Quotes

"A relevant quote...says more in a sentence than you will achieve in a whole chapter" Nigel Viney

"We must remember three things.
Number one and first in importance, we must have as much fun as we can with what we have.
Number two, we must eat as well as we can, because if we don't, we won't have the health and strength to have as much fun as we might.
Number three, and third and last in importance, we must keep the house reasonably in order, wash the dishes and such things. But we will not let the last interfere with the other two."
John Steinbeck, "About Ed Ricketts"

"The most famous English midget, Geoffrey Hudson, was about eighteen inches high at the age of thirty when he fought a famous duel with a turkey gobbler that had insulted him by stealing his lunch. Geoffrey won the duel...and ate the gobbler."
Frank Edwards, "Stranger than Science" (1959)

"The Club which missed its own centenary:
For many years, Crawley Cricket club was looking forward to its centenary in 2006. In 1998 it was bought to the attention of the club by a local historian, Nadine Hygate, that this date was incorrect and the club had actually formed in the 19th century. Crawley Cricket club website"

[The team were] relying on occasional players, despite of the obvious contradiction between "relying" and "occasional"
Nick Misoulis (2004)

"They decided to take the Norwegian and his friend - who had given his name as Per Sandwich-Man - back to the station for questioning."
Fly-on-the-wall documentary on policemen (2004)

“Don’t make a talent into a burden.” Edie Wiseman, (2004)

"The best part about being a pessimist is that you're either always right or pleasantly surprised." George F. Will

“any inconvienience caused. Tested and we apologise for the system is being” Electronic sign at bus stop, Southampton

“The known is always less disturbing than the unknown. This is why good horror writers don't go into great detail on their horrors. They'd rather let you fill in the blanks because they know that you can scare yourself easier than they can scare you.” Mark Rosewater (2005)

"I develop ... rapport by learning to see the situation from the perspective of the other person, not my own. Consider what happens in a normal conversation. Someone sits and talks about themselves, while you pick up on a few things that relate to you. You wait for then to finish so that you can say, 'Yes, I ...' and then start talking about yourself. They then respond by returning to their own stories and opinions, and so the dialogue continues. In other words, you are listening to someone to see how the conversation relates to you.

Now consider the alternative: you listen to whatever they have to say to learn how the content of their conversation relates to them. You build in your mind a representation of their way of seeing the world, and you piece together their patterns. People love talking about themselves, so you can happily ask any questions to complete those patterns and gain more information about their world. After a while, this will become almost second nature to you, and you will be able simply to look at someone and tell almost immediately what their reactions to various stimuli might be." Derren Brown (2005)

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