Playing His Game Quotes & Sayings

As I'd listened in on the conversation, I'd noted what seemed to be disappointment in Loving's voice. I wondered if that was due to his reluctance to cease playing this game with me personally. But that was perhaps projecting my feelings onto him. I — Jeffery Deaver

He plays the same game, but for the first time in his life he is truly playing, rather than working, being a human, and this is a vast distinction realized by few. — Chris Matakas

Pascal was even convinced that he could use his theories to justify a belief in God. He stated that 'the excitement that a gambler feels when making a bet is equal to the amount he might win multiplied by the probability of winning it'. He then argued that the possible prize of eternal happiness has an infinite value and that the probability of entering heaven by leading a virtuous life, no matter how small, is certainly finite. Therefore, according to Pascal's definition, religion was a game of infinite excitement and one worth playing, because multiplying an infinite prize by a finite probability results in infinity. — Simon Singh

No Scrabble. More and more of his friends were playing it now, in a knowing ironic way, triple-word-score-craving freaks, but it seemed to him like a game designed expressly to make him feel stupid and bored. — David Nicholls

It's a little early in our relationship for us to be 'surmounting,' but, hey, I'm game if you are. I'll even let you be on top." He looked directly at me, a coy smile playing on his lips. — Stacey Marie Brown

Standing there at Powell's grave, telling my nephew about a buried skull, I realize how much of our relationship revolves around body parts and severed heads. Once Owen learned to walk, we started playing a game I call Frankenstein, in which I am Frankenstein's monster and I chase him around trying to harvest his organs and appendages because my master is building another boy. "Frankenstein needs your spleen," I yell, aping the voice of an announcer at a monster truck rally. "Give me your spleen!" Which is why the seemingly gross book I gave him for his birthday, a collection of poetry for children called The Blood-Hungry Spleen was actually a sentimental choice, even though my sister tells me it didn't go over so well when he brought it to preschool. — Sarah Vowell

It is far best for the Christian never to see some things, so he will never want them. The old-fashioned Christian who will not have playing cards in his house will never learn to gamble with them. One who never sees, in movies and night clubs or elsewhere, half-clothed girls, drinking, smoking, gambling, petting, making love to many men, is likely to miss being led into that kind of life by these sirens of sin. It is the Devil's game to make people think it necessary for people to know the ways of the world. — John R. Rice

Years ago she had discovered that she could control her relationships with heterosexual men far better by playing the sexy siren than the blushing ingenue. Being the sexual aggressor put her subtly in charge. She was the one who defined the rules of the game instead of the man, and when she sent her suitor on his way, he assumed it was because he didn't measure up to all the other men in her life. — Susan Elizabeth Phillips

My grandson Sam Saunders has been playing golf since he could hold a club and I spent a lot of time with him over the years. Like my father taught me, I showed him the fundamentals of the game and helped him make adjustments as he and his game matured over the years. — Arnold Palmer

Katsa didn't know how long they'd been grappling when she realized he was laughing. She understood his joy, understood it completely. She'd never had such a fight, she'd never had such an opponent. She was faster than he was offensively-much faster-but he was stronger, and it was as if he had a premonition of her every turn and strike; she'd never known a fighter so quick to defend himself. She was calling up moves she hadn't tried since she was a child, blows she'd only ever imagined having the opportunity to use. They were playing. It was a game. When he pinned her arms behind her back, grabbed her hair, and pushed her face into the dirt, she found that she was laughing as well. — Kristin Cashore

Violet handed the phone to Jay, who seemed remarkably composed considering they'd almost lost their closed-door privileges.
They'd lost them before, once when they were eight and Violet's mom had walked in to find them playing a game of "I'll show you mind, if you show me yours," which at that point consisted of Violet flashing her flat-as-a-pancake chest at Jay. Her moment had come in while the bottom of Violet's shirt was pulled up in front of her face. They never got far enough for him to show his. — Kimberly Derting

Hugh is now playing a game on his mobile phone. His greasy fat fingers with bitten down nails surprisingly agile on the keys. The concentration on his face is admirable in a way. It was probably with a similar level of concentration that the theory of relativity was formulated. — Glenn Haybittle

The goal of Scientology is making the individual capable of living a better life in his own estimation and with his fellows and the playing of a better game. — L. Ron Hubbard

The challenge lies in knowing how to bring this sort of day to a close. His mind has been wound to a pitch of concentration by the interactions of the office. Now there are only silence and the flashing of the unset clock on the microwave. He feels as if he had been playing a computer game which remorselessly tested his reflexes, only to have its plug suddenly pulled from the wall. He is impatient and restless, but simultaneously exhausted and fragile. He is in no state to engage with anything significant. It is of course impossible to read, for a sincere book would demand not only time, but also a clear emotional lawn around the text in which associations and anxieties could emerge and be disentangled. He will perhaps only ever do one thing well in his life.
For this particular combination of tiredness and nervous energy, the sole workable solution is wine. Office civilisation could not be feasible without the hard take-offs and landings effected by coffee and alcohol. — Alain De Botton

It's quite the game you're playing, Charlie." I shouldn't ask. I shouldn't. Don't ask. Don't . . . "And do you like playing it?" I'm surprised he even heard me, what with my voice as low as it is. But he must have - that or he read my lips, where his focus is locked right now - because he steps in closer, until our chests are almost touching but aren't. I hold the air in my lungs as he leans in toward my ear, his warm breath skating along my neck. "Yes, I do. Too much. — K.A. Tucker

Control oil and you control money. That's how you become a dominant player in the new Great Game - the one that Putin has been playing so masterfully in his effort to engineer the demise of the dollar. — Marin Katusa

I soon found myself outside in a little courtyard overlooking the ocean. I found him standing against the rails with a mischievous look on his face. Like this was all some game he was playing with me.
"Took you long enough."
I was puffed out by the time I got to where he was standing as I tried to catch my breath.
"Well, if you didn't run so fast I might have gotten here sooner."
"That's just part of the fun, isn't it?"
I stared at him and tried to figure out what exactly he was doing.
"What is?" I asked. I wasn't sure if I wanted the answer, or the answer I had the feeling he was going to give me.
"The chase."
I sighed.
"Nobody likes to be chased. At least not in these shoes," I joked. — Jennifer Whitfield

The male has paid a heavy price for his masculine 'privilege' and power. He is out of touch with his emotions and his body. He is playing by the rules of the male game plan and with lemming-like purpose he is destroying himself-emotionally, psychologically and physically. — Herb Goldberg

Obama is like a chess player who is playing simultaneous chess and has opened his game with an unusual opening. — Henry A. Kissinger

Frank Farrelly ... must be thought of with respect (perhaps even delight?) by his clients who have so far played the game of therapy with their therapists, but, I am afraid, also a shocking example for those therapists who, in Laing's words, 'are playing at not playing a game'. — Paul Watzlawick

I don't recall you playing much tennis. As for the gymnastics ... "
His sexy growl of a laugh seemed to snag Elliot in the guts. "Yeah, you do have some beautiful moves as I recall. They didn't require a lot of footwork. — Josh Lanyon

It was a curious game. This curiousness was evidenced, for example, in the fact that the young man, even though he himself was playing the unknown driver remarkably well, did not for a moment stop seeing his girl in the hitchhiker. And it was precisely this that was tormenting. He saw his girl seducing a strange man, and had the bitter privilege of being present, of seeing at close quarters how she looked and of hearing what she said when she was cheating on him (when she had cheated on him, when she would cheat on him). He had the paradoxical honor of being himself the pretext for her unfaithfulness.
This was all the worse because he worshipped rather than loved her. It had always seemed to him that her inward nature was real only within the bounds of fidelity and purity, and that beyond these bounds she would cease to be herself, as water ceases to be water beyond the boiling point. — Milan Kundera

For now, though, as long as he insists on giving in to mischievous impulses, such as hiding under the Great Council table during session, he must take his punishment."
"Oh, Daniel, you didn't." Legna tsked at the child, making his chubby cheeks turn a brilliant scarlet color.
"I didn't mean to. I was just playing hide and seek with Uncle Noah."
"Yes, well, next time perhaps you ought to begin the game by actually informing your uncle he is part of it instead of having him find out the hard way, eh? — Jacquelyn Frank

A man may daydream of how he would spend a million dollars, but playing the same game with a billion dollars sours the fantasy. There are too many possibilities. The house he once wished for with all his heart is suddenly too small. The travel, too cheap. He wanted to visit an island. Now he contemplates buying one. — Holly Black

No-one will ever have golf under his thumb. No round ever will be so good it could not have been better. Perhaps this is why golf is the greatest of games. You are not playing a human adversary; you a playing a game. You are playing old man par. — Bobby Jones

Let's say you're playing chess against someone who's got more pieces on the board and decades more experience than we do. How do you win?"

"You don't," Rose said. "Unless you cheat."

"We already tried cheating," I said. "Getting him in trouble, risking his job. He's apparently planning a response tonight."

"Change the game, then," Rose said.

"Again, we tried that. There's no winning. Not really. So what I'm proposing is pretty simple."

"Do tell," Rose said. "Also, you do know that we're being followed?"

"We're surrounded," I said. "But she wants to deal badly enough that she'll hear us out before she murders us. Nevermind that. Our analogy here. I'm proposing the pigeon strategy. Knock over all of the pieces, shit on the board, and then strut around like we're the victors. — Wildbow

Athletes train 15 years for 15 seconds of performance. Ask them if they got lucky. Ask an athlete how he feels after a good workout. He will tell you that he feels spent. If he doesn't feel that way, it means he hasn't worked out to his maximum ability.
Losers think life is unfair. They think only of their bad breaks. They don't consider that the person who is prepared and playing well still got the same bad breaks but overcame them. That is the difference. His threshold for tolerating pain becomes higher because in the end he is not training so much for the game but for his character. Alexander Graham Bell was desperately trying to invent a hearing aid for his partially deaf wife. He failed at inventing a hearing aid but in the process discovered the principles of the telephone. You wouldn't call someone like that lucky, would you?Good luck is when opportunity meets preparation. Without effort and preparation, lucky coincidences don't happen. — Shiv Khera

Since we're playing that game ... I tilted my face up to his and gave him a lovesick gaze.
"Do you have to sneeze?" he asked.
"Be quiet. I'm pretending to enjoy your company, just as you said."
"Try not to strain anything."
"Oh, I won't. I'm very good at faking it."
That shut him up. — Ilona Andrews

She had rushed to him like some stupid, lust-struck idiot, playing right into his hands. That fucking note ... That Goddamn gift ... The way he had taken her the night before and the things he said ... All a part of his game. — Ella Dominguez

One more thing," Megan said, stopping Doug in his tracks.
His shoulders slumped and he turned around. "What? You want my kidney?"
"I want in on the next ultimate Frisbee game," Megan said.
Doug grinned. "You're playing skins."
Megan grinned back. "We'll see about that. — Kate Brian

Perhaps you should consider your difficulty in getting past Wendlyn's naval defences to be a sign that you should stop playing at being a god."
"Playing?" The King smiled, his crooked teeth glowing yellow in the firelight. "I am not playing. And this is not a game. — Sarah J. Maas

The great Jack Nicklaus summed things up neatly during a charity match on the Old Course at St. Andrews where he and I were playing against Ben Crenshaw and Glen Campbell. I asked him what he considered to be the most important factor to overcome in the game of golf. His reply, "It's an unfair game." — Sean Connery

Anton had the feeling that by doing something which was within his power but which he could not quite think of, he could undo everything and return to the way they had been before, sitting around the table playing a game. It was as if he had forgotten a name remebered a hundred times before and now on the tip of his tongue, but the harder he tried to recall it, the more elusive it became. — Harry Mulisch

It's a dangerous game Cherrycoke's playing here. Often he thinks the sheer volume of information pouring in through his fingers will saturate, burn him out...she seems determined to overwhelm him with her history and its pain, and the edge of it, always fresh from the stone, cutting at his hopes, at all their hopes. He does respect her: he knows that very little of this is female theatricals, really. She has turned her face, more than once, to the Outer Radiance and simply seen nothing there. And so each time has taken a little more of the Zero into herself. It comes down to courage, at worst an amount of self-deluding that's vanishingly small: he has to admire it, even if he can't accept her glassy wastes, her appeals to a day not of wrath but of final indifference... — Thomas Pynchon

I looked up, and I really wished I hadn't. My obsession with those eyes was playing a taunting game with me. His mesmerising gaze was like none other I had ever experienced in my life. It was almost as if he could reach into my soul and pick out all of my sins. Sins I didn't want him to know about. Sins that would ultimately destroy me if they ever got out. If he knew my sins, he wouldn't be kneeling beside me with my hand in his. He wouldn't be sharing with me that look of promises to come. He would be disgusted with me. I was disgusted with me. — Jaimie Roberts

Cricket was a manly game. Manly masters spoke of the 'discipline of the hard ball'. Schools preferred manly games. Games were only manly if it was possible while playing them to be killed or drowned or at the very least badly maimed. Cricket could be splendidly dangerous. Tennis was not manly, and if a boy had asked permission to spend the afternoon playing croquet he would have been instantly punished for his 'general attitude'. Athletics were admitted into the charmed lethal circle as a boy could, with a little ingenuity, get impaled during the pole-vault or be decapitated by a discus and did a manly death. Fives were thought to be rather tame until one boy ran his head into a stone buttress and got concussion and another fainted dead away from heat and fatigue. Then everybody cheered up about fives. — Arthur Marshall

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

The greatest player in the world. Ronaldinho? Absolutely. I just can't get enough of watching him play - he's a delight for the eye. His technique is incredible, his touch, his vision, he scores and he orchestrates everything. He's just the complete player. I know how difficult it is for a forward playing at this level, but for him it's so easy. He does it every single game and it's just unbelievable to watch. — Ruud Van Nistelrooy

We have nothing against playing video games; they have many good features and benefits. Our concern is that when they are played to excess, especially in social isolation, they can hinder a young man's ability and interest in developing his face-to-face social skills. Multiple problems, including obesity, violence, anxiety, lower school performance, social phobia and shyness, greater impulsivity and depression, have all been associated with excessive gaming. The variety and intensity of video game action makes other parts of life, like school, seem comparatively boring, and that creates a problem with their academic performance, which in turn might require medication to deal with attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD), which then leads to other problems down the road in a disastrous negative cycle ... — Philip G. Zimbardo

What do you say to taking up our game where we left off? I was winning, you will recall.'
Winning, for all love: how your ageing memory does betray you, my poor friend,' said Stephen, fetching his 'cello. They tuned, and at no great distance Killick said to his mate, 'There they are, at it again. Squeak, squeak; boom, boom. And when they do start a-playing, it's no better. You can't tell t'other from one. Never nothing a man could sing to, even as drunk as Davy's sow.'
I remember them in the Lively: but it is not as chronic as a wardroom full of gents with German flutes, bellyaching night and day, like we had in Thunderer. No. Live and let live, I say.'
Fuck you, William Grimshaw. — Patrick O'Brian

I've come to warn you, too. It's a dangerous game you're playing. There's a reason the rest of us maintain a distance from Adair, and we've learned our lesson the hard way. But now you've shown him love and that's given him the notion that he is deserving of such devotion. Did you ever think that perhaps the only thing that holds the devil in check is that he knows how despised he his? Even the devil longs for sympathy at times, but sympathy for the devil is fuel for the flame. Your love will embolden him
likely in a way that will bring you regret. — Alma Katsu

Oh, my god!" I said to Reyes, my eyes radiating accusations at him. "She took your picture? Just what kind of game are you playing? You're under arrest, mister." His mouth tilted and a dimple emerged on one cheek as I took his wrist and threw him against a wall. Or, well, urged him toward it. I held him against the cool wood with one hand and frisked him with the other. — Darynda Jones

Svensson has struggled as everyone struggles, he's conceded his defeats. He's not a player, but he has lost nonetheless. Svensson is no stranger than the rest of us. At some point he decided to stop playing the game, and turned to the tangible things: Svensson and the painter Kiki Kaufman have a daughter named Bella. Bella has two teeth (the research intern did a terrible job). Svensson and Kiki are turning a ruin into a house, they're turning a study into a nursery, they plant and harvest and breed animals and slaughter and cook. — Thomas Pletzinger

I want to kiss you." Jace's whisper pulled me from my thoughts and I glanced up to find his eyes blazing with raw need. "Just because Marc won't touch you doesn't mean I shouldn't. Right? I don't have that kind of self-control, and honestly, I don't see the point in it. Are you supposed to be impressed by how long we can go without touching you? 'Cause if that's the game we're playing, I think I'd rather lose. — Rachel Vincent

For whatever reason God chose to make man as he is - limited and suffering and subject to sorrows and death - He had the honesty and the courage to take His own medicine. Whatever game He is playing with His creation, He has kept His own rules and played fair. He can exact nothing from man that He has not exacted from Himself. He has Himself gone through the whole of human experience, from the trivial irritations of family life and the cramping restrictions of hard work and lack of money to the worst horrors of pain and humiliation, defeat, despair and death. When He was a man, He played the man. He was born in poverty and died in disgrace and thought it well worthwhile. — Dorothy L. Sayers

Since the most important responsibility of a coach in regard to the actual playing of the game is to teach his players properly and effectively to execute the various fundamentals of the game, he is first of all a teacher. — John Wooden

Kim Jong Un came in as a fresh face, so I think there's a great disappointment that he's playing the same game as his father. — Barbara Demick

What the fuck are you doing?" His hands wanted to hold her, his arms wanted to wrap her up, but he squeezed the edge of the bed. Whatever game she was playing, he wasn't going to fall for it. She wouldn't make him a fool. Not more than she already had. "I told you. Sweet is good. Sweet can be better. I don't think you know that." Her hands were around his face, and it made his chest tight. He didn't understand that, either. Coming here had not eased his confusion; he was more confused now than ever. Maybe ever in his whole motherfucking life. "Fuck you." She smiled. "Maybe. But sweet. — Susan Fanetti

I think that the only real way to tell if a boy like likes you is to be direct. None of this game-playing, that's juvenile. Instead, even though it might be scary, the thing to do is to just march up and ask one of your friends to ask someone else to ask one of his friends what he thinks about you. — Lisa Yee

He looked at me with a smile that I still remember and ran a finger along his impeccably trimmed mustache. Cricket is about a lot more than playing by the rules, Mistry. It's a gentleman's game. Don't you ever forget that. — Ken Doyle

You know that man's story already. He's just starting to believe what Day's been saying to him for years, but he's scared as fuck. If you hurt him in any way, Day will hurt you." Johnson stopped grinning and looked back at God. "I thought Day hated him?" "Day is complex, Johnson. He's crazy about Ronowski, that's why he rides the man so hard." "I get that," Johnson responded. "All right. I don't mind doing the slow thing. We'll start with wings and a game tonight." Johnson shrugged and started inching toward his car. "Next week, maybe dinner and a movie." "Sounds good, bro." God waved and climbed in his truck. Now that he was done playing Chuck Woolery and there were no more love connections to be made. He was going home to his sweetheart. — A.E. Via

He narrowed his eyes at me, pushed out of the booth and stomped over to the cash desk where Ash had returned and was playing a game on his mobile phone.

"Sorry, sir," he echoed, dead-pan, and then added: "She is the owner."

He dropped his voice to a stage whisper. "And she's righ' crazy, so I wouldn't mess with her. She stabbed someone with a plastic fork just last week."

"A--a plastic fork?" the man said, looking over at me nervously.

"Yeah, and you would not believe the mess. A carving knife woulda made cleaner work of it."

The man slapped a few coins on the counter near the cash and, clutching the remains of his paper, dashed out the door.

"Thanks, Ash," I said, absently.

"No probs," he said. "Chasing zombies on my phone--fair inspirational, aye? — K.C. Dyer

As a boy, Ogion like all boys had thought it would be a very pleasant game to take by art-magic whatever shape one liked, man or beast, tree or cloud, and so to play at a thousand beings. But as a wizard he had learned the price of the game, which is the peril of losing one's self, playing away the truth. The longer a man stays in a form not his own, the greater this peril. Every prentice-sorcerer learns the tale of the wizard Bordger of Way, who delighted in taking bear's shape, and did so more and more often until the bear grew in him and the man died away, and he became a bear, and killed his own little son in the forests, and was hunted down and slain. And no one knows how many of the dolphins that leap in the waters of the Inmost Sea were men once, wise men, who forgot their wisdom and their name in the joy of the restless sea. — Ursula K. Le Guin

Speaking of Vaughan, his claim in the Daily Telegraph last week that the story of a senior county pro being offered money to fix domestic matches was 'the tip of the iceberg' did not go down well with one former England captain contacted by the Top Spin. 'I played the game for almost 20 years,' he seethed, 'and I don't know a single player who has been offered money, either for information or to fix a game. To say it's the tip of the iceberg is absolute rubbish.'
The fact that the player in question had just registered a mediocre Stableford score of 20 playing off a handicap of 14 had nothing to do, I was assured, with his foul mood. — Lawrence Booth

He did not really understand the game they were playing: in his world, the best way to get something was to deserve it, not to toady to the giver. — Ken Follett

To any young kid who wants to be a footballer, I would simply say: Have fun playing football and enjoy the team - spirit. That's the right attitude; that will bring you pleasure and fulfillment in football. A baker cannot live on bread he made yesterday, and a footballer cannot live on his last game. It's about the here and now. — Jurgen Klinsmann

His eyes narrowed on her and the bag. "Why?" he asked cautiously, afraid she was trying to steal his treats.
Just what kind of sick game was she playing? — R.L. Mathewson

Around the corner I have a friend,
In this great city that has no end,
Yet the days go by and weeks rush on,
And before I know it, a year is gone.
And I never see my old friends face,
For life is a swift and terrible race,
He knows I like him just as well,
As in the days when I rang his bell.
And he rang mine but we were younger then,
And now we are busy, tired men.
Tired of playing a foolish game,
Tired of trying to make a name.
"Tomorrow" I say! "I will call on Jim
Just to show that I'm thinking of him",
But tomorrow comes and tomorrow goes,
And distance between us grows and grows.
Around the corner, yet miles away,
"Here's a telegram sir," "Jim died today."
And that's what we get and deserve in the end.
Around the corner, a vanished friend. — Charles Hanson Towne

You and I are players, God's our coach, and we're playing the biggest game of all. We have a loving God that made us. We need to get on His team. It says in His word, there's only one way to Him and that's through Jesus Christ. — Joe Gibbs

No matter how I feel about his beliefs,he's the one truly losing here. I knew the risks,but he was just a pawn,torn between so many playing an invisible game. — Victoria Aveyard

Dennis Murray is a wonderful Golf Professional who is personable and skillful as an instructor. Dennis helped me work on my golf swing for a full week back in the 80's when I was still playing the PGA Tour. His instruction was great and helped my game very much. — Jerry Pate

You are interfering in my business, warlock."
Magnus spat blood into his face. "You are torturing a child in my city, Shadowhunter. [ ... ] I thought we were playing a game where we said what the other person was and what we were doing." Magnus told him. "Did I get it wrong? Can I guess again? are you breaking your own sacred Laws, asshole? — Cassandra Clare

A Black man should be more independent and depend on himself for his freedom and not to take it for granted that someone would lead him to it. The blacks are tired of standing at the touchlines to witness a game that they should be playing. They want to do things for themselves and all by themselves. — Steven Biko

I have spoken to Paul and he is now talking to his family and seeing where his future lies, whether it be here or back in Scotland, said Worthington. Obviously I'm delighted with the way he played today and also the way he performed at Sheffield Wednesday on Saturday when he only knew he would be playing 15 minutes before the game. — Nigel Worthington

Greyface and his followers took the game of playing at life more seriously than they took life itself and were known even to destroy other living beings whose ways of life differed from their own. — Malaclypse The Younger

The Psalms offer us a way of joining in a chorus of praise and prayer that has been going on for millennia and across all cultures. Not to try to inhabit them, while continuing to invent nonpsalmic "worship" based on our own feelings of the moment, risks being like a spoiled child who, taken to the summit of Table Mountain with the city and the ocean spread out before him, refuses to gaze at the view because he is playing with his Game Boy. — N. T. Wright

Whatever exists is inevitably flawed. Buddha, in his detachment from the world, finds all its hustle and bustle ridiculous because he has nothing to do with it. A cynic finds the feelings of his fellow human beings ridiculous because he has no feelings himself. Someone who does not play soccer thinks it ridiculous to chase around after a little leather ball for hours at a time. He doesn't bother to ask whether this game might be a lot of fun. All he sees is the ridiculousness of grown men playing like little boys. People who do anything will no doubt appear ridiculous to people who do nothing. A person who acts can always make a fool of himself. A person who doesn't never runs that risk. We might even say that life is always ridiculous but death is never ridiculous. — Fritz Zorn

Make a list of some things your children like you to do with them but aren't necessarily fun for you - playing a board game on the floor with a young child, going outside to throw a ball, sitting down with a child to read his or her creative story or to look at an artistic creation, and so on. Commit to saying yes to their requests instead of no, knowing that if you invest in what is important to them, they will be open to believing in what is important to you. — Sally Clarkson

Domination and critique have always formed an apparatus covertly against a common hostis: the conspirator, who works under cover, who used everything THEY give him and everything THEY attribute to him as a mask. The conspirator is everywhere hated, although THEY will never hate him as much as he enjoys playing his game. No doubt a certain amount of what one usually calls "perversion" accounts for the pleasure, since what he enjoys, among other things, is his opacity. But that isn't the reason THEY continue to push the conspirator to make himself a critic, to subjectivate himself as critic, nor the reason for the hate THEY so commonly express. The reason is quite simply the danger he represents. The danger, for Empire, is war machines: that one person, that people transform themselves into war machines, ORGANICALLY JOIN THEIR TASTE FOR LIFE AND THEIR TASTE FOR DESTRUCTION. — Tiqqun

She is playing a game that she doesn't want to play, but can't seem to quit. As a player she wishes to see how the game concludes, but she also wishes the other player would retreat. She wants to win after-all and she makes for a sore loser, but her combatant uses his moves to keep her off-guard and primed for his advance. Should she block him, outmaneuver him, or just play dead until his back is turned? Isn't the last the way of the female? — Donna Lynn Hope

He finessed his way through it all, playing the "I don't recall" game. He played the same game when asked about how Betty and UD officers had inserted Betty's name on their official visitors' log when it was Monica who actually visited, so as not to betray the president. It was yet another obvious lie on his part. I knew that game. Everyone with eyes could see it. He never recalled how she came to him with letters or papers. There was a back-and-forth on how the Clintons had garnered a lawyer for Monica so she could obfuscate matters and not implicate the president in his defense in Paula Jones's civil sexual harassment case. They discussed how unethical that was, and that's when the president had the nerve to blame the debacle on the information's getting leaked, not that it actually happened. Finally it came down to blaming Monica. — Gary J. Byrne

The time I like listening to music most on headphones is, I have a game I play with my brother, he's a musician as well.And he sends me MIDI files of keyboard pieces. So, these are pieces where I just get a MIDI file; I don't know what instrument he was playing them on; I know nothing about his section of the sound of the piece, and then when I'm sitting on trains I do a lot of train travel I turn them into pieces of music. And I love to do that; it's my favorite hobby. — Brian Eno

It's one thing to win a game with a base hit, or to save a game by pitching a scoreless ninth ... it's something altogether different to save our National Pastime by day in and day out showing up with the joy and passion of a kid playing Little League and the determined attitude and work ethic of a consummate professional bent on doing one thing and one thing only: his job. — Tucker Elliot

If the actor gave his performance without knowing that he was in a play, then his tears would be real tears and his life a real life. And whenever I think of this pain and joy that rise up in me, I am carried away by the knowledge that the game I am playing is the most serious and exciting there is. — Albert Camus

Beatrix kept pace easily with Christopher as they headed toward the forest. It nagged at him to have someone else holding Albert's leash. Beatrix's assertiveness was like a pebble lodged in the toe of his shoe. And yet when she was near, it was impossible to feel detached from his surroundings. She had a knack of keeping him anchored in the present.
He couldn't stop watching how her legs and hips moved in those breeches. What was her family thinking, to allow her to dress this way? Even in private it was unacceptable. A humorless smile curved his lips as he reflected that he had at least one thing in common with Beatrix Hathaway--neither of them was in step with the rest of the world.
The difference was that he wanted to be.
It had been so easy for him, before the war. He had always known the right thing to do or say. Now the prospect of reentering polite society seemed rather like playing a game in which he had forgotten the rules. — Lisa Kleypas

After Game Six of the Finals, as Paxson's shot went through the net, Michael Jordan raced to the basket to get the ball. He held it up high above his head, and his teammates thought he was going to say something about a prospective trip to Disneyland. Instead, he yelled out, Thunder Dan Majerle-my fucking ass! — David Halberstam

The lacrosse game took place in the optimistically dubbed SuperDome, an air-inflated sports facility made from some sort of pliable material. Thomas was playing in an indoor league for the winter season. Ryan had come along too. He half watched his brother, half played catch in the corner with a couple of other kids. Ryan also kept looking over at his father. He did that a lot now, looked for his father, as though Adam might suddenly vanish into thin air. Adam got it, of course. He tried to reassure him, but what could he really say? — Harlan Coben

Vic Wertz once hit a ball rather famously that was later described as such: 'It would have been a home run in any other park - including Yellowstone.' Instead, he's remembered as the guy who got robbed by Willie Mays' spectacular catch during the 1954 World Series between the Indians and the Giants, a play that remains one of the game's all-time greatest defensive efforts. What people often forget about Wertz is that his greatest battle wasn't that one at bat, and that one out never defined his career. He was stricken with polio in 1955, and after 74 games his season was over and his career was hanging in the balance. 'The Catch' by Willie Mays couldn't keep him down, and neither could polio - he came back in 1956, and despite playing in only 136 games he belted 32 home runs with 106 RBIs. — Tucker Elliot

Phenex gently took the biscuit from her, examined it for a moment, and then, in a blur of movement, pelted Gadreel with it. It hit him squarely in the forehead before landing in his bisque, making it splatter.
Gadreel bared his teeth. "I was playing."
"So am I. It's a game called Whack-a-Douche. I just set the all-time high score. — Kendra Leigh Castle

ABOYNE (vb.)
To beat an expert at a game of skill by playing so appallingly that none of his clever tactics or strategies are of any use to him. — Douglas Adams

I have always thought you could take the measure of a man by his sports manners - that is to say, the way in which he conducts himself on the playing field, or even over a game of chess or cards. — Graydon Carter

it is again: that Hindu belief that all of life is maya, illusion. Once we see life as a game, no more consequential than a game of chess, then the world seems a lot lighter, a lot happier. Personal failure becomes "as small a cause for concern as playing the role of loser in a summer theater performance," writes Huston Smith in his book The World's Religions. If it's all theater, it doesn't matter which role you play, as long as you realize it's only a role. Or, as Alan Watts said: "A genuine person is one who knows he is a big act and does it with complete zip. — Eric Weiner

My idol was always Romario. He was playing in Holland at the time and I loved him. His skills, technique, I loved him he was my hero. I liked his whole game. One moment it would be like he was sleeping and then another moment he would change the game. — Rafael Van Der Vaart

So, think about how you use a disc that you own of an Xbox 360 game. If I buy the disc from a store, I use that disc in my machine, I can give that disc to my son and he can play it on his 360 in his room. We both can't play at the same time, but the disc is the key to playing. I can go round to your house and give you that disc and you can play on that game as well. — Larry Hryb

Everyone have a game, everyone is playing in his own game and his own game he is the king the others are the other figures from the chess. — Deyth Banger

There was something growing in me. Something far more than the festering hate that had begun too many years ago. This girl that sits obediently in the bath, awaiting her master's return was just an image, a picture in a book with no accompanying explanation. She sits in silence, she answers his questions and she succumbs his touches without complaint. But in the dark recesses of her mind something continues to thrive. Like a switch flipped it had changed her from the pathetic, frightened girl into a soulless demon playing a sickening game. Dragging him in with her acquiesce until she could chew him up and spit him out. — Roxanne Lee

Michael left because of the Bulls' management, not because he'd lost his love of playing the game. — Tiger Woods

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

These rules, the sign language and grammar of the Game, constitute a kind of highly developed secret language drawing upon several sciences and arts, but especially mathematics and music (and/or musicology), and capable of expressing and establishing interrelationships between the content and conclusions of nearly all scholarly disciplines. The Glass Bead Game is thus a mode of playing with the total contents and values of our culture; it plays with them as, say, in the great age of the arts a painter might have played with the colours on his palette. — Hermann Hesse

Please," he says. That one word is enough to get me off my bed. I'm standing in the center of our room now, hands on the waistband of my boxers. I yank and let them drop to the floor. And now he's staring at my cock, stroking his. "What do you want?" I ask. And I need him to be specific. This is a very dangerous game we're playing. It will probably end in disaster. But if there's any way I can prevent that, I will. — Sarina Bowen

Cheat? Good heavens, this is an amateur cricket match amongst leading prep schools, I'm an Englishman and a schoolmaster supposedly setting an example to his young charges. We are playing the most artistic and beautiful game ever devised. Of course I'll cunting well cheat. Now, give me my robe and put on my crown. I have immortal longings in me. — Stephen Fry

I don't supposed you'd take on a new job as a nanny?"

"Live in?" he asked, "I'm not so sure. My grandmother's right next door. She might not approve of the arrangement. Or are we talking about another role-playing game?" He burrowed his chin between her shoulder and neck and whispered into her ear. "Because she wouldn't need to know about that. — Paula Altenburg

His biggest rule was that you didn't involve anyone who wasn't already playing the game. Or, as he phrased it, if you have to kill innocent bystanders, then your planning is at fault and someone should best eliminate you. — Martha Wells

When a country has political parties, sooner or later it becomes impossible to intervene effectively in public affairs without joining a party and playing the game. Whoever is concerned for public affairs will wish his concern to bear fruit. Those who care about the public interest must either forget their concern and turn to other things, or submit to the grind of the parties. In the latter case, they shall experience worries that will soon supersede their original concern for the public interest. — Simone Weil