Puttering Quotes & Sayings

Look for wars to trim transition times. If you decide to do something, do it. You can lose thirty minutes or more puttering around the house, putting things away, getting distracted, and losing intensity before taking whatever action you decide to take. — Laura Vanderkam

Hester Landon, independent, invincible, indestructible. Who might have died after a terrible fall, if not for a neighbor - and her own indefatigable will. Now she reigned in a suite of rooms in his parents' home while she recovered from her injuries. There she'd stay until deemed strong enough to come back to Bluff House - or if his parents had their way, there she would stay, period. He wanted to think of her back here, in the house she loved, sitting out on the terrace with her evening martini, looking out at the ocean. Or puttering in her garden, maybe setting up her easel to paint. He wanted to think of her vital and tough, not helpless and broken on the floor while he'd been pouring a second cup — Nora Roberts

Upon my word, Watson!" said Holmes at last with an unsteady voice, "I owe you both my thanks and an apology. It was an unjustifiable experiment even for one's self, and doubly so for a friend. I am really very sorry." "You know," I answered with some emotion, for I had never seen so much of Holmes's heart before, "that it is my greatest joy and privilege to help you. — Martin Edwards

Confronted by a Church that has ceased to manifest God's mercy and intimate connection with humankind - that has converted Christ into a grim and joyless adjunct to the policing of bedrooms and marital intercourse - men and women can no longer see themselves as beloved of God, only as impure and reprehensible. — Uta Ranke-Heinemann

Take it from me, whenever you see a bunch of buggers puttering around talking about truth and beauty and the best way of attacking Ethics, you can bet your sandals it's all because dozens of other poor buggers are doing all the real work around the place. — Terry Pratchett

If for a moment you are inclined to regard these taluses as mere draggled, chaotic dumps, climb to the top of one of them, and run down without any haggling, puttering hesitation, boldly jumping from boulder to boulder with even speed. You will then find your feet playing a tune, and quickly discover the music and poetry of these magnificent rock piles
a fine lesson; and all Nature's wildness tells the same story
the shocks and outbursts of earthquakes, volcanoes, geysers, roaring, thundering waves and floods, the silent uprush of sap in plants, storms of every sort
each and all are the orderly beauty-making love-beats of Nature's heart. — John Muir

Anger is fear in disguise. — Rajneesh

On every birthday, when I wake, I now take out the old Nagan, load it with one bullet, spin the chamber and pull the trigger with the barrel in my mouth. I've cheated death nine times. It is my greatest achievement. And three months to go to my next birthday. I can't wait. — Eddy Shah

There were also times when they didn't kiss and roam nonstop. The in-between times. That's when they just held each other and whispered. Marnie, of course, heard it all. Adam would try to make Robyn laugh, and she would, whether it was funny or not. She would tease him and he would tell her what it was like before. And they talked about what it would be like after. It was as if they were two normal kids in love, sitting on a sofa in a warm living room, telling each other almost everything and sorting out the world with someone's mom puttering annoyingly in the background. Except, of course, they weren't two normal kids. Would never be. — Teresa Toten

I know that aiming at perfection has its drawbacks. It makes you go into details that you can avoid but that is the only way you can achieve excellence. So, in that case, being finicky is essential. — J.R.D. Tata

It is critical to your family's well being and to your kids' self-esteem that you like (not just love) your youngsters. What does "like" mean? Here's an example. It's a Saturday and you're home by yourself for a few hours - a rare occurrence! Everyone has gone out. You're listening to some music and just puttering around. You hear a noise outside and look out to see a car pulling up in the driveway. One of your kids gets out and heads for the front door. How do you feel in your gut right at that moment? If it's "Oh no, the fun's over!" that may not be like. If it's "Oh good, I've got some company!" that's more like like. Liking your children and having a good relationship with them is important for lots of reasons. The most important reason, though, may be that it's simply more fun. Kids are naturally cute and enjoyable a lot of the time, and you want to take advantage of that valuable quality. And they only grow up with you once. — Thomas W. Phelan

I felt very unstressed on my wedding day. I'm very grateful for that ... spending the day on my own, being super quiet and happy and just puttering around doing my own thing. — Sonya Walger

What reading does, ultimately, is keep alive the dangerous and exhilarating idea that a life is not a sequence of lived moments, but a destiny ... the time of reading, the time defined by the author's language resonating in the self, is not the world's time, but the soul's. The energies that otherwise tend to stream outward through a thousand channels of distraction are marshaled by the cadences of the prose; they are brought into focus by the fact that it is an ulterior, and entirely new, world that the reader has entered. The free-floating self
the self we diffusely commune with while driving or walking or puttering in the kitchen
is enlisted in the work of bringing the narrative to life. In the process, we are able to shake off the habitual burden of insufficient meaning and flex our deeper natures. — Sven Birkerts

Owning your own home is America's unique recipe for avoiding revolution and promoting pseudo-equality at the same time. To keep citizens puttering in their yards instead of sputtering on the barricades, the government has gladly deprived itself of billions in tax revenues by letting home owners deduct mortgage interest payments. — Florence King

Learn to like what doesn't cost much.
Learn to like reading, conversation, music.
Learn to like plain food, plain service, plain cooking.
Learn to like fields, trees, brooks, hiking, rowing, climbing hills.
Learn to like people, even though some of them may be different...different from you.
Learn to like to work and enjoy the satisfaction doing your job as well as it can be done.
Learn to like the song of birds, the companionship of dogs.
Learn to like gardening, puttering around the house, and fixing things.
Learn to like the sunrise and sunset, the beating of rain on the roof and windows, and the gentle fall of snow on a winter day.
Learn to keep your wants simple and refuse to be controlled by the likes and dislikes of others. — Lowell C. Bennion

Fall has arrived and has already begun to put everything into a deep sleep; flies and other insects have suffered their first setback, and up in the trees and down on the ground you can hear the sounds of struggling life, puttering , ceaselessly rustling, laboring not to perish. — Knut Hamsun

The imagination needs moodling,
long, inefficient happy idling, dawdling and puttering. — Brenda Ueland

Nook people are those of us who need solitude, but also the sound of someone puttering in the next room. — Durga Chew-Bose

The problem with taking your happy pills and puttering along as before is that it's no better than sweeping dirt under the carpet. I want you to take that rug out back and beat the hell out of it. — Julie Holland

At about 3:30 on May 9, 2013, then, I was puttering around when Pavel came over to say, "There is something interesting you might want to see. Little sparks and fireworks outside." Pavel's English isn't the greatest, so it took me a second to figure out what he was talking about. Then I got it: fireworks, Russia, Victory Day - made sense, though it was surprising that he could see them from space. I floated over to the Russian segment to look out the window: no, it wasn't happening on Earth - it looked like fireflies were coming off the left side of the Station. — Chris Hadfield

It's much easier to make jokes about sensitive issues if there is some dissent, some conflict. — Mo Rocca

There are some movies I can watch over and over, never get sick of. I'll put one of those on and be puttering around the house. Then a certain scene will come on and I'll just have to go over and watch. — David Fincher

Puttering is really a time to be alone, to dream, to get in touch with yourself ... To putter is to discover. — Alexandra Stoddard

I couldn't think of anything I wanted to do or any place I wanted to be more than home. Where I can walk around the yard, sweeping leaves off the slate paths to my heart's content. Where I can spend all day in my pajamas puttering around the house, or curled up in my favorite chair in the family room next to the big stone fireplace. The walls are papered deep red, hung with Madison's paintings and lined with our favorite books. The furniture is comfortable and inviting. Our house is made to be lived in; we use every inch of it and don't mind the signs of wear and tear. There's a deep dent in the floor next to the hearth ... It's part of the story of this house, where a family has left its mark, and where it continues to grow and evolve. — Sissy Spacek