Strapped Quotes & Sayings

William focused on her, opened his mouth, closed it. Seeing the weapon strapped to her back and peeking over her shoulder samurai-style, he frowned. "Nice sword," he said dryly.
"Thanks."
"It's one of my favorites."
"If you're nice, I'll give it back to you in a year or two."
"You're so good to me. — Gena Showalter

-Purity strapped- for release 2014

"Bad's good. Bad's not bad until your seen doing bad. So bad's good unless your caught doing bad, and that's too bad. — Lucee Lovett

It was the single forgiving phrase in the syntax of weaponry I had strapped about me. The rest were unequivocal sentences of death. — Richard K. Morgan

For the record, there were no framed pictures of me around our house, and the only class portrait Dad had ever ordered was the one from Sparta Elementary in which I'd sat, knees glued together, in front of a background that looked like Yosemite, sporting pink overalls and a lazy eye. "This is classic," Dad said. "That they shamelessly send me an order form so I can pay $69.95 for prints large and small of a photo in which my daughter looks as if she just suffered a great blow to her head - it just shows you, we are simply strapped to a motorized assembly line moving through this country. We're supposed to pay out, shut up or get tossed in the rejects bin. — Marisha Pessl

Ahhhhhhhggg. Oh sweet Lord Jesus, my hand." He attempted to make a fist and winced. "I think Chuck Parson had a textbook strapped to his stomach."
"Those are called abs", I told him. — John Green

For instance, in one corner of the Eastern Galactic Arm lies the large forest planet Oglaroon, the entire "intelligent" population of which lives permanently in one fairly small and crowded nut tree. In which tree they are born, live, fall in love, carve tiny speculative articles in the bark on the meaning of life, the futility of death and the importance of birth control, fight a few extremely minor wars and eventually die strapped to the underside of some of the less accessible outer branches. In — Douglas Adams

Some field days can be tough. I've worked inside fuel tanks with 3 foot ceilings, in -42 to +42 Celsius temperatures, in snow and smoke and hail, and I've dug through snow and ice and pavement to find legal evidence. I've worked clear through the night by headlamp, and I've flown in a rickety long-islander with propane tanks strapped into the other seats. I've jury-rigged missing equipment, broken into my own truck, and cut out an emergency helicopter pad with a machete. I've been hungry, cold, tired, lost, injured, and downright hopeless! — Mark Mason

I was thirty-seven then, strapped in my seat as the huge 747 plunged through dense cloud cover on approach to the Hamburg airport. — Haruki Murakami

If ka is a train - and it is, a vast, hurtling mono, maybe sane, maybe not - then this nasty little lycanthrope is its most vulnerable hostage, not tied to the tracks like little Nell but strapped to the thing's very headlight. — Stephen King

This, fundamentally, is philanthrocapitalism in action: introducing policies that help concentrate wealth in the upper echelons of society in the hope that the wealthy will donate to the financially strapped rest. — Linsey McGoey

Second, my nightmare I'd had wouldn't release me from its sharp claws. An image of Keeley strapped down on a table of horrors was too much for my brain to compute. Things were dark and dank, not to mention the monster looming over her in a leather mask. That particular visual haunted me the most. What if these weren't just dreams? Suppose they were events actually taking place? Those twin intuitions were the hardest for me to process. How could I possibly help her? — Lora Ann

But when you're a kid it's like you're wearing these binoculars strapped to your eyes and you can't see anything except what's in the dead center of the lenses — Russell Banks

The Doctor was strapped to a wide table of some kind, and Turlough immediately started on the straps that held him.
"We must stop meeting like this."
"Very amusing," the Doctor replied with an irritated look. Sharma made quicker work of them with his issue knife.
"You're forgetting your manners." Turlough remembered their predicament.
"Thank me later," he suggested, and turned to leave. — David A. McIntee

With stagnant wages and booming consumption, the cash-strapped American masses had a virtually unlimited demand for loans but an uncertain ability to repay them. — Michael Lewis

Jack Sparrow: How did you get here?

Will Turner: Sea turtles, mate. A pair of them strapped to my feet.

Jack Sparrow: Not so easy, is it? — Jack Sparrow

I'd say it's harder to play with an acoustic guitar strapped over your shoulder for a few hundred people than it is to play in front of thousands with an entire bombastic band behind you. — Robin Zander

The world is a rollercoaster, and i am not strapped i, maybe i should hold with care but my hands are busy in the air — Brandon Boyd

Lexi stepped from the darkness. She wore a skin-tight black leather jacket, black leather pants that might have been painted on, and black leather boots. Strapped around her waist and thigh was a bright yellow utility belt. But it was the signature mask, cape, and emblem on her chest that gave it away. "Batgirl..." Cate whispered. — Giselle Fox

You have so much to offer, she was often told, as if she had a tray of cigarettes and candy perpetually strapped to her waist. — Lily King

When I was seven, I watched One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest with my mom. When Jack Nicholson was strapped to the table getting electroshock treatment, my mom burst into tears. She said it reminded her of her life, and I was stunned, because I didn't know my mom had been nominated for an Oscar. — Christopher Titus

Why should I have been surprised?
Hunters walk the forest
without a sound.
The hunter, strapped to his rifle,
the fox on his feet of silk,
the serpent on his empire of muscles
all move in a stillness,
hungry, careful, intent.
Just as the cancer
entered the forest of my body,
without a sound. — Mary Oliver

I go to church strapped with a 45 glock. — Master P

The world is one unending chess match, my dear, and I am the one playing it how I please. I poke and prod to move my pieces to places I find desirable. And the defiant ones who resist me I simply remove from the board." He pulled up his right sleeve, showing Laura a sheathed dagger strapped to his arm. "But you, Laura, are not of this chess match at all. You walked unexpectedly onto my board, scattering my pieces out of the way, the ones that I had worked on so tirelessly to arrange to perfection. — J.S. Bailey

Beckett finally allowed himself to turn to her, to see what they saw. He had to smile. She was sheer sex and sin. The boots were old favorites with high, steel heels. And as predicted, her pants were orgasmically tight. She had a corset on, goddamn it, and her tits were so distracting it was obscene. Across her chest hung rounds of ammo like she'd just won the beauty pageant of death, and a leather jacket topped the whole fucking thing off. Well, that and the impressive automatic weapon slung over her shoulder. She pulled her favorite knife from where it was strapped to her thigh next to another. She twirled her hair into a bun and slid the knife into it, meeting his gaze when it was set. Eve was magnificent. Every damn time. — Debra Anastasia

The others strapped themselves below - except for Coach Hedge, who insisted on clinging to the forward rail, yelling, YEAH! Bring it on, Lake! — Rick Riordan

And so it came to pass that i was strapped to a gurney and covered in raw liver and slabs of beef that very quickly turned rancid under the bright spotlights. there exists a videotape somewhere that documents me being wheeled about the dance floor by two burly "orderlies," while i desperately search for a bathroom big enough to accommodate the stretcher so i can do a bump of cocaine. watching me retch from the decomposing meat, and simultaneously fiend for drugs, makes for an entertaining time, indeed.
when i told my mother the extremes i went to in order to make a living, she just shook her head and said, "now don't you wish you'd finished college, dear?"
mothers are so wise, sometimes. — James St. James

My parents strapped a pair of plastic skis on my boots when I was two years old and sent me down our driveway in Vail. Of course, they were holding on to me the whole time, but that was my first experience 'skiing.' — Mikaela Shiffrin

Okay. Parachuting on its own? Maybe not so terrifying. Parachuting into a Mexican jungle at night while strapped to an angry Uchben man named Brutus? An unimaginable nightmare that would haunt my every waking moment for the rest of my life. — Mimi Jean Pamfiloff

His specialty was interrogation. Imagine it, gentlemen. Being strapped to a table so that you are entirely at the mercy of a monster such as this. A person who delights in your pain. A person to whom your screams are more delicious than a lover's whisper. A creature who knows how to keep you alive while he skillfully and meticulously deconstructs those things that define you as human? — Jonathan Maberry

Mr. Sambridge possessed a remarkably good mouthful of natural teeth for someone his age, whether ritually maintained or expensively corrected I could not tell.

As someone who has spent hours of agony strapped down in Dr. Frankenstein's chamber of dental horrors in Farrington Street, I could only respect - and hate - anyone who still possessed such a spotless set of choppers. — Alan Bradley

He strapped a video camera to the hood of his car and we drove around while he filmed us smashing through piles of old dead Christmas trees that residents had left in the alleys and he would set on fire. I could never get Jake to "put out" but it still was a really romantic night for me, so I stayed in touch. — John Waters

I think what makes the Byrds stand up all these years is the basis in folk music. Folk music, being a timeless art form, is the foundation of the Byrds. We were all from a folk background. We considered ourselves folk singers even when we strapped on electric instruments and dabbled in different things. — Roger McGuinn

As Xcor got ready to leave the ranch just before midnight, he let his shellan check the fastenings on the bulletproof vest. She was very thorough, to the point where he had a feeling if she could have strapped herself to his chest, she would have. Capturing her hands, he kissed her fingertips one by one. "I am a lucky male, to be cared for thusly." Fates, — J.R. Ward

I went to a foot specialist recently and she said:
"You've broken a bone, it's healed funny."
"What can you do?"
"Not much."
She strapped me up though and that's the reason my foot is hurting, because the strapping gave me cramp.
When I'm about to die I'm going to head ti a swamp so I topple in when the time comes. In 50,000 years when they dig me up, pretty well preserved, the scientists will have to work out what sort of life I led from my bone structure, teeth and whatnot. Maybe I'll be clutching a Felt record or something to give them a clue. They'll look at my foot and say: "This man broke a bone and it's healed funny." And they'll look at the Felt record, analysing the grooves with a Groove Analyser and they'll say: "He was obviously in an indie band and one day the pressure got too much, and he booted a wall." And they wouldn't be far from the truth, those crazy scientists. — Stuart Murdoch

Sure enough, a few moments later, an enormous blue-green SeaWing emerged from the water, shaking her wings vigorously. She was powerfully built, as big as Morrowseer, with broad shoulders and gleaming teeth and a healing burn scar on her neck, and she had a trident longer than Deathbringer strapped to her back. Holy mother of lava, Deathbringer thought. I'm supposed to kill THAT? Commander Tempest was followed by two more SeaWings: a big green male dragon with dark green eyes and gold bands around his ankles, and a wiry female with small eyes and dark gray-blue scales. Behind them, keeping their scales in the water as they eyed the troops on the beach, were about twenty other SeaWing soldiers. "Blister!" Commander Tempest shouted, stamping one foot in the sand. "We're here! Let's get this over with!" The — Tui T. Sutherland

Had the girl had any common sense, she would have dropped the line at once. But she had no sense. She made no sense. She was a pale English rose of a governess, adrift in a watery wilderness, on her way to a grueling post on a godforsaken island, when any fool could have told her-a woman so lovely need never work for her keep.
Had the men around her any sense, they would have cut the rope immediately. But they were idiots, bloody shite-for-brains idiots, too entranced by the pretty girl in peril to reach for their knives.
Had Gray his own knife, he would have drawn it. But he wasn't wearing his knife, because he wasn't the captain on this ship, was he? Nor an officer, nor even part of the crew. He was just a stupid, overdressed passenger who hadn't strapped on a goddamned knife that morning because it might ruin the lines of his goddamned brand-new coat. — Tessa Dare

Make no mistake, the woman had a heart. She had a bigger one that people would think. There was a lot in it, stored up, high in miles of hidden shelving. Remember that she was the woman with the instrument strapped to her body in the long, moon-slit night. — Markus Zusak

I joined an all-girl band in Detroit and, although I was a pianist and drummer, I was asked to play bass because no one else wanted to. When I strapped it on, it fit me as good as my leathers. At the first gig we played, I looked out at the audience and thought, 'This is what I'm going to be doing for the rest of my life.' — Suzi Quatro

The sun is high and I'm surrounded by sand.
For as far as my eyes can see
I'm strapped into a rocking chair
With a blanket over my knees
I am a stranger to myself
And nobody knows I'm here
When I looked into my face
It wasn't myself I'd seen
But who I've tried to be.
I'm thinking of things I'd hoped to forget.
I'm choking to death in a sun that never sets.
I clugged up my mind with perpetual grief
And turned all my friends into enemies
And now that past has returned to haunt me.

I'M SCARED OF GOD AND SCARED OF HELL
AND I'M CAVING IN UPON MYSELF
HOW CAN ANYONE KNOW ME
WHEN I DON'T EVEN KNOW MYSELF — Jose Angel Manas

Some people would look at a backing track as something that would confine you, but it really frees us up. It's nice not to be strapped down to a certain spot when you're trying to put on a show. — Tyler Joseph

A prize-winning science reporter, Simons had become the number-two editor at the Post a year before. An intent, sensitive man with a large nose, thin face and deep-set eyes, he looks like the kind of Harvard teaching assistant who carries a slide ruler strapped to his belt. But he is skillful with fragile egos, and also the perfect counterpoint to Bradlee. Bradlee is more like Woodward: he wants hard information first and is impatient with theories.

-- Carl Bernstein, Bob Woodward — Carl Bernstein

We believe that the body hath its rights - to move in a reasonable ambit - to raise, to lower its limbs - but across the face of this earth, there are every day those who suffer unforgivable torments, strapped or chained, confined in boxes or in the holds of ships. May the Lord remind me of this always as I walk free upon paths, and may I thus always give thanks unto Him for the strange, small gifts of gesture, of simple tasks done with requisite care and sphere of action. — M T Anderson

Things felt so out of control right now. It was like I had been strapped to a rocket that was hurtling through life. I couldn't get a grasp on everything that was happening. Maybe it was more like I had been strapped to a missile. I needed to figure out how to diffuse it and fast, or everything was going to blow up. And then that would be the end. — Keary Taylor

I personally think skateboarding is harder because it has so many moving parts. With snowboarding, your feet are strapped to your board. — Shaun White

Prometheus on the rock. Do you know that story? Every day he's punished for giving mortals fire by being strapped to a rock and having his liver eaten out by an eagle. I always thought it was a poor punishment. That he'd just get used to the pain, and the eagle would have to think of some new torture. But you don't. And he does. — Kendare Blake

You are pregnant, with child, in the family way. People, some of whom you hardly know, will begin to comment on your belly size. They might even give it a rub, like you have strapped an animal of some kind in your front side and given total strangers permission to pet you at their leisure. — Amy E. Spiegel

I recalled with some discomfort that the man driving the vehicle had invented the sport of volcano boarding, presumably as a way of solving, in one deft move, the problems of the insufficient riskiness of both snowboarding and hanging out on the slopes of active volcanoes. Although I was not sure that I wanted to live forever, I was sure that I didn't want to go down in a blaze of chintzy irony, plunging into a ravine strapped into the passenger seat of a thing called the Immortality Bus. — Mark O'Connell

We have to look at the long-term energy requirements of our country and how we figure out how to get off foreign oil. That is the ultimate goal because we are dependent so much on foreign oil that we are really strapped in what we can do as a country. — Mark Begich

Hoping to settle the wheelchair matter once and for all, Graham dragged his chief of construction, his chief of architecture, and a film crew out to Dulles Airport, whose escalators were approximately the same width as those planned for Metro. There he produced a variety of braces and crutches. As the cameras rolled, Graham rode up and down the escalators using one aid after another, climaxing by riding both directions in a wheelchair, facing up each time. Graham clearly believed he had proved beyond doubt that 'it is entirely possible, easily and safely, for wheelchair travelers to use escalators.' His aides watched in disbelief; a fit and fearless major general in his fifties hardly represented the disabled population, whatever braces he strapped to his legs. All he had proved, concluded the WMATA architect Sprague Thresher, was that 'if everybody who had to use a wheelchair was Jack Graham, we wouldn't need elevators. — Zachary M. Schrag

To some people, there is no noise on earth as exciting as the sound of three or four big fan-jet engines rising in pitch, as the plane they are sitting in swivels at the end of the runway and, straining against its brakes, prepares for takeoff. The very danger in the situation is inseparable from the exhilaration it yields. You are strapped into your seat now, there is no way back, you have delivered yourself into the power of modern technology. You might as well lie back and enjoy it. — David Lodge

She heard a trill of laughter float down the hall, lifted a brow. "Company?"
"Indeed." With his disapproving eye, Summerset scanned her wilted shirt and slacks, skimmed over the weapon harness still strapped to her side. "I suggest you bathe and change before meeting your guests."
"I suggest you kiss my ass," she said cheerfully and strolled by him. — J.D. Robb

The tops of her breasts pushed upward, beckoning. Lovely, so lovely. Yet they weren't what claimed his attention. Knives were strapped to every inch of visible skin. Some were twined with the bra's straps. Some were simply taped. With what, he didn't know. He only knew he liked it. A lot. Took him a while, but he finally dropped the last to the floor. He — Gena Showalter

Hello, boys," he said, reaching for the parazonium strapped to the small of his back. "You look a little lost. Let me direct you back to hell. — Elisabeth Naughton

Strapped, noosed, nighing his hour, He stood and counted them and cursed his luck; And then the clock collected in the tower Its strength, and struck. — A.E. Housman

I've always considered myself a folk singer, even though we strapped on Rickenbacker guitars and played pretty loud. — Roger McGuinn

But what he said was true enough: I had recently destroyed a perfectly good set of wire braces by straightening them to pick a lock. Father had grumbled, of course, but had made another appointment to have me netted and dragged back up to London, to that third-floor ironmonger's shop in Farringdon Street, where I would be strapped to a board like Boris Karloff as various bits of ironmongery were shoved into my mouth, screwed in, and bolted to my gums. — Alan Bradley

Why should there be the method of science? There is not just one way to build a house, or even to grow tomatoes. We should not expect something as motley as the growth of knowledge to be strapped to one methodology. — Ian Hacking

Strapped by tight credit and plummeting sales, businesses have overhauled the way they manage supply chains, inventory, production practices and staffing. — Janet Yellen

The Irish were poor, but not enslaved. He had come here to hack away at the ropes that held American slavery in place. Sometimes it withered him just to keep his mind steady. He was aware that the essence of proper intelligence was the embrace of contradiction. And the recognition of complexity was to be balanced against the need for simplicity. He was still a slave. Fugitive. If he returned to Boston he could be kidnapped at any time, taken south, strapped to a tree, whipped. His owners. They would make a spectacle of his fame. They had tried to silence him for many years already. No longer. He had been given a chance to speak out against what had held him in chains. And he would continue to do so until the links lay in pieces at his feet. — Colum McCann

Julie swallowed. "Flat Finn is on Facebook?" She'd love to see those status updates. 'Got strapped to the roof of the car today for a trip to Starbucks. Would have loved to taste caramel mocha, but can't move arms and so was forced to stare longingly at delicious hot beverage. Will the taunting never end? — Jessica Park

And here I am, strapped into a tree, a stone's throw from the biggest idiot in the games. — Suzanne Collins

The past is strapped to our backs. We do not have to see it; we can always feel it. — Mignon McLaughlin

You have to unhook your seat belt." "That's not true." "I'm afraid it's difficult to walk on the beach if you're strapped to a car seat. — Nora Roberts

Once they got there, it wasn't a pretty landing. With the oars damaged and the foresail torn, Leo could barely manage a controlled descent. The others strapped themselves in below - except for Coach Hedge, who insisted on clinging to the forward rail, yelling, "YEAH! Bring it on, lake!" Leo stood astern, alone at the helm, and aimed as best he could. Festus creaked and whirred warning signals, which were relayed through the intercom to the quarterdeck. "I know, I know," Leo said, gritting his teeth. He didn't have much time to take in the scenery. To the southeast, a city was nestled in the foothills of a mountain range, blue and purple in the afternoon shadows. A flat desert landscape spread to the south. Directly beneath them the Great Salt Lake glittered like aluminum foil, the shoreline etched with white salt marshes that reminded Leo of aerial photos of Mars. "Hang on, Coach!" he shouted. "This is going to hurt." "I was born for hurt! — Rick Riordan

We begin to understand that to coparent is to one day look up and notice that you are on a roller coaster with another human being. You are in the same car, strapped down side by side and you can never, ever get off. There will never be another moment in your lives when your hearts don't rise and fall together, when your minds don't race and panic together, when your stomachs don't churn in tandem, when you stop seeing huge hills emerge in the distance and simultaneously grab the side of the car and hold on tight. No one except for the one strapped down beside you will ever understand the particular thrills and terrors of your ride. — Glennon Doyle Melton

They seemed more like machines than humans, and, let's face it, they are a civilian's army. An army whose soldiers dressed in costumes and walked and talked like robots, with guns strapped to their waist belts, always looking for an enemy. — Kenneth Eade

When I'm following someone, I'm listening to a bear bell strapped to their packs. When I'm leading on a climb, like on a rock, I like to feel my way through it on my own, so I know the tricky moves and where to place gear. — Erik Weihenmayer

I'm strapped in [the barrel] with a five-point drag-racing harness. With 50 feet to go, they tell me on the walkie-talkie to get ready for a head-first. "We love ya, man," was the last thing I heard. Then I could feel myself going over. — Steve Trotter

Just remember,' a Marine Corps lieutenant colonel told me as he strapped his pistol belt under his arm before we crossed into Kuwait, 'that none of these boys is fighting for home, for the flag, for all that crap the politicians feed the public. They are fighting for each other, just for each other. — Chris Hedges

I was traveling down the road with a buddy and there's a guy driving around in a jeep with a dead deer strapped to the hood. My buddy says to me you think he's been hunting? Nope, They're probably giving them away with the purchase of every jeep. Here's your sign! — Bill Engvall

Oh, Fortuna, blind, heedless goddess, I am strapped to your wheel,' Ignatius belched, 'Do not crush me beneath your spokes. Raise me on high, divinity. — John Kennedy Toole

It was comforting for only a moment. Then Joshua realized that the dude still had a seriously huge knife in his hand.
The part of him that was crying like a kicked puppy took off running. Unfortunately it took the rest of him with it.
"No! Nononono!" He cried even as he bolted. This was what scared him about being a werewolf. He wasn't in control of his body anymore. Because of his last name and small size, he'd always been a target of bullies. He'd learned early that they could hurt him but they couldn't control him if he didn't let them. And then he learned martial arts and they couldn't even hurt him anymore. In the last twenty-four hours, it had been as if he was strapped into a rollercoaster: all he could do was go for the ride and scream a lot. — Wen Spencer

Something about seeing his father in his heavy, dark armored clothes, his broadsword strapped across his back, reminded Alec of being a child again, when his father had been the biggest, strongest and the most terrifying man he could imagine. And he was still terrifying. — Cassandra Clare

Gabriel raised an eyebrow. "Are you seriously going out with a dagger strapped to your back? You might as well just wear a sign that says Look at me, I'm a killer! — Chelsea Fine

He [Old Mr. Turveydrop] was a fat old gentleman with a false complexion, false teeth, false whiskers, and a wig. He had a fur collar, and he had a padded breast to his coat, which only wanted a star or a broad blue ribbon to be complete. He was pinched in, and swelled out, and got up, and strapped down, as much as he could possibly bear. — Charles Dickens

He follows a man with a rolled up mattress strapped to his back. When he stepped down from the train into the brutalising glare of the searchlights in the marshalling yard he noticed two SS soldiers pointing at this man and laughing. — Glenn Haybittle

Shotgun!" announced Clary as Jace came back around the side of the van.
Alec grabbed for his bow, strapped across his back. "Where?"
"She means she wants the front seat," said Jace, pushing wet hair out of his eyes. — Cassandra Clare

Our joy is not strapped by the confines of our present situation; it is deeply rooted in the confidence we have in Jesus Christ. It cannot be moved. — Robin M. Bertram

You get that he took something precious from you, your ability to trust ... He took that from you, now's your time to fight and get it back ... Just live in the now, Kia, keep livin' in the now and when I say that, right now.."
"That doesn't make me any less scared, Sam," I whispered in his ear and he lifted his head and looked down at me."
"He strapped you with that too, baby. Fight back and learn to be fearless. — Kristen Ashley

You don't shower or shave for a month, until you smell like a sewer. Then you walk around for two weeks wearing a dress and a goalie mask with a dildo strapped to the front. That's what I did. And I will never be afraid of public humiliation again. — Neil Strauss

A few months ago, I was sitting morosely at my desk, wondering why I had ever agreed to review Barbara Bush: A Memoir for an English newspaper. The experience was proving to be a degradation of the act of reading. Imagine, if you will, being strapped into a chair and made to listen to Liberace playing the piano for hour upon hour. Or imagine being fed chocolate dinner mints, like a hapless goose, until you are on the verge of explosion. Such was my lot. — Christopher Hitchens

Your heart doesn't belong on your sleeve, sunshine. It belongs strapped to your boot next to a six-inch dagger. — Alistair Cross

Monday ushers in a particularly impressive clientele of red-eyed people properly pressed into dry-cleaned suits in neutral tones. They leave their equally well-buttoned children idling in SUVs while dashing to grab double-Americanos and foamy sweet lattes, before click-clacking hasty escapes in ass-sculpting heels and polished loafers with bowl-shaped haircuts that age every face to 40. My imagination speed evolves their unfortunate offspring from car seat-strapped oxygen-starved fast-blooming locusts, to the knuckle-drag harried downtown troglodytes they'll inevitably become. One by one I capture their flat-formed heads between index finger and thumb for a little crush-crush-crushing, ever aware that if I'm lucky one day their charitable contributions will fund my frown-faced found art project to baffle someone's hallway. — Amanda Sledz

He was able to find the intensity and beauty that he wanted, in the plung itself. Physical forces in a complicated coalition of gravity, acceleration, and temperature were powerful and intense enough to satisfy him. It made sense. Nothing was as comforting as the enduring purity of elemental forces, and returning to them could not mean defeat. But he never thought that he would die in a bark suit, strapped to a shock pancake, next to an incompetent midget. — Mark Helprin

And I can promise you something, because it was a thing I saw many years later - a vision in the book thief herself - that as she knelt next to Hans Hubermann, she watched him stand and play the accordion. He stood and strapped it on in the alps of broken houses and played the accordion with kindness silver eyes and even a cigarette slouched on his lips. The bellows breathed and the tall man played for Liesel Meminger one last time as the sky was slowly taken away from her. — Markus Zusak

I'll show them 'love is worthless,'" Silena Beauregard grumbled as she strapped on her armor. "I'll pulverize them! — Rick Riordan

I don't even have moderately big breasticles. They just look like - well, nevermind what they look like. At least they stay strapped down when I worm into a sports bra. — Lilith Saintcrow

I was just a music lover who wondered what it would sound like if Otis Redding strapped on a guitar and played in a punk band. That's it. — Benjamin Booker

But I couldn't get the image out of my head of the beast strapped to the table, Father humming while the candle wax slowly dripped, and Montgomery assisting. I felt betrayed, as though the boy I'd idolized was nothing more than a fantasy. — Megan Shepherd

like licorice strips. Nate links his fingers with mine. His bad arm is still strapped up. The forecast from the doctors hasn't improved, but Nate's demeanor has. He's come to a certain peace with the whole thing. The windshield's cold behind my back, the sky endless ahead. "Lucy," he says, looking down at his arm, "thanks, and I mean it. I can't get through this without you. I know that now." I remember that day, the fight that stripped us both bare, — Teagan Kade

The sick in soul insist that it is humanity that is sick, and they are the surgeons to operate on it. They want to turn the world into a sickroom. And once they get humanity strapped to the operating table, they operate on it with an ax. — Eric Hoffer

The killjoys initiated automobile crash standards so rigorous that we can't buy a car that hasn't been dropped from the top of a phone pole with our whole family strapped inside. — P. J. O'Rourke

He listened to a fire fighter tell of a woman he had found strapped into her seat, screaming. When he cut the seat belt, she fell apart. She was being held together by the seat belt. She died at his feet. — Laurence Gonzales

I grunted, hauling the rope hand over hand. A plaintive squeak came from the pulley system with each draw, as if I had strapped some unfortunate mouse to a torture device and was twisting with glee. — Brandon Sanderson

But the herm was gray-faced, lips purple-blue, eyelids fluttering. An IV pump, not dependent upon potentially erratic ship's gravity, infused yellow fluid rapidly into Bel's right arm. The left arm was strapped to a board; plastic tubing filled with blood ran from under a bandage and into a hybrid appliance bound around with quantities of plastic tape. A second tube ran back again, its dark surface moist with condensation. — Lois McMaster Bujold

A typical 'Larry King Live' is a pastiche whose absurdism defies parody. Wearing his trademark suspenders and purple shirts, he looks as if he's strapped to the chair with vertical seat belts, unable to eject. — James Wolcott

It was one of the rare mornings when Dad was around. He'd gotten up early to go cycling, and he was sweaty, standing at the counter in his goony fluorescent racing pants, drinking green juice of his own making. His shirt was off, and he had a black heart-rate monitor strapped across his chest, plus some shoulder brace he invented, which is supposedly good for his back because it pulls his shoulders into alignment when he's at the computer. "Good morning to you, too," he said disapprovingly. I must have made some kind of face. But I'm sorry, it's weird to come down and — Maria Semple

The dark forest looked on fire. The trees were lit up like funeral pyres. She thought she saw bodies strapped to the trees, burning, burning, burning. — Jeanette Winterson

Desideria gaped. "How could they have that so fast?" "Nothing moves faster than the media." Fain changed the screen over to another report on a different frequency. "I swear, they hired a publicist to convict you both. I couldn't get this much coverage if I painted myself pink and ran naked through the League's main hall with a bomb strapped on my back, screaming 'death to sycophantic pawns. — Sherrilyn Kenyon

I would say I'm more fascinated by Big Daddy V than I am necessarily a huge fan of Big Daddy V. He simply threw on the double-strapped unitard ... and now he's some sort of fearsome, fighting, wrecking machine. — James Roday