heavier than French brains. So he decided that other factors, such as overall body weight, should also be taken into account when measuring brain size: this explained the larger Germanic brains to his satisfaction. But for his prominent work on how men have larger brains than women, he didn't make any such adjustments. Whether by accident or by design, it's a kludge. — Ben Goldacre

With 'Silver Linings,' I didn't feel - I was thinking of certain things, but I just said, 'Let me go with it.' You have to know what you're doing, where you're going with the scenes, and I put a lot of work into that. But when you're out there, at the same time you gotta be ready for anything. — Robert De Niro

If your coping mechanism to date has been to ignore your weight, don't feel badly. You're in good company. I've done my share of standing on the doctor's scale backwards, cringing as the nurse scribbled on the clipboard, anxious when the doctor came in glancing over my record. I scrutinized his face for any semblance of judgment. Whether or not I faced the scale or the doctor skipped a pep talk, it didn't change the truth and it still pervaded every hour of my waking thoughts. I knew what I needed to do and just agonizingly prolonged it. What about you?

We want our lies to be true--desperately. We think it means less work, less pain. But aren't we experiencing work and pain every day when we are obese? We don't escape it, we just reallocate it, attach it to different problems.

The sooner we face the numbers and start to deal with them, the sooner we can resolve them. — Shannon Sorrels

I used to be a session musician before I was a wrestler. I played bass guitar. I was big pals with Lars Ulrich and he asked me if I wanted to play bass with Metallica in their early days but it didn't work out. — Hulk Hogan

You know why it didn't work out with him?" "Why?" "Because God made you for me." Not — Penelope Ward

I didn't sleep that night. I cried. I wasn't frightened for myself; I was indignant; it was the wickedness of it that broke me. The war came to an end and I went home. I'd always been keen on mechanics, and if there was nothing doing in aviation, I'd intended to get into an automobile factory. I'd been wounded and had to take it easy for a while. Then they wanted me to go to work. I couldn't do the sort of work they wanted me to do. It seemed futile. I'd had a lot of time to think. I kept on asking myself what life was for. After all it was only by luck that I was alive; I wanted to make something of my life, but I didn't know what. I'd never thought much about God. I began to think about Him now. I couldn't understand why there was evil in the world. I knew I was very ignorant; I didn't know anyone I could turn to and I wanted to learn, so I began to read at haphazard. — W. Somerset Maugham

Yes, he was leaving, but he'd told her repeatedly that they would find a way to make it work. and yes, it was true that they didn't know each other well, but considering the short time they'd been together, he'd learned enough to know that he could love her forever. all they needed was a chance. — Nicholas Sparks

I went from being totally unknown and never acting professionally to being in a major movie and being very famous. It all happened so quickly, I didn't have any time to work things out. It's been pretty scary at times. — Emma Watson

My dad had even hired an accompanist to play for me on a piano. But he had never pushed me to music because I don't think he wanted me to be hurt as much as he was if it didn't work. — Kim Basinger

I had just finished a run of shows in the States and went to NY to work with BenZel for a couple weeks, mainly as a different focus to touring. I didn't have any expectations or pressures with what would come out of those two weeks, and think 'Tough Love' sums this up. It was me experimenting with my voice and having fun with it. It just felt right and kind of dictated the route of the next album, much like 'Devotion' did on my first album — Jessie Ware

I never wanted to churn it out. Comedians tend to work all the time. They never put it down like musicians who might make an album then take three or four years off to recharge their batteries. Comedians tend to work straight through and they get stale because of that. Even when I didn't have a lot of money I never ever did it unless I had something new to say. — Chris Rock

I didn't expect it was going to be easy. But hard work is a lot easier to tolerate when it's something you want to do instead of something you have no choice about. — Lisa Kleypas

I left Goldman Sachs. I was thinking about going to another Wall Street place. I didn't want to do that. That was crazy. After you work on Wall Street, it's a choice: would you rather work at McDonald's or on the sell side? I would choose McDonald's over the sell side. — David Tepper

Serving [Hamilton's] legacy didn't just mean commemorating him, though: It also meant continuing his work. [Eliza] crusaded against slavery, as Hamilton had. And this widow of an orphan helped to found the first private orphanage in New York. That's the real power of a legacy: We tell stories of people who are gone because like any powerful stories, they have the potential to inspire, and to change the world. — Jeremy McCarter

Hmph." I pushed the button a couple more times, trying to hurry the elevator along.

"Oh, yeah, that's going to do some good. Everyone knows an elevator doesn't shift into second until you really lean on the call button."

I pressed it another fifteen times, giving Jim a triumphant smile when the green light lit above the door. "Ha! See? It does too work - oh, sorry. Didn't mean to step on your foot. — Katie MacAlister

Did Jane tell you all she knows about bears?"
"Yes," the king replied. "Don't act like food, inexplicably double your height and weight, and play dead unless it doesn't work."
"She didn't, perhaps, mention how me might kill the beast?"
"No," Edward said. "Her information was more the useless type. — Cynthia Hand

That's what it is. That's what my morning was like: all these real physical heavy positive vibrations, the soul of this tape. The fuzzy groove. The meaning of it all, if it has one: All love, all the time. Peace and happiness in every day. Peace and happiness with cow blood dripping from your hands, bright blood staining your fingerprints because you didn't glove up since you don't normally do prep work. Peace and happiness when you're making a list of everything that's wrong with the world and squinting your eyes tight trying to imagine your way out of it. Peace, peace, peace, happiness, happiness, happiness. — John Darnielle

The thing about the Lexington International Bank ladder was that it was very long, and climbing it was very exhausting, and so Andrew Brown didn't have a lot of time to think about whether he really wanted to get to the top of it - and besides, since so many other people were climbing too, the view from the top must be worth it.
So he kept going. He worked hard. He put his heart and mind and soul into it. There was an opening for a position half a rung higher than he already was. With a promotion, he might get two hours a week of a secretary's time. He'd go to more important meetings, with more senior people, and have the opportunity to impress them, and if he did he might be promoted again and then ... well, of course eventually he'd be running the whole office. It's important to have a dream: otherwise you might notice where you really are. — Naomi Alderman

Hope reliably triumphs over experience. It's always very tempting to console ourselves with an apparently very reasonable thought: the reason it didn't work out this time was not that the expectations were too high, but that we directed them onto the wrong person. We — The School Of Life

Homework strongly indicates that the teachers are not doing their jobs well enough during the school day. It's not like they'll let you bring your home stuff to school and work on it there. You can't say, 'I didn't finish sleeping at home, so I have to work on finishing my sleep here. — Jim Benton

I didn't want my records to sound like anybody else, and when I've got my guys in the studio, I have a language with those guys because we work together every day. A lot of times, you bring in outside guys, studio players, whatever, and they're great musicians. It's just that they don't necessarily play the way I want it to be played. — Jason Aldean

Since we didn't use guns, we wanted to make sure we could earn the ability to win the audience over by making it believable. A lot of what you do when you work out in that mode is use your mental energy. — Lucy Liu

I did Wall Street, and then everything that happened with An Education took me up until March. I didn't want to work during that because there was just so much stuff. I didn't realize you had to go to so many parties. It was a nightmare! I had to go to all these parties! The glamour! — Carey Mulligan

Gentleman Jim [dog] was cheerful enough, partly because his owner was so well trained... He had alsot trained him to get up when he didn't want to, simply by climbing slowly and painfully on top of him and squeezing all the breath out of him as he slept. On the occasions this didn't work and Gordon seemed to be simply lapsing into a coma, Gentleman Jim would unroll his massive tongue, containing over a half a pint of drool, and dribble it slowly into his ear until Gordon finally awoke... — Livi Michael

Circenn moved swiftly, intending to catch the tear upon his finger, kiss it away, then kiss away all her pain and fear, and assure her that he would permit no harm to touch her and would spend his life making things up to her; but she dropped the flask onto the table and turned swiftly.
"Please, leave me alone," she said and turned away from him. "Let me comfort you, Lisa," he entreated.
"Leave me alone."
For the first time in his life, Circenn
felt utterly helpless. Let her grieve, his heart instructed. She would need to grieve, for discovering that the flask didn't work was tantamount to lowering her mother into a solitary grave. She would grieve her mother as if she'd in truth died that very day. May God
forgive me, he prayed. I did not know what I was doing when I cursed that flask. — Karen Marie Moning

It wasn't meant to work with them, was it? He didn't know if he could try anymore. — Ann Brashares

I didn't want to be a sideman. My own style was coming out and I was into my own writing. I wrote a whole album, I arranged it all with pencil and paper. I did eventually do a lot of work with my father, but that was different. I was living at home; I wasn't a starving musician. I wasn't spoiled, but I wasn't going to have some producer come in and tell me what to play. — Shuggie Otis

My ideals told me that men and women could both go out to work and be truly equal. My children told me something more complicated, something I really didn't want to hear. Their need for me was like the need for water or light: it had a devastating simplicity to it. — Allison Pearson

Forever wasn't pain and grief.
Forever wasn't a problem.
Forever was my heartbeat and it was the hope tomorrow held. Forever was the glistening silver lining of every dark cloud, no matter how heavy and thick it was. Forever was knowing moments of weakness didn't equate to an eternityof them.Forever was knowing that I was strong.Forever was the fire breathing dragon inside me that had shed the fear like a snake shedding skin. Forever was simply a promise of more. Forever was a work in progress. — Jennifer L. Armentrout

I had done a couple of auditions for 'Amistad' and didn't feel it was going to go any further - and then the call came about heading to Los Angeles to work with Steven Spielberg. It was surreal: exciting, challenging, overwhelming. — Chiwetel Ejiofor

Is what how it is for me?" "Do you still know everything, all the time?" She shook her head. She didn't smile. She said, "Be boring, knowing everything. You have to give all that stuff up if you're going to muck about here." "So you used to know everything?" She wrinkled her nose. "Everybody did. I told you. It's nothing special, knowing how things work. And you really do have to give it all up if you want to play." "To play what?" "This, — Neil Gaiman

After college, I went to Alley Theatre in Houston to work in their apprentice actor program. I thought I was gonna get discovered. It didn't happen. I moved back to Germantown, Tennessee, outside of Memphis, and taught at my old high school. — Chris Parnell

I've never had a very quiet voice. I tried in choir to make it smaller, and it just didn't work out. And I listened to a lot of soul music when I was growing up on my own accord. But I was mostly into Mama Cass and Gladys Knight, and they all had big voices too; just different than mine. — Beth Ditto

Ramona was willing to talk about anything, now, about things beyond the present moment. Childhoods in El Modena and at the beach. The boats offshore. Their work. The people they knew. The huge rocks jumbled under them: "Where did they come from, anyway?" They didn't know. It didn't matter. What do you talk about when you're falling love? It doesn't matter. All the questions are, Who are you? How do you think? Are you like me? Will you love me? And all the answers are, I am like this, like this, like this. I am like you. I like you. — Kim Stanley Robinson

Lonely? How can you be lonely ? You've got yourself, haven't you? If you ever lose yourself, then you'll really be lonely. In the meantime, stop complaining. You're nearly a man now, and a man has to work. Ever since the world began, men have been doing jobs they didn't like. Why should it be any different for you? You're the seventh son of a seventh son, and this is the job you were born to do. - Mam — Joseph Delaney

It didn't work. It didn't work because I knew not to give the best of myself to the worst of people. — A.S. King

Your voice is powerful. Your voice has meaning. If it didn't, people wouldn't work so hard to silence you.
Remember that. — Kameron Hurley

Wizards don't believe in gods. They didn't deny their existence, of course. They just didn't believe. It was nothing personal; they weren't actually rude about it. Gods were a visible part of narrativium that made things work, that gave the world its purpose. It was just that they were best avoided close up. — Terry Pratchett

In life we have our trophy people. These are the ones we work hard for, we are proud of. We want to show them off to our family, our friends, we want them on our arm at company functions. We take pictures with them to let everyone know we feel like a winner and we are happy.

Then you have your participation ribbons, the ribbons you get just for simply showing up. You didn't have to earn it, it was just given to you. These things usually end up in a drawer somewhere, maybe you pick them up again when you are bored and say "that was a fun night, I wonder if they are still handing out these things?" but you don't tell people about it, nothing to be proud of. — Brittany Williams

We loved it. We loved how slow it was. We love that it took forever. Actually, we never wanted it to end. We loved the jungle, the rafts, the ridiculous armor and helmets ... I think most of all we loved that it didn't have a happy ending for anyone. The whole time we were sort of expecting that someone would survive because that's how stories work: Even if everything is a total disaster, someone lives to tell the tale. But not with Aguirre, the Wrath of God. Hell no. Everyone dies. That's awesome. — Jesse Andrews

Hunter's dead," Taylor said without preamble. "It was these . . . these things. They came crawling up out of him and were eating him, oh God, I mean, it was like . . . I mean he was crying and Dekka prayed with him and he tried to fry his own brain just like he did with Harry only I guess it didn't work, I guess he couldn't do it, so Sam . . ." She swallowed. "Anyone have some water?"
"What about Sam?" Astrid demanded.
"He did it for him. Sam. I mean, he . . . Hunter was, you know . . . so Sam." She pantomimed raising her hands, like Sam, like he would do when using his power.
Astrid closed her eyes and crossed herself.
"Rest in peace," Edilio said and crossed himself as well.
"Sam burned the boy?" Howard asked. Then, bitterly sarcastic said, "Yeah, you all pray to Jesus. Because Jesus is really providing a lot of help here. Sounds to me like Sam was the one doing what had to be done. — Michael Grant

I was studying communications and acting, and I decided over the summer that I wanted to work on my acting skills and perform in a pageant. I didn't have any other way of practicing, so I entered the Miss Rhode Island pageant. I ended up wearing a dress that was a $20 rental. It was too short, and there was a hole in the back of it. — Olivia Culpo

He wasn't directing it, of course, so I didn't work with Hitchcock. — Sally Kellerman

It was such a pleasure to work with Eugene Levy. What a treat. That's a guy I grew up watching as a kid. Guys like that, they were hilarious and didn't have to be super vile or X-rated. — Harland Williams

You didn't like him, did you, Dad?"
"It wasn't that I didn't like him," my dad says slowly. "It was just that he lives in a completely different world, and I worried that he didn't really approve of you the way you are, that he was trying to change you into something else."
God, I never realized my dad was that perceptive..
"You see, the thing is," he says after we've both sat for a while in the sunshine, "the thing is that love is really the most important thing. I know it's hard for you to see it now" - he chuckles quietly- "but when I first laid eyes on your mother I thought she was fantastic, and I've never stopped loving her, not for a second. Oh yes, we've had our rough patches, and she can be a bit of an old battle-ax at times, but I still love her. That in-love feeling at the beginning settles down into a different, familiar sort of love, but it has to be there right from the start, otherwise it just won't work. — Jane Green

We were running one morning through the fall leaves. I looked at him and had what I supposed was a defining moment. I saw how handsome he is, how strong
mentally and physically. When I was with him, I ... I really liked myself. Being with him was fun. Easy. I'd never felt so intensely about anyone before, and it made me sad. I wanted him to be around for a long time, to be my friend forever, and I knew it didn't work that way. But it didn't occur to me that what I was feeling was romantic love. Not until Mick kissed me." Fielding smiled slowly, a blush warming his cheeks. I felt an answering smile hijack my own. "Which he would never, ever have done if not for the mistletoe. — Eli Easton

I've spent a lot of time in tiny venues in the way that I got my record deal and got my name out there just performing live. I was literally performing my songs in all kinds of different ways with different guitarists, and I didn't have an album up online or anything. It's been a lot of work; it definitely hasn't been a sudden explosion into fame. — Florence Welch

I always try to remember that I am a work in progress. When I maintain that perspective, I realize that I don't have to be perfect. I don't have to have it all together. I don't need to try to have all the answers. And I don't need to learn everything in a day. When I make a mistake, it's not because I'm a failure or worthless. I just didn't do something right because I still haven't improved enough in some part of the process. And that motivates me to keep growing and improving. If I don't know something, it's an opportunity to try to improve in a new area. — John C. Maxwell

Being Chinese immigrants in the United States, it was important for my parents to maintain ties that went back a long time. They led by example. My dad didn't bring his work pressures home. We were always aware of them and would go as kids to his office and run around. But when he came home, he was able to leave things behind, at least from our perspective, and focus on us. — Chien Chung Pei

It is usually a mistake to reject something merely because it has been tried before and didn't work. — Robert G. Picard

At the beginning, I thought the best Islamic work was in Spain - the mosque in Cordoba, the Alhambra in Granada. But as I learned more, my ideas shifted. I traveled to Egypt, and to the Middle East many times.I found the most wonderful examples of Islamic work in Cairo, it turns out. I'd visited mosques there before, but I didn't see them with the same eye as I did this time. They truly said something to me about Islamic architecture. — I.M. Pei

Human relationships didn't work anyhow. Only the first two weeks had any zing, then the participants lost their interest. Masks dropped away and real people began to appear: cranks, imbeciles, the demented, the vengeful, sadists, killers. Modern society had created its own kind and they feasted on each other. It was a duel to the death
in a cesspool. — Charles Bukowski

You can have the rest of your life with her," St. Just said gently. "What if she won't have me?" Emmie asked softly. "What if she can't understand? She's six years old, St. Just. I've let her think she's had no mother for half her years on earth, and I was ready to turn my back on her completely." His fingers closed over hers, and this time he didn't simply pat her hand and let go. "You were trying to do the best you could in difficult circumstances. You wanted what was best for Winnie, and she will eventually understand that. It will work out. I know it will." "I can only hope so, and I can only continue to try my best." "Winnie — Grace Burrowes

I did undergo hypnotherapy, and it didn't work! The guy couldn't put me under. I was very disappointed. I was very keen to be suggested, to have somebody tell me to run naked or cluck like a chicken or whatever, but it didn't work for me, I'm afraid. — James McAvoy

I didn't like the way it looked in white trousers, and I couldn't find anything to work underneath them. — Sara Blakely

It was then Jessica realized he wasn't using his left hand at all, and that he held the arm oddly, as though something were wrong with it. There shouldn't be except for a minor bullet wound. She'd aimed carefully, and she was an excellent markswoman. Not to mention he was a very large target.
He looked her way then, and caught her staring. Admiring your handiwork, are you? I daresay you'd like a better look. Regrettably, there's nothing to see. There's nothing wrong with it, according to the quacks. Except that it doesn't work. Still, I count myself fortunate, Miss Trent, that you didn't aim a ways lower. I'm merely disarmed, not dismanned. But I have no doubt that Herriard here will see to the emasculation. — Loretta Chase

Then he said, "That's a long way from stage designing, isn't it." She nodded. "Quite a long way." She started to ask him if he intended to do any work pertaining to the atom bomb, but she didn't, because what would it matter if he did or didn't? — Patricia Highsmith

I've never been nervous. I just wanted to play and have a good time. If it didn't work, then I would get nervous. But, for the most part, I just go for it. — Kevin Clash

I wanted to tell him a story, but I didn't. It's a story about a Jew riding in a streetcar, in Germany during the Third Reich, reading Goebbels' paper, the Volkische Beobachter. A non-Jewish acquaintance sits down next to him and says, "Why do you read the Beobachter?" "Look," says the Jew, "I work in a factory all day. When I get home, my wife nags me, the children are sick, and there's no money for food. What should I do on my way home, read the Jewish newspaper? Pogrom in Romania' 'Jews Murdered in Poland.' 'New Laws against Jews.' No, sir, a half-hour a day, on the streetcar, I read the Beobachter. 'Jews the World Capitalists,' 'Jews Control Russia,' 'Jews Rule in England.' That's me they're talking about. A half-hour a day I'm somebody. Leave me alone, friend. — Milton Sanford Mayer