Quotes & Sayings About Off Duty

When you lose interest in a program, your last duty to it is to hand it off to a competent successor. — Eric S. Raymond

He made a commitment, Eena."
"And you believe this commitment," she spoke the word detestably, "is more important than true love?"
"Yes."
"No," she stubbornly disagreed.
"Yes," Ian insisted as he put his finger to her lips, preventing her from arguing any further. "Love grows and wanes, Eena, but honor, duty, and commitment, those things are constant and stable. They define who you are."
"They define who you are?" she repeated. "You mean miserable?"
"Content," he retorted.
"Lonely," she argued.
"Faithful," he insisted, his eyes widening to emphasize the importance of the word.
"Empty, regretful, and ... "
"Hopeful," Ian whispered in her ear.
This word caught her off guard. At present, hope was probably all any of them could cling to. — Richelle E. Goodrich

Awake, my soul, and with the sun thy daily course of duty run. Cast off dull sloth, and joyful rise to pay thy morning sacrifice. All praise to thee, who safe hast kept and hast refreshed me while I slept! Grant, Lord, when I from death shall wake, I may of endless life partake. All praise to thee, my God, this night for all the blessings of the light. Keep me, oh keep me, King of Kings, beneath Thine own almighty wings. Praise God, from Whom all blessings flow. Praise Him, all creatures here below. Praise Him above, ye heavenly host. Praise Father, Son, and Holy Ghost. — Thomas Ken

Now, there is a tendency at a point like this to look over one's shoulder at the cover artist and start going on at length about leather, tightboots and naked blades.
Words like 'full', 'round' and even 'pert' creep into the narrative, until the writer has to go and have a cold shower and a lie down.
Which is all rather silly, because any woman setting out to make a living by the sword isn't about to go around looking like something off the cover of the more advanced kind of lingerie catalogue for the specialized buyer.
Oh well, all right. The point that must be made is that although Herrena the Henna-Haired Harridan would look quite stunning after a good bath, a heavy-duty manicure, and the pick of the leather racks in Woo Hun Ling's Oriental Exotica and Martial Aids on Heroes Street, she was currently quite sensibly dressed in light chain mail, soft boots, and a short sword.
All right, maybe the boots were leather. But not black. — Terry Pratchett

They beat up on a weakling, and that's all they did. The rest is smoke-filled, coffee-house crap. They tortured and tormented a weaker kid. And it wasn't just that night. Read the letters, it was eight months. And you know what? I'll bet it was his whole life. They beat him up, and they killed him. And why? Because he couldn't run very fast. I'm off duty now, don't ask me to be pals with these guys. — Aaron Sorkin

Oooo, what is that?" Red yelled when she saw the palace. "That's Buckingham Palace," Alex said. "It's where the monarchy resides." Red was mesmerized. "What a stylish and tasteful place! Look at that beautiful statue out front of it in the middle of the street! That looks exactly like the statue I wanted to build in celebration of Charlie's and my wedding!" Red left the others and flew down to the gate. She peered through the bars at the palace in delight. She had to hang on to the bars tightly because the fairy dust was making her drift back to the sky. One of the palace guards on duty saw Red and stared at her in disbelief. It wasn't every day he saw a floating woman at the gate. "Yoo-hoo!" Red called to him. "I just love your hat! Please tell the current monarch that Queen Red of the Center Kingdom says hello - " Conner flew to the gate and pulled Red's hands off the bars. "Red, come on. You're gonna get left behind! — Chris Colfer

Listen, if you walk into a whorehouse and find yourself getting sucked off, it's because you put some money on the counter, not because the gods transported a pair of lips to your cock.' 'That's . . . a really incredible metaphor, Jean, but I think I could use some help translating it.' 'What I'm saying is, we have a duty to accept on faith, but also a duty to weigh and judge. Once you insist that some mundane thing was actually the miraculous hand of the gods, why not treat everything that way? When you start finding messages from the heavens in your breakfast sausages, you've thrown aside your responsibility to use your head. If the gods wanted credulous idiots for priests, why wouldn't they make you that way when you were chosen? — Scott Lynch

Ten times a day I am compelled to reflect on my past life ... and I can never justify to myself the spending of four years on dramatic criticism. I have sworn an oath to endure no more of it. Never again will I cross the threshold of a theatre. The subject is exhausted; and so am I.
I am off duty forever, and am going to sleep. — George Bernard Shaw

As the Nazi emphasis on nonintellectual virtues (patriotism, loyalty, duty, purity, labor, simplicity, "blood," "folk-ishness") seeped through Germany, elevating the self-esteem of the "little man," the academic profession was pushed from the very center to the very periphery of society. Germany was preparing to cut its own head off. By 1933 at least five of my ten friends (and I think six or seven) looked upon "intellectuals" as unreliable and, among these unreliables, upon the academics as the most insidiously situated. Tailor — Milton Sanford Mayer

It is not enough to just ride this earth. You have to aim higher, try to take off, even fly. It is our duty. — Jose Yacopi

Ain't all buttons and charts, little albatross. Know what the first rule of flying is? Well I s'pose you do, since you already know what I'm 'bout to say.
I do. But I like to hear you say it.
Love. Can know all the math in the 'verse but take a boat in the air that you don't love? She'll shake you off just as sure as a turn in the worlds. Love keeps her in the air when she oughta fall down ... tell you she's hurtin' 'fore she keens ... makes her a home. — Joss Whedon

Paramount among the responsibilities of a free press is the duty to prevent any part of the government from deceiving the people and sending them off to distant lands to die of foreign fevers and foreign shot and shell. — Hugo Black

attacks occurred, the FDNY's response would have been severely compromised by the concentration of so many of its off-duty personnel, particularly its elite personnel, at the WTC. The PortAuthority's response was hampered by the lack of both standard oper= ating procedures and radios capable of enabling multiple commands — Anonymous

Cutting corners no doubt makes the job easier for the government, but making the government's job easier is rarely a priority. Preserving the Constitution, fighting off the nibblers and chippers, even nibblers and chippers with good intentions, was once regarded by conservatives as the first duty of the citizen. It still is. — Wesley Pruden

Very well," he said now. "Fighting positions, please, ladies..."
"That's debatable," Halt said in an undertone to Will as they stood watchingn. A number of the off-duty crew had gathered to watch as well. There was a certain enjoyment to be had in watching two extremely attractive girls trying to split each other's skulls open with wooden swords.
"The 'fighting' part or the 'ladies' part?" Will replied with a grin. Halt looked at him and shook his head. "Definitely the 'ladies,'" he said. "There's no debate about the fighting.'"

~Halt & Will about Evanlyn and Alyss — John Flanagan

Off to the side and out of the glow of the headlights, Blay hung back and watched as Qhuinn crouched down by the driver's door and cursed softly. "Messy. Very messy." Tohr did the duty on the passenger seat. "Oh, look, a matched set." "I think they're dead." "Really. What gave that away. The fact they aren't moving or that this guy over here has no facial features left? — J.R. Ward

The problem with today's young people', I said, 'isn't that they do things which are bad for them, as so much of the media likes to think. It's that they don't do these things right. You're all so intent on getting off your heads on drugs that you don't think about the fact that you could overdose and, to put it plainly, die. You drink until your liver explodes. You smoke until your lungs collapse beneath the rot. You create diseases which threaten to wipe you out. Have fun, by all means. Be debauched, it's your duty. But be wise about it. All things in excess, but just know how to cope with them, that's all I ask. — John Boyne

All quiet along the Potomac tonight, no sound save the rush of the river, while soft falls the dew on the face of the dead, the picket's off duty forever. — Ethel Lynn Beers

And he was, one could see, at peace with all the world. His daily round of tasks may or may not have been completed, but he was obviously off duty for the moment, and his whole attitude was that of a policeman with nothing on his mind but his helmet. — P.G. Wodehouse

In a lifetime among cops since, I've noted that investigators who piece together the aftermaths of home invasion murders tend to keep their guns on all the time after that, even when off duty in their own house, and keep them by the bed when they go to sleep.They have learned from the helplessly-murdered dead — Massad Ayoob

I know a 'crime against nature' when I see one. It is usually a sign of crimes against nature that we cannot bear to see them at all, that we recoil and hide our eyes, and no one has ever cringed at the sight of a soybean factory. I also know phony arguments when I hear them
unbridled appetite passing itself off as altruism, and human arrogance in the guise of solemn 'duty.' We must, as C.S. Lewis advises, 'reject with detestation that covert propoganda for cruelty which tries to drive mercy out of the world by calling it names such as 'Humanitarianism' and 'Sentimentality. — Matthew Scully

On sentry duty with Hazel, he would try to take his mind off it. He loved spending time with her. He asked her about growing up in New Orleans, but she got edgy at his questions, so they made small talk instead. Just for fun, they tried to speak French to each other. Hazel had some Creole blood on her mother's side. Frank had taken French in school. Neither of them was very fluent, and Louisiana French was so different from Canadian French it was almost impossible to converse. When Frank asked Hazel how her beef was feeling today, and she replied that his shoe was green, they decided to give up. Then Percy Jackson had arrived. Sure, Frank had seen kids fight monsters before. He'd fought plenty of them himself on his journey from Vancouver. But he'd never seen gorgons. He'd never seen a goddess in person. And the way Percy had controlled the Little Tiber - wow. Frank wished he had powers like that. — Rick Riordan

I come from a privileged background but I worked a lot of winter seasons in the Alps and I've done lots of mundane summer jobs back in Britain where I mixed with less well off people. Maybe it comes from there but I've always felt that it's our duty to make society fairer. — Jonathan Trigell

Governments are deemed to succeed or fail by how well they make money go round, regardless of whether it serves any useful purpose. They regard it as a sacred duty to encourage the country's most revolting spectacle: the annual feeding frenzy in which shoppers queue all night, then stampede into the shops, elbow, trample and sometimes fight to be the first to carry off some designer junk which will go into landfill before the sales next year. The madder the orgy, the greater the triumph of economic management. — George Monbiot

To be a living sacrifice will involve all my time. God wants me to live every minute for Him in accordance with His will and purpose, sixty minutes of every hour, twenty-four hours of every day, being available to Him. No time can be considered as my own, or as "off-duty" or "free." I cannot barter with God about how much time I can give to serve Him. Whatever I am doing, be it a routine salaried job, or housework at home, be it holiday time and free, or after-work Christian youth activities, all should be undertaken for Him, to reveal His indwelling presence to those around me. The example of my life must be as telling as my preaching if He is to be honored. — Helen Roseveare

Abandon her? If only my duty or my conscience would let me. The galaxy would be better off, if you ask me. Who'd even know we were in the same pod? Except that I would know. And that would be enough. — Amie Kaufman

Celebrities are our heroes and heroines now, discussed the next day over latte or lunch. We have such a strong need to talk to each other, to have some commonality of story, that we're finding it in celebrities. In effect, we're turning reality into fiction. Using actors and actresses, just off duty. And how is this working for us? Not great. It leaves us with a perennially empty feeling. We find the celebrities empty, and at some level, we find ourselves empty for paying them so much attention. We've become reluctant voyeurs, and at some level, we know they're just people trying to live their lives. Our culture begins to lack content, depth, and substance. We miss the richness of human experience that story embodies, reflects, and carries forward. We might have to go back to reading books. Yay! — Lisa Scottoline

When men take pleasure in feeling their minds elevated with strong drink, and so indulge their appetite as to disorder their understandings, neglect their duty as members of a family or civil society, and cast off all regard to religion, their case is much to be pitied. — John Woolman

For me, in a world full of armies of stylists and makeup artists, what I think truly makes a fashion icon is how a girl dresses when she's off duty and she has to put her own looks together - no small challenge! — Derek Blasberg

It is our duty to give meaning to the life of future generations by sharing our knowledge and experience; by teaching an appreciation of work well done and a respect for nature, the source of all life; by encouraging the young to venture off the beaten path and avoid complacency by challenging their emotions. — Paul Bocuse

It's my duty as a human being to be pissed off — Eric Bogosian

The state of mind of the photographer creating is a blank. I might add that this condition exists only at special times, namely when looking for pictures. -Something keeps him from falling off curbs, down open manholes, into bumpers of skidding trucks while in this condition but goes off duty at other times ... This is a very special kind of blank. A very active state of mind really, it is a very receptive state ... — Minor White

And such is your definition of matrimony and dancing. Taken in that light, certainly their resemblance is not striking; but I think I could place them in such a view. You will allow that in both man has the advantage of choice, woman only the power of refusal; that in both it is an engagement between man and woman, formed for the advantage of each; and that when once entered into, they belong exclusively to each other till the moment of its dissolution; that it is their duty each to endeavor to give the other no cause for wishing that he or she had bestowed themselves elsewhere, and their best interest to keep their own imaginations from wandering towards the perfections of their neighbors, or fancying that they should have been better off with any one else. — Jane Austen

Marvin: Look, look, no, just think. They left me - an ordinary, menial robot - to stop you - a gigantic, heavy-duty battle machine - whilst they ran off to save themselves ... What do you think they would leave me with?
Frogstar Robot: Well, er, something pretty damn devastating I would expect.
Marvin: Expect? Oh yes, expect. I'll tell you what they gave me to protect myself with, shall I?
Frogstar Robot: Yes all right.
Marvin: Nothing.
Frogstar Robot: What?
Marvin: Nothing at all. Not an electronic sausage.
Frogstar Robot: Well, doesn't that just take the biscuit! — Douglas Adams

My only reason why I am not doing films is my children. My children need my attention, and it's my duty to give them my time. I have not given birth to them to just dump them and go off to work. I am not that kind of a person. — Kajol

This notice has been written, because I felt it a sacred duty to wipe the dust off their gravestones, and leave their dear names free from soil. — Charlotte Bronte

I don't have an off-duty wardrobe. — Hamish Bowles

I had to be the only person on the planet capable of pissing off every guy in my life on the same day while managing to get them to all lie to each other - while lying to them my self. — Stormy Smith

But when a long train of abuses and usurpations, pursuing invariably the same Object evinces a design to reduce them under absolute Despotism, it is their right, it is their duty, to throw off such Government, and to provide new guards for their future security - — James Madison

I love 'Call of Duty;' I'm a huge fan, but I started off with 'Medal of Honor' and I stuck with what I knew. I never got into the online play with people, across the world, across the country. — Mehcad Brooks

Parenting can be established as a time-share job, but mothers are less good "switching off" their parent identity and turning to something else. Many women envy the father's ability to set clear boundaries between home and work, between being an on-duty and an off-duty parent ... Women work very hard to maintain a closeness to their child. Father's value intimacy with a child, but often do not know how to work to maintain it. — Terri E Apter

Canada, having few indigenous prejudices, has been compelled to import them from elsewhere, duty-free, and it is the rare Canadian who is not shaken, at some time in the year, by "old, unhappy, far-off things / And battles long ago", like Wordsworth's solitary reaper. We are a nation of immigrants, and not happy in our minds. — Robertson Davies

An oncology ward is a battlefield, and there are definite hierarchies of command. The patients, they're the ones doing the tour of duty. The doctors breeze in and out like conquering heroes, but they need to read your child's chart to remember where they've left off from the previous visit. It is the nurses who are the seasoned sergeants
the ones who are there when your baby is shaking with such a high fever she needs to be bathed in ice, the ones who can teach you how to flush a central venous catheter, or suggest which patient floor might still have Popsicles left to be stolen, or tell you which dry cleaners know how to remove the stains of blood and chemotherapies from clothing. The nurses know the name of your daughter's stuffed walrus and show her how to make tissue paper flowers to twine around her IV stand. The doctors may be mapping out the war games, but it is the nurses who make the conflict bearable. — Jodi Picoult

Law enforcement officers are never 'off duty.' They are dedicated public servants who are sworn to protect public safety at any time and place that the peace is threatened. They need all the help that they can get. — Barbara Boxer

I've been living off rats mostly. Can't steal too much food from Hogsmeade; I'd draw attention to myself."
He grinned up at Harry, but Harry returned the grin only reluctantly.
"What're you doing here, Sirius?" he said,
"Fulfilling my duty as godfather," said Sirius, gnawing on the chicken bone in a very dog-like way. "Don't worry about me, I'm pretending to be a loveable stray."
He was still grinning, but seeing the anxiety in Harry's face, said more seriously, "I want to be on the spot. Your last letter... well, let's just say things are getting fishier. — J.K. Rowling

God, two men in one day had made her blush. Worse - were making her hornier than an off-duty Marine in Taiwan. — Cherise Sinclair

A larceny and a missing. Me ears-ring missing and she larcen it. That gal just buss 'way like kite. She is a little duty gyal, that one. Never take no instruction from her mother. From she born, me say, this little one, this little one going turn slut like her auntie. Sometime me wonder if is fi her own or fi me. Anyway, she gone from Wednesday morning. Leave out before the sun even rise and is not the first time neither. But this time she take me ears-ring and me Julia of Paris shoes. Me no business bout the shoes. Imagine, she take off to go school from four in the morning? I mean to say, who love school so much that they leave four hour early? Me can smoke in here? — Marlon James

Have you ever turned to the end of a horror novel to see if the hero made it out of the darkness and into the light? If you have ever done this, I have three simple words which I feel it is my duty to convey: SHAME ON YOU! It is low to mark your place in a book by folding down the corner of the page where you left off; TURNING TO THE END TO SEE HOW IT CAME OUT is even lower. If you have this habit, I urge you to break it . . . break it at once! — Stephen King

We are citizens of an age, as well as of a State; and if it is held to be unseemly, or even inadmissible, for a man to cut himself off from the customs and manners of the circle in which he lives, why should it be less of a duty, in the choice of his activity, to submit his decision to the needs and the taste of his century? — Friedrich Schiller

Along with voting, jury duty, and paying taxes, goofing off is one of the central obligations of American citizenship. — Sarah Vowell

He grinned. "You realise I'm reporting for duty on the second of January?"
"Good. Then the last memory you'll have of me is wearing a party frock and knocking back cocktails while I kick old 1914 right in the teeth. Let's send it off in style.
(Delilah and Johnny) — Deanna Raybourn

Whenever there's heavy-duty emotional work to be done, they call me. As for playing the completely off-the-wall, sexy, gorgeous lady that I am - no, they don't think of me. — Bonnie Bedelia

Jackie gave a low gurgling laugh that made my toes curl and beamed at me. "Thanks," she said. "Sergeant Morgan - your sister - we worked on it this weekend. At Bennie's." Bennie's was a cop bar, a place where off-duty police officers hung out - and sometimes stopped in for a quick snort while on duty. The clientele was not known to be friendly to non-cops who wandered in. If Deborah had taken Jackie to Bennie's, they had clearly bonded even more than I'd realized. "It's a really good place for background," Jackie said. "I have to send the writers there to see it." She winked at Deborah. "We did tequila shots. She's not so tough with a couple of drinks under her belt." Debs snorted, but didn't say anything. — Jeff Lindsay

Time indeed changes manners and notions, and so far we must expect institutions to bend to them. But time produces also corruption of principles, and against this it is the duty of good citizens to be ever on the watch, and if the gangrene is to prevail at last, let the day be kept off as long as possible. — Thomas Jefferson

Where the off duty watch were sleeping, for one single moment you would have almost — Herman Melville

We of the great modern democracies must strive unceasingly to make our several countries lands in which a poor man who works hard can live comfortably and honestly, and in which a rich man cannot live dishonestly nor in slothful avoidance of duty; and yet we must judge rich man and poor man alike by a standard which rests on conduct and not on caste, and we must frown with the same stern severity on the mean and vicious envy which hates and would plunder a man because he is well off and on the brutal and selfish arrogance which looks down on and exploits the man with whom life has gone hard. THEODORE ROOSEVELT. SAGAMORE HILL, October 1, 1913. — Theodore Roosevelt

If anything, I'm constantly trying to figure out how to look chic with the minimal effort required because I'm constantly packing. My off-duty style is always influenced by my mood. — Martha Hunt

I don't mean to harp on this, but it's like the networks are a how-to manual for terrorists. You see them on the news. This reporter is standing outside a water treatment plant, going, 'If they poured the poison here it could wipe out thousands because the guard is off duty from noon until 1 every day!' — Jay Leno

Preachers are always pleasant company when they are off duty. — Mark Twain

I know no surer way of shaking off the dreary crust formed about the soul by the trying to do one's duty or the patient enduring of having somebody else's duty done to one, than going out alone, either at the bright beginning of the day, when the earth is still unsoiled by the feet of the strenuous and only God is abroad; or in the evening, when the hush has come, out to the blessed stars, and looking up at them wonder at the meanness of the day just past, at the worthlessness of the things one has struggled for, at the folly of having been so angry, and so restless, and so much afraid. Nothing focusses life more exactly than a little while alone at night with the stars. What are perfunctory bedroom prayers hurried through in an atmosphere of blankets, to this deep abasement of the spirit before the majesty of heaven? And as a consecration of what should be yet one more happy day, of what value are those hasty morning devotions, — Elizabeth Von Arnim

Old men keep sending young men off to kill or be killed in foreign lands while they spew their platitudes about duty and honor and freedom and loyalty, and all the while the gap between the rich and the poor in our own country continues to widen and jobs get shipped overseas and education continues to falter and it seems to me that all of this killing and being killed comes down to one thing. Greed. — Scott Pratt

I happened to notice that among the men who had willingly presented themselves for jury-service was one whom I knew to be the father of seven children. Under a law of Augustus's he was exempt for the rest of his life; yet he had not pleaded for exemption or mentioned the size of his family. I told the magistrate: "Strike this man's name off. He's a father of seven." He protested: "But, Caesar, he has made no attempt to excuse himself." "Exactly," I said, "he wants to be a juryman. Strike him off." I meant, of course,that the fellow was concealing his immunity from what every honest man considered a very thankless and disagreeable duty and that he therefore was almost certain to have crooked intentions. Crooked jurymen could pick up a lot of money by bribes, for it was a commonplace that one interested juryman could sway the opinions of a whole bunch of uninterested ones; and the majority verdict decided a case. — Robert Graves

Remember, it is the president's constitutional duty to provide a strong national defense. Don't insert politics into national security. Listen to your ground commanders. They know better than anyone what our military's needs are. Have somebody strong at home who can provide you with needed support 'off the battle field.' — Ryan Zinke

I took a trip in 2004, a year after the war started in Iraq. I played music on the streets of Baghdad for Iraqi civilians. I'd also play for U.S. soldiers at night when they were off duty in the bars. Then I would talk to people, and I would film them and ask them about their life and the conflict. — Michael Franti

In The Theory of the Moral Sentiments, Smith emphasized that trust, responsibility and accountability exist only in a society that respects them, and only where the spontaneous fruit of human sympathy is allowed to ripen. It is where sympathy, duty and virtue achieve their proper place that self-interest leads, by an invisible hand, to a result that benefits everyone. And this means that people can best satisfy their interests only in a context where they are also on occasion moved to renounce them. Beneath every society where self-interest pays off, lies a foundation of self-sacrifice. — Roger Scruton

You don't have to rush out to become the mayor of your city or the president of the United States in order to help others, but you can begin with your relatives and friends and the people around you. In fact, you can start with yourself. The important point is to realize that you are never off duty. — Chogyam Trungpa

I've worn a lot of humdingers in my time, but as a model it's my duty - my responsibility - to bring life to any garment. That can be challenging when it comes to high fashion, where the creations can be very eccentric, but I've gained a reputation for being the go-to girl who can pull it off. — Erin O'Connor

Publishing has no onus to be representative, but a fourth of America lives in conditions close to or below the poverty line. Think about the last time you read a novel in which someone went to cash a benefit check or paid for food in food stamps, or got off a double-shift at a retail store and were having their home or car repossessed. These are the conditions in which much of this country lives and it is a dereliction of capability (not duty) to ignore it in literature. — John Freeman

At home, off-duty, I wear T-shirts from Fruit of the Loom - but I have them tailored. — Tom Ford

It is a merciful provision my dears, for it takes three or four women to get each man into, through, and out of the world. You are costly creatures, boys, and it is well that mothers, sisters, wives, and daughters love their duty and do it so well, or you would perish off the face of the earth,' said Mrs. Jo solemnly ... — Louisa May Alcott

I will wait till after Christmas. What should we all do without the calendar, when we want to put off a disagreeable duty? The admirable arrangements of the solar system, by which our time is measured, always supply us with a term before which it is hardly worthwhile to set about anything we are disinclined to. — George Eliot

Our virtues themselves are not free and floating qualities over which we retain a permanent control and power of disposal; they come to be so closely linked in our minds with the actions in conjunction with which we have made it our duty to exercise them that if we come to engage in an activity of a different kind, it catches us off guard and without the slightest awareness that it might involve the application of those same virtues. — Marcel Proust

Caesar gives his legions free rein to chase women and gamble when they are off duty. "My men fight just as well when they are stinking of perfume," he says. — Anonymous

'What was being on the moon literally like?' [ ... ] 'Being on the moon?' His tired gaze inspected the narrow street of cheap jewellery stores, with its office messengers and lottery touts, the off-duty taxi-drivers leaning against their cars. 'It was just like being here.' — J.G. Ballard

Never give up the freeness of your soul. Live your duty to mankind, nurture creatures of this world as a true mother of the earth, but never shut your imagination off from those desires that distinguish you from the ordinary. Never allow yourself to be sapped of that extraordinary energy that is the necessary ingredient for creating something new and progressive. — Janvier Chouteu-Chando

He raised his bottle. "Well, if you ever want to go diving when you're off duty, let me know." "I'm not looking for a relationship, Mr. Carver. I'm here to solve a murder." He opened his front door to go inside. "Who said anything about a relationship? I'm just offering a no-strings recreational dive." A — Toni Anderson

What is evil neither can nor should be loved; for it is not one's duty to be a lover of evil or to become like what is bad; and we have said that like is dear to like. Must the friendship, then, be forthwith broken off? Or is this not so in all cases, but only when one's friends are incurable in their wickedness? If they are capable of being reformed one should rather come to the assistance of their character or their property, inasmuch as this is better and more characteristic of friendship. But a man who breaks off such a friendship would seem to be doing nothing strange; for it was not to a man of this sort that he was a friend; when his friend changed, therefore, and he is unable to save him, he gives him up. — Aristotle.

This tree is indeed a Tree of Life, for without the higher and finer sentiments man does not life; he merely exists. If any branch of that tree does not bear fruit, the Master tells us that it shall be cut off and cast into the fire. It is the duty of all living things to produce some truly constructive labor as recognition of the divine life which is within them. God is most glorified when His children glorify His spirit within themselves. — Manly Hall

I saw this cool interview with Amy Adams from when she did 'Enchanted' and played a princess, and when kids came up to her with no make-up and ripped jeans on, she said, 'I'm off duty. I'm an off-duty princess', and I thought that was quite sweet. — Lily James

Because they claim to be concerned with the welfare of whole societies, governments arrogate to themselves the right to pass off as mere abstract profit or loss the human unhappiness that their decisions provoke or their negligence permits. It is a duty of an international citizenship to always bring the testimony of people's suffering to the eyes and ears of governments, sufferings for which it's untrue that they are not responsible. The suffering of men must never be a mere silent residue of policy. It grounds an absolute right to stand up and speak to those who hold power. — Michel Foucault

Women becoming, consequently, weakerthan they ought to behave not sufficient strength to discharge the first duty of a mother; and sacrificing to lasciviousness the parental affectioneither destroy the embryo in the womb, or cast if off when born. Nature in every thing demands respect, and those who violate her laws seldom violate them with impunity. — Mary Wollstonecraft

My Christmas present? That's nice. But I'm not really in the mood to - "
"Open the goddamn thing or I'll kill you where you stand."
"Sir! Opening it." She ripped the paper, stuffed it hurriedly in her pocket, and pulled off the lid. "It's a key code."
"That's right. It's to the ground transpo that'll be at the airport over in that foreign country. Air transpo's been arranged, for two, on one of Roarke's private shuttles. Round trip. Merry fricking Christmas. Do what you want with it."
"I - you - one of the shuttles? Free?" Peabody's cheeks went pink as a summer rose. "And - and - and - a vehicle when we get there? It's so ... It's so seriously mag."
"Great. Can we go now?"
"Dallas!"
"No. No. No hugs. No hugs. No. Oh, shit," she muttered as Peabody threw her arms around her and squeezed. "We're on duty, we're in public. Let me go or I swear I'll kick your ass so hard that extra five pounds you're whining about will end up in Trenton. — J.D. Robb

But newspapers have a duty to truth,' Van said.
Lev clucked his tongue. 'They tell the truth only as the exception. Zola wrote that the mendacity of the press could be divided into two groups: the yellow press lies every day without hesitating. But others, like the Times, speak the truth on all inconsequential occasions, so they can deceive the public with the requisite authority when it becomes necessary.'
Van got up from his chair to gather the cast-off newspapers. Lev took off his glasses and rubbed his eyes. 'I don't mean to offend the journalists; they aren't any different from other people. They're merely the megaphones of the other people. — Barbara Kingsolver

There is no Christian duty that is not to be seasoned and set off with cheerishness, which in a thousand outward and intermitting crosses may yet be done well, as in this vale of tears. — John Milton

I'm an actor, and when I close the door at home I'm kind of off-duty. — Warwick Davis

May the time not be far off when all other European nations will come to the realisation that the primary necessity is putting an end to the quarrels and strife of centuries and of building up of a finer community of all peoples is: The recognition of a higher common duty arising out of common rights? — Adolf Hitler

Six times their weight (an acceleration of 6-g). Most riders, unless they were off-duty astronauts or high-performance pilots wearing g-suits, would be rendered unconscious by this force. There would be no oxygen supply getting through to the brain at all. Typically, fairground rides with child riders aim to keep accelerations below 2-g, and those for adults experience at most 4-g. — Anonymous

Our men and women fighting in Iraq are held accountable for their performance and their conduct. On duty and off, twenty-four hours a day. They're fighting for us, for our safety, our rights, and our freedoms. — Wesley Clark

Forty-seven years old, tired, but none the worse for wear. In a little more than thirteen months, he had discovered, analyzed, and packed tens of thousands of pieces of artwork, including eighty truckloads from Altaussee alone. He had organized the MFAA field officers at Normandy, pushed SHAEF to expand and support the monuments effort, mentored the other Monuments Men across France and Germany, interrogated many of the important Nazi art officials, and inspected most of the Nazi repositories south of Berlin and east of the Rhine. It would be no exaggeration to guess he put 50,000 miles on his old captured VW and visited nearly every area of action in U.S. Twelfth Army Group territory. And during his entire tour of duty on the continent, he had taken exactly one and a half days off. — Robert M. Edsel

There's really no such thing as an 'ex-cop' or a cop who's 'off-duty' or 'retired.' Once trained, once indoctrinated, a cop is always alert, assessing reality in terms of its potential for illegal acts. — Sue Grafton

One of the maddening ironies of writing books is that it leaves so little time for reading others'. My bedside is piled with books, but it's duty reading: books for book research, books for review. The ones I pine for are off on a shelf downstairs. — Mary Roach

How are your accommodations?" Dalinar asked.
"Sir? I'm in storming prison." A smile cracked Dalinar's face.
"So I see. Calm yourself, soldier. If I'd ordered you to guard a room for a week, would you have done it?"
"Yes."
"Then consider this your duty. Guard this room."
"I'll make sure nobody unauthorized runs off with the chamber pot, sir. — Brandon Sanderson

From out of nowhere, Phury felt an overwhelming tide of guilt, like someone had popped the lid off all
his deepest concerns and his fears for the future of the race. He had to respond to it, couldn't bear the
pressure.
Riding the wave, he found himself saying in a rush, We live and die for our kind. The species is our first
and only concern. We fight every night and count the jars of thelessers we kill. Stealth is the way we
protect the civilians. The less they know about us, the safer they are. That is why we disappeared. — J.R. Ward

As the life and good fame of yonder man were in your hands there seemed no choice to me, save to be silent in accordance with your behest. Yet it was not without heavy misgivings that I thus bound myself, for, having cast off all duty towards other human beings, there remained a duty towards him, — Nathaniel Hawthorne

Woe to that seven months abortion who thinks to take advantage of the accidents of birth, and, mocking the call of duty, sneaks off to stare at a wall in China! — Aleister Crowley

Raven: The Reverend Mr Larynx has been called off on duty, to marry or bury (I don't know which) some unfortunate person or persons, at Claydyke: ... — Thomas Love Peacock

But Ransom soon perceived that it regarded intelligence simply and solely as a weapon, which it had no more wish to employ in its off-duty hours than a soldier has to do bayonet practice when he is on leave. Thought was for it a device necessary to certain ends, but thought in itself did not interest it. It assumed reason as externally and inorganically as it had assumed Weston's body. — C.S. Lewis

CERBERUS, n. The watch-dog of Hades, whose duty it was to guard the entrance - against whom or what does not clearly appear; everybody, sooner or later, had to go there, and nobody wanted to carry off the entrance. — Ambrose Bierce

Another badass Gurkha in recent memory was Sergeant Dipprasad Pun of the Royal Gurkha Rifles. In 2010, while serving as the lone on-duty guard patrolling a small one-room outpost on the edge of the Afghan province of Helmand, Pun was suddenly ambushed by somewhere between fifteen and thirty Taliban warriors armed with RPGs and assault rifles. During his Ultimate Mega Gurkha Freakout Limit Break Mode, the five-foot-seven-inch sergeant fired off four hundred rounds of machine gun ammunition (every bullet he had), chucked seventeen grenades, detonated a remote mine, and then took an enemy soldier down by chucking a twenty-pound machine gun tripod into the dude's face. — Ben Thompson