Telephone Answering Quotes & Sayings

It is not rude to turn off your telephone by switching it on to an answering machine, which is cheaper and less disruptive than ripping it out of the wall. Those who are offended because they cannot always get through when they seek, at their own convenience, to barge in on people are suffering from a rude expectation. — Judith Martin

Kekrando had been preparing for a war game, which was why he was aboard the destroyer We are Proud to Follow the Shining Example of Combat Rifleman Tuut-uas-Val Kedwala instead of his command ship the He Who Pushes Aside Fear Shall Always be Victorious. — Craig Alanson

They live by symbols. They read meaning into the barrage of spam on the unused computer, the delete key that stops working, the imagined abandonment in the decision to replace it. The voice on my answering machine is still John's. The fact that it was his in the first place was arbitrary, having to do with who was around on the day the answering machine last needed programming, but if I needed to retape it now I would do so with a sense of betrayal. One day when I was talking on the telephone in his office I mindlessly turned the pages of the dictionary that he had always left open on the table by the desk. When I realized what I had done I was stricken: what word had he last looked up, what had he been thinking? By turning the pages had I lost the message? Or had the message been lost before I touched the dictionary? Had I refused to hear the message? I — Joan Didion

Let's train ourselves to not hate each other. We all come from the same consciousness in the mind. — Allan Wesler

I remembah when you whuh a tiny baby and I had to lift those tiny legs and wipe the SHIT out of you-ah tuchus. It was fuckin' disgustin'. — Sarah Silverman

I don't like expensive things ... I just can't help looking in a magazine for the splurge and the save. — Tyra Banks

-When I was growing up, Lieutenant Uhura was a major role model for me, a strong black woman on the bridge of a starship ...
-In a miniskirt, answering the interplanetary telephone? — Suzanne Brockmann

Telephone message on his manager's answering machine shortly before dying of heroin overdose: I need help bad, man. — Jimi Hendrix

I did something rather innovative that my competitors didn't like: I took out a full-page advertisement in the Yellow Pages that listed an office on the east side of Cincinnati, and another office on the west side, while every other heating/air-conditioning company had only one location and one phone number. I was the citywide company. In fact, our 'westside office' was just an answering service taking telephone message. From the start we appeared to be a big company. — Kevin Harrington

It is the phenomenon somethings called "alienation from self." In its advanced stages, we no longer answer the telephone, because someone might want something; that we could say no without drowning in self-reproach is an idea alien to this game. Every encounter demands too much, tears the nerves, drains the will, and the specter of something as small as an unanswered letter arouses such disproportionate guilt that answering it becomes out of the question. To assign unanswered letters their proper weight, to free us from the expectations of others, to give us back to ourselves - there lies the great, the singular power of self-respect. Without it, one eventually discovers the final turn of the screw: one runs away to find oneself, and finds no one at home. — Joan Didion

But that shadow self of hers wasn't so sure. The ugly, toxic thought was smaller than a drop of blood, yet it poisoned the entire stream. — Kristin Hannah

She was in a mental hospital, and so, she could allow herself to feel things that people usually hide. We are all brought up only to love, to accept, to look for ways around things, to avoid conflict. — Paulo Coelho

Sometimes, the people we invest the most time in disappoint us the most. — Mike Tyson

How peaceful life would be without Love, Adso. How Safe. How Tranquil. And how Dull. — Umberto Eco

She is dead. Almost certainly dead. Nearly conclusively dead. She is, at the very least, not answering her telephone. — Catherynne M Valente

I don't even have voice mail or answering machines anymore. I hate the phone, and I don't want to call anybody back. If I go to hell, it will be a small closet with a telephone in it, and I will be doomed and destined for eternity to return phone calls. — Drew Barrymore

Writing is work. It takes a lot of contemplation, concentration, and out-and-out sweat. People tend to romanticize it, that somehow your work appears by benefit of some mystical external force. In reality, to be a writer, you have to sit down and write. It's work, and often it's hard work. — Wendelin Van Draanen

I hear my father's voice faintly, over the telephone, answering for me in a soft drawl. "He's my son." He reaches out his hand, pressing it against the glass, as if trying to touch me. He smiles, and I see a tear making its way down his cheek.
[ ... ]
I press my hand up against my father's and I'm suddenly close enough to the glass to see my reflection, blurred by the tears now filling my eyes. I wipe them away with my fist and take a good look at my father. — Carolee Dean

I've never been a blind romantic. — Sandra Bullock

Screening telephone calls with a receptionist or the humbler answering machine is not a dishonorable thing to do. The warmest people in the world still need uninterrupted time to attend to their lives and should not be outwitted if they have made it obvious that they are not always available upon summons. — Judith Martin

Surprise is a major factor in distinguishing an answer to prayer from a projection of my own mental processes. When I can't believe I made up the answer myself, I have to look around to see where it came from. — Pat Schneider

This is my court and I control the balls on it. — Tracy Krimmer