Richman Quotes & Sayings

I told my daughter, the first time she fell in love, not to hold it too close. Think of yourself in a warm, summer pool, I told her, concentric circles rippling all around you. Golden beams of sunlight flooding your hair, striking your face. Inhale it. Breathe it. It will not leave you. If you place sunlight in your palms, it will turn to shadow. If you put fireflies in a jar, they will die. But if you love with wings on, you will always feel the exhilaration of being suspended in flight. — Alyson Richman

I need a stunt mouth. — Adam Richman

I remember my late father, who was the biggest football fan I have ever known, used to stress when I was younger that, win or lose, you always have to compete with honor. — Adam Richman

Super polished signage is not always a good sign. I'm always looking for places that you have to know about to find. Also, just food-wise, if I'm eating ethnic cuisine - I hate that phrase, but still - If I'm eating Mexican food, I'm looking to see that there are Mexicans in the restaurant. They know if the food is being made right. — Adam Richman

Apologists for activist government never tire of telling us that the
benevolent state is our protector and that without it wed be at the mercy of
monsters. It is about time that we understood that the U.S. government does
more to endanger the American people than any imagined monsters around the
world ... by pursuing its Grand Foreign Policy of meddling anywhere and
everywhere. — Sheldon Richman

Among other grand achievements, F. A. Hayek had a remarkable career pointing out the flaws in collectivism. One of his keenest insights was that, paradoxically, any collectivist system necessarily depends on one individual (or small group) to make key social and economic decisions. In contrast, a system based on individualism takes advantage of the aggregate, or 'collective,' information of the whole society; through his actions each participant contributes his own particular, if incomplete, knowledge-information that could never be tapped by the individual at the head of a collectivist state. — Sheldon Richman

Americans live under the delusion that enterprise here is both private and free. It may be nominally private, but it's anything but free. Unfortunately, most people don't know what freedom is. So they are unfazed when they hear that before you can do anything of a commercial nature, you need government permission. — Sheldon Richman

Basically, Sam Phillips recorded Bill Haley, Johnny Cash, and all those other Memphis guys; Chuck Berry played the top two strings; Elvis appeared on The Ed Sullivan Show above the waist; the Beatles made all the girls squirm by singing about wanting to hold their "hands"; Ray Davies got lost in a sunset; Pete Townshend smashed his guitar; Brian Wilson heard magic in his head and made it come out of a studio; the Rolling Stones urinated on a garage door; and then (skipping a bit) you've got Joey Levine and Chapman-Chinn and Mott the Hoople and Iggy and the Runaways and KISS and the Pink Fairies and Rick Nielsen and Jonathan Richman and Johnny Ramone and Lemmy and the Young brothers and Cook and Jones and Pete Shelley and Feargal Sharkey and Rob Halford ... and Foghat. You get what I'm saying. It didn't happen in a vacuum, but it did happen, and now here we are in the aftermath. — Frank Portman

Well, I like how people talk. I like language. You know, Linda Richman spoke in Yiddish. — Mike Myers

The Replacements made me feel a little less scared, because they made good imaginary friends. They looked like a band that would actually be fun to be in. Some bands just lend themselves to that fantasy, like Lynyrd Skynyrd or Earth, Wind & Fire - they looked like you could just drop in and they wouldn't even notice you were hanging around for at least two albums. Jonathan Richman once said he formed a band because he was lonely. The Replacements were imaginary friends who I could practice on while I was learning to have actual friends. — Rob Sheffield

Roadrunner, roadrunner, going faster miles an hour. Gonna drive past the Stop 'n' Shop, with the radio on. I'm in love with Massachusetts and the neon when it's cold outside. And the highway when it's late at night. Got the radio on, I'm like the roadrunner. — Jonathan Richman

A woman who loves books has a dreamer's soul, with each story she has read woven into her own. — Alyson Richman

I always hated watching cooking shows where the chef would use ingredients that I couldn't get my hands on, cooking implements that I couldn't afford, recipes that I could never have access to. — Adam Richman

Progressives did not like the antiquated thinking that saw the Constitution as a barrier to government expansion. The "living Constitution" was born. That benign-sounding phrase (coined later) was conjured up to justify changing the Constitution, without formal amendment, from a limit on power to a blank check. What was impermissible to the federal government by an earlier interpretation became permissible once the Constitution was construed as a evolving document. But by that philosophy, the Constitution is no limit on government power at all. A constitutional government that defines its own powers is a contradiction in terms. — Sheldon Richman

The mind, the heart, the womb. Those three are all threaded in a sacred dance. A woman's pelvis is like an hourglass with the capacity to tell time. It both creates and shelters life. When a mother's diet in insufficient, nutrients are pulled from her own teeth and bone. Women are built to be selfless. — Alyson Richman

In L.A., I love the L'Ermitage in Beverly Hills. Also, the Beverly Wilshire, where they make great huevos rancheros. I also love Shutters on the Beach, where I walk around everywhere in a bathrobe. — Adam Richman

Now you can get artisanal everything - pickles, coffees, house-cured meats, mustard. The pendulum has swung back to this kind of food, and it gives me the greatest hope for the future, especially because we're living in a time with issues like polluted Gulf Coast seafood and food labeled organic that may not really be organic. — Adam Richman

Anyone who believes in the natural and inalienable rights to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness is obliged to accept that individuals have the right to buy and sell alcohol. That's why all the regulations that people take for granted-the restrictions on hours of operation, the ban on Sunday sales, the minimum distance from schools and churches, the minimum age, and the protection of local wineries from competition by wineries in other states-are illegitimate. — Sheldon Richman

Government interference with the economic process represents a substitution of political for consumer objectives. — Sheldon Richman

There was a lightness to the material that she loved but that also made her feel vulnerable, and she wondered which was more dangerous - the transparency of a fabric or of the soul? — Alyson Richman

In my old age, I have come to believe that love is not a noun but a verb. An action. Like water, it flows to its own current. If you were to corner it in a dam, true love is so bountiful it would flow over. Even in separation, even in death, it moves and changes. It lives within memory, in the haunting of a touch, the transience of a smell, or the nuance of a sigh. It seeks to leave a trace like a fossil in the sand, a leaf burning into baking asphalt. — Alyson Richman

Natto, Japanese ferment bean paste, will never cross my lips again. Spam Musubi, on the other hand, is something I love. I used to have a roommate of Vietnamese descent, and he would eat it all the time. It looked gross, but I finally had it - wrapped in seaweed and rice - it was terrific. — Adam Richman

If you're a guy who's always been the fun-to-be-around teddy bear, then all of a sudden people are viewing you as sexy, it's nice. It's great not having to be the plucky best friend or the comic relief anymore - I love that. — Adam Richman

The truly free market is the worker's best friend. — Sheldon Richman

Freedom is never more in peril than when politicians feel the pressure to 'do something.' — Sheldon Richman

We think of prices as simply the notation of how much we must pay for things. But the price system accomplishes far more than that. Hundreds of millions of people buying and selling, and abstaining from buying and selling, generate a system of signals - prices to producers and consumers about relative scarcities and demand. Through this system, consumers can convey to producers their subjective priorities and entrepreneurs can invest accordingly. — Sheldon Richman

Christian Louboutin made you cry. So I bought you Jimmy Choo's. — Julie A. Richman

It should go without saying that even the most narrowly construed eminent-domain power would violate individual rights. Either a person owns his legitimately acquired property or he does not. — Sheldon Richman

The Travel Channel had success with their 'Food Paradise' series, '10 Best Places to Pig Out' and those types of specials, so they knew there was a market for comfort food and wanted to develop a show around it. — Adam Richman

If people give up their attachment to expansive government, they will feel free to fight the income tax. — Sheldon Richman

Today, the people who would use guns to violate rights have little trouble getting them, while those who would use them to defend their rights have increasing trouble getting them ... Gun control is in effect a subsidy for criminals. — Sheldon Richman

But in order to survive in this foreign world, I had to teach myself that love was very much like a painting. The negative space between people was just as important as the positive space we occupy. — Alyson Richman

He laughs. And in his laugh I hear bliss. I hear feet dancing, the rush of skirts twirling. The sound of children.
Is that the first sign of love?
You hear in the person you're destined to love the sound of those yet to be born. — Alyson Richman

Those who create the wealth naturally want to keep it and devote it to their own purposes. Those who wish to expropriate it look for ever more-clever ways to acquire it without inciting resistance. One of those ways is the spreading of an elaborate ideology of statism, which teaches that the people are the state and that therefore they are only paying themselves when they pay taxes. — Sheldon Richman

There's no way that I could have known about a 72-oz. steak challenge in Amarillo unless thousands upon thousands of locals and travellers alike had attempted it. I guess if 'Man V Food' is me paying homage to these legends, then I suppose 'Man V Food Nation' is the legacy. — Adam Richman

Perhaps the deterioration of American education is illustrated by the high correlation between the number of years a person has attended school and his inability to understand the words "the right of the people to keep and bear arms shall not be infringed." It is more likely, though, that those who interpret the Second Amendment to preclude an individual right to own guns are driven by their political agenda. Whichever the case, they do themselves no credit when they tell us that a simple, elegant sentence means the opposite of what it clearly says. — Sheldon Richman

Pablo Picasso was never called an asshole. — Jonathan Richman

I was hanging out with Jonathan Richman last night. — Evan Dando

I went in for a checkup, and when my doctor had me stand on the scale, even he was surprised. Seeing that number (which I'll take to the grave) was a turning point. I knew I needed to make a change. I cut out white flour and starches and worked with my doctor and a nutritionist to develop a plan. — Adam Richman

I love that you can pick up your phone at a hotel and have something to eat in your bed. I love home, but there are amenities at a hotel that you simply don't have at home. — Adam Richman

There is no right way to go on an edible journey. You can never tell what is going to be great, so you have to try everything. If you become doctrinaire about sticking to lowbrow foods or epicurean delights, your just being an extremist, and it won't do you any good. — Adam Richman

Tax relief through deductions is very precarious. It is a way for the government to let you keep a little cash without conceding that it is your money. Tax deductions can be taken away. . . "An income tax deduction is a matter of legislative grace," the U.S. Supreme Court said in 1943. In other words, all income belongs to the state. If it allows you to use some of it for purposes it chooses, be grateful. But don't think it is yours as a matter of right. That is where the Sixteenth Amendment to the U. S. Constitution has delivered us. — Sheldon Richman

Cable news is 24 hours long so you have to fill it up with something. No, the Muppets are not communist. And the character of Tex Richman is not an allegory for capitalism in any way. The character is called Tex Richman. It's a joke. Clearly he is a classic, old school bad guy. He's bad not because he works for an oil company but because he's evil. No, it's not a communist movie in any way. — James Bobin

You can learn a lot when you play in a little town in Holland or Western Australia, and you learn different things than you would learn playing a big city. — Jonathan Richman

To go from hating the way I looked to being a 'Cosmo' centerfold is a profound honor. — Adam Richman

There are some things that a woman knows that she cannot tell even her family. It is part intuition and part self-preservation. — Alyson Richman

I was logging 15-hour days, sampling food every minute. I had access to these amazing dishes, and it was easy to lose sight of how quickly the bites added up. — Adam Richman

The draft is a monstrous violation of individual liberty, and even a good motive cannot make it otherwise. In a free society no one should be compelled to take up arms, or be forced to kill or risk being killed ... But who can blame prospective volunteers from doubting that there is a threat from Iraq? The Bush administration has yet to make a persuasive argument to that effect. — Sheldon Richman

A good spicy challenge strikes a balance between flavour and fear. — Adam Richman

Wealth comes from the production and exchange of goods and services. If someone efficiently produces a good that many people willingly trade their money for, he becomes wealthy. — Sheldon Richman

These $40 burgers with foie gras and truffles and all of that flies in the face of one of the most proletarian foods around. It's overpriced, overdone and just not worth it. — Adam Richman

Why is Netanyahu pushing war? Among several reasons, demonizing Iran reduces pressure on Israel to negotiate seriously with the Palestinians. Many Israelis prefer building Jewish settlements on Palestinians' land instead. Moreover, Israel's rulers oppose any development-such as an Iranian-U.S. detente-that could diminish Israel's U.S.-financed hegemony in the region. War with Iran would be a catastrophe all around. Netanyahu and his hawkish American allies-the same people who gave us the disastrous Iraq war and ISIS-must be repudiated. — Sheldon Richman

To those who believe the dead do not visit them, I say you have cataracts in your soul. I am a man of science, yet I believe in guardian angels and the haunting by ghosts. — Alyson Richman

I think it's very, very, very hard to get a book published. I never want to be one of those teachers that say, 'don't do this, ' because how sad would the world be if people didn't create art and write? But, it's not an easy journey being a writer. — Alyson Richman

We wore that grief like one wears one's underclothes. An invisible skin, unseen to prying eyes, but knitted to us all the same. We wore it every day. — Alyson Richman

Most recently, Richman et al (1997) have argued that a four-dimensional — Pierangelo Isernia

My most memorable food challenge was probably the Big Texan in Amarillo. All the big executives called me because it was such an iconic challenge, and a victory in that would be a legitimizing device for myself as much as for the show. — Adam Richman

I like being the people's champion when it comes to dining. — Adam Richman

Love stories always seem to be a spark. — Alyson Richman

We are all in "the perpetual quest for keeping oneself occupied, entertained, and important - which burns at the edge of addiction. — Jana Richman

To combat the monotony of gym workouts, I started playing soccer. I looked at workouts as training sessions. My soccer training includes squats, pushups, resistance-band work, and sprints. Ninety minutes of running became part of my love of the game rather than a chore. — Adam Richman

We must acknowledge, of course, that what looks like failure to us Americans outside the privileged elite may not actually be failure for our overlords. — Sheldon Richman

I know only one thing. One doesn't abandon family. One doesn't leave them, even in the name of love. — Alyson Richman

Playing shows and making records keeps been getting easier and more fun. — Jonathan Richman

Your eyes are wide open. I feel as though I could step inside them and make myself at home. — Alyson Richman

'Man v. Food' was the biggest career-defining opportunity. I went from anonymity to someone of note with access to amazing eateries. — Adam Richman

I had to teach myself that love was very much like a painting. The negative space between people was just as important as the positive space we occupy. The air between our resting bodies, and the breath in our conversations, were all like the white of the canvas, and the rest our relationship- the laughter and the memories- were the brushstroke applied over time. — Alyson Richman

I had previously been in the band the Modern Lovers with Jonathan Richman. — Jerry Harrison

Andy Paley got us a show opening for his band at an outdoor show at Simmon's College, on a Friday. — Jonathan Richman

Some conservatives are surprised to find people on the Left supporting the war in Afghanistan. It's not surprising at all ... It is hard for the government to prosecute a war and not expand ... Conservatives may think they can support war and oppose the expansion of the state, but that is like trying to square the circle. What makes them think they can contain the expansion? — Sheldon Richman

There was also something about the smell of bookshops that was strangely comforting to her. She wondered if it was the scent of ink and paper, or the perfume of binding, string, and glue. Maybe it was the scent of knowledge. Information. Thoughts and ideas. Poetry and love. All of it bound into one perfect, calm place. — Alyson Richman

I will wait for Cleopatra, for I know my time must come. And I'm getting ready for wherever she'll be at-tra, cause I'm getting stronger now and not so dumb. — Jonathan Richman

It's weird because people think the biggest guys are the biggest eaters, but fat doesn't expand as much as muscle, so you want someone with a big frame who can expand. — Adam Richman

I realized that I didn't need nearly as many calories as I'd grown accustomed to. I ate 100 to 200 calories every two hours or so, consumed healthy proteins (yogurt, lean meat, turkey jerky), and drank a gallon of water a day. And as my weight dropped, my energy soared. — Adam Richman

She always told us there were two types of women. Those who are lit from the outside and those who are lit from within. The first needs the shimmer of a diamond to maker her sparkle, but for the other, her beauty is illuminated through the sheer light of her soul. — Alyson Richman

If you do a quantity challenge, the problem you'd face would be a starchy challenge. If it has a lot of potatoes, a lot of bread or fried elements, that's difficult. With heat challenges, challenges that use the whole pepper are much, much easier than ones that use pepper extract. That's concentrated, and also devoid of flavour. It's just heat. — Adam Richman

No matter how much the government controls the economic system, any problem will be blamed on whatever small zone of freedom that remains. — Sheldon Richman

My favorite Galaxie 500 album is the first one, 'Today,' recorded in three days at Noise New York and produced by Kramer. It contains my favorite Galaxie 500 songs: 'Temperature's Rising,' 'Tugboat,' and our interpretation of Jonathan Richman's 'Don't Let Our Youth Go to Waste.' — Dean Wareham

Government spending reduces the capital that could be invested to serve consumers and to produce new employment opportunities. — Sheldon Richman

The state is an organization of mere mortals who, by one dubious method or another, have been allowed to don the mantle of political legitimacy and to command obedience on pain of imprisonment even of those who never consented to the preposterous arrangement. — Sheldon Richman

The alternative to the market process is government control, and we know where that principle leads. — Sheldon Richman

Well, you know it was so different from when you rehearsed. You're out there with your guitar and trying to get a sound, but it doesn't sound anything like what you expect! — Jonathan Richman

The more the words the less the meaning and how does that benefit anyone?

Ecclesiastes 6:11 — N.D. Richman

I love Jonathan Richman - I love a lot of his music, and the thing I really like about him is his attitude. He seems very happy, and the way he performs is like, 'Don't worry, everybody, just get into it. I'm just having fun; I like when you guys are having fun.' — Mac DeMarco

The housing and financial crisis could not have occurred in the absence of government housing and monetary policies. — Sheldon Richman

Sometimes it works. Sometimes I feel like playing 'Hospital'. Sometimes I feel like playing 'Pablo Picasso'. I've been playing a lot lately. I do it as long as I feel like it. — Jonathan Richman

They played Boston. They played at the Boston Tea Party and through an amazing chain of events I got to hang out with them backstage even though I was underage. — Jonathan Richman

The more power government has to provide things, the more power it has to dictate terms. — Sheldon Richman

People with an investment in government power will torture logic like a medieval inquisitor rather than face the facts ... There's a simple way to keep money out of politics: Keep politics out of our money. — Sheldon Richman

I don't do any songs that I'm sick of now - sometimes even songs that I request. If I'm sick of 'em I don't do 'em even for myself. — Jonathan Richman

The first Mardi Gras I went to, I stayed at the Tulane AE Pi house on Broadway. Slept on a pool table one night, slept under it the next. — Adam Richman

The government's coercive taxing power necessarily creates two classes: those who create and those who consume the wealth expropriated and transferred by that power. — Sheldon Richman

I've long struggled with my body image and have worked hard to achieve a healthy weight. — Adam Richman

You are too young to understand, solange, but there are many different types of love in this world. There are lovers of the flesh, lovers of the mind, and lovers sustained by family.: — Alyson Richman

When government 'creates jobs' by taking money from the private sector and 'investing' in favored projects, it is not truly productive activity. Rather, the government has preempted the economic process, forbidding it to serve consumers so that it can instead serve the objectives of politicians and bureaucrats. — Sheldon Richman

You will never be lonely with a book at your side, — Alyson Richman

Back in the day, I used to watch 'The Cajun Chef' with Justin Wilson. His mixing would go one way, and his stomach would go the other. — Adam Richman

There are two sensations of skin you will always remember in your lifetime; the first time you fall in love-and that person holds your hand-and the first time your child grasps your finger. In each of those times, you are sealed to the other for eternity. — Alyson Richman

In a day and age when there are so many culinary competitions - ranging from contests of taste to those of technique - The World Food Championships will be the ultimate food competition. — Adam Richman

I knew what I was getting into: 72-ounce steaks, shakes by the quart, atomic wings. When I landed 'Man v. Food' in 2008, I accepted the fact that my weight would fluctuate. But instead of stressing about the scale, I made my long-term health a primary concern. — Adam Richman