"But I don't want to go among mad people," Alice remarked.
"Oh, you can't help that," said the Cat, "we're all mad here. I'm mad. You're mad."
"How do you know I'm mad?" said Alice.
"You must be," said the Cat, "or you wouldn't have come here."
-- Lewis Carroll, Alice's Adventures in Wonderland
"It's not denial. I'm just very selective about what I accept as reality."
-- Calvin (Bill Watterson, "Calvin and Hobbes")
God grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change,
the courage to change the things I can,
and the weaponry to make the difference.
"The world is a comedy to those who think, a tragedy to those who feel."
-- Horace Walpole (1717-1797), Letters
"Whenever I'm caught between two evils, I take the one I've never tried."
-- Mae West
"The pendulum of the mind alternates between sense and nonsense,
not between right and wrong."
-- C.G. Jung, Memories, Dreams, Reflections
"Radical feminist views.....what a waste of time. To me it is like walking through life with your map upside down."
-- Bunny Sterling
"You're dead", he said. Keli waited. She couldn't think of any suitable reply. "I'm not" lacked a certain style, while "Is it serious?" seemed somehow too frivolous.
-- Princess Keli in trouble (Terry Pratchett, Mort)
"The views expressed above are purely those of the aliens who are controlling my mind, with a little input from Elvis who is on their spaceship."
"Insanity is often the logic of an accurate mind overtasked."
-- Oliver Wendell Holmes (1809-1894), The Autocrat of the Breakfast-Table
"Reality is that which, when you ignore it, doesn't go away."
-- Philip K. Dick
"There's a certain inefficiency in constantly questioning me on things you've already made up your mind about."
-- Spock to Captain Kirk
"The telephone does not have the constitutional right to be answered."
-- Walter Matthau, First Monday in October
"It may be that your purpose in life is just to serve as a bad example for others."
Good Morning!
This is God!
I will be handling all of your problems today.
I will not need your help.
"Violence is the last refuge of the incompetent."
-- Salvor Hardin (Mayor of Terminus) (Isaac Asimov, Foundation)
"To be prepared against surprise is to be trained.
To be prepared for surprise is to be educated."
-- James Carse
"I am wrong. We are all wrong, just in slightly different ways, although many may turn out to be the same way."
-- Garth Thor Thornton
Experimental Metaphysicist
The double-entendred pen is smarter than the double-edged sword
"Be uncomfortable; be sand, not oil, in the machinery of the world."
-- German poet Gunter Eich (1907-72)
"Goodbye is not an ending, but a different start for you."
-- Amanda Bradley
"When you go looking for something specific, your chances of finding it are very bad, because of all the things in the world, you're only looking for one of them. When you go looking for anything at all, your chances of finding it are very good, because of all the things in the world, you're sure to find some of them."
-- Darryl Zero, The Zero Effect
Late one night at the insane asylum one inmate
shouted, "I am Napoleon!"
Another one said, "How do you know?"
The first inmate said, "God told me!"
Just then, a voice from another room shouted,
"I did not!"
If you could pick one super-human power (such as comic-book characters have) what would you choose? Why?
Invisibility. The possibilities are endless.
"Let there be spaces in your togetherness."
-- Kahlil Gibran
Sometimes it is just as important to know when to leave others alone as it is to know when to talk with them. We all need to be alone at times--to think, to work out a problem, or just to be quiet with ourselves. This is especially true in families, where we're often surrounded by others. If we tune in to our other family members, we can develop sensors that will let us know when they need some time alone. Part of good communication is knowing when NOT to talk, too.
When something is "new and improved", which is it?
If it's new, then there has never been anything before it.
If it's an improvement, then there must have been something before it.
"I lived half my life before I realized it was a do-it-yourself job."
-- Poster
"The future isn't written in stone dear, even if it was stone can be shattered"
-- Lady Andrade (Melanie Rawn, The Warrior Prince) ????
One of the questions on the psychological test that our company gives to potential management candidates is "Do you like making new friends or keeping old ones?"
One guy considered answering this with "I like making new friends. I've killed all my old friends. Do you want to be my friend?"
I've often wondered if he would have still gotten the position if he had used that answer on the test. If so, then that would explain a lot about where I work.
Some days you are the bug,
some days you are the windshield.
There is a fine line between genius and insanity.
I have erased this line.
"I was part of that strange race of people aptly described as spending their lives doing things they detest to make money they don't want to buy things they don't need to impress people they dislike."
-- Emile Henry Gauvreay
"Wouldn't it be nice if the wattage of a car stereo
could not exceed the IQ of the driver?"
-- from INTP list
"Great spirits have often encountered
violent opposition from mediocre minds."
-- Albert Einstein
"If you were born without wings,
do nothing to prevent them from growing."
-- CoCo Chanel
BECOMING REAL
"...Generally, by the time you are Real, most of your hair has been loved off, and your eyes drop out and you get loose in the joints and very shabby. But these things don't matter at all, because once you are Real you can't be ugly, except to people who don't understand..."
-- Margery Williams, The Velveteen Rabbit
My old pal Slippery Jack Cardwell said, "Irony is the sub-stratum of human existence." But the more I thought about it, the more it troubled me.
"Jack", I said, " This is bullshit. You could also say that 'spit is the substratum of human existence' and it would make as much sense."
Slip said "Yeah, that's right. Ironic, isn't it?"
-- August Jassid
"I suppose that in all disorder and in all of what we even consider normalcy, lies a nest of bearable lies. And that is that."
-- KeyserSzze
"The world is a dangerous place to live; not because of the people who are evil, but because of the people who don't do anything about it."
-- Albert Einstein
If you're headed in the wrong direction,
God allows U-turns.
"Things are not as they seem to be; nor are they otherwise."
-- Buddha
"I am never certain. Therefore, I am never wrong."
-- Brandyn Webb
Row, row, row your boat
Gently down the stream.
Merrily, merrily, merrily, merrily
Life is but a dream.
-- Traditional Song
"Yoga is the restraint of modifications of the mindstuff."
-- Patanjali, Yoga Sutras
In other words:
If you let go of your preconceived notions about things,
you have a chance to see what is really there.
INTP secret handshake:
Two cups of milk, one large scoop of vanilla ice-cream,
and a fresh hand. Blend on hi for about one minute.
-- Asim Jalis
> my 6 year-old is just starting to be really curious
> about numbers and how they can be put together,
> and honestly, i think he's got more of a "talent"
> for math than the rest...
You get number and number and then after a while you
don't feel anything at all.
-- Asim Jalis
Someone said:
"I suck at pool. I can count the number of times
I've played on one hand."
And Shane pointed out:
"You'd suck less if you played on a table instead..."
"One can never consent to creep when one feels an impulse to soar."
-- Helen Keller
"If a man does not keep pace with his companions,
perhaps it is because he hears a different drummer.
Let him step to the music he hears,
however measured or far away."
-- Henry David Thoreau
"You must know the rules.
Only then will you understand why you must break them."
Do not meddle in the affairs of dragons,
for you are crunchy and good with ketchup.
-- bumper sticker
From a Pratchett book: There's a rat population problem in Ankh-Morpork. So the city offers a bounty on rats--2 cents per rat tail brought in. The rat population declines briefly, then explodes. When asked what to do about it, the Patrician says, "Shut down the rat farms."
"I shall pass this way but once. Therefore, any good that I can do or any kindness that I can show, let me do it now, for I shall not pass this way again."
-- William Penn (paraphrased)
Friends are quiet angels who lift us to our feet
when our wings have trouble remembering how to fly.
My life's a mess....it's littered with blessings.
May love litter your life with blessings.
Frustra fit perplura, quod fieri per pauciora.
(It is vain to do with more what can be done with less.)
-- William of Occum 1300-1349
Occum's Razor
(The simplest answer is probably the right one.)
"The author who benefits you most is not the one who tells you something you did not know before, but the one who gives expression to the truth that has been dumbly struggling in you for utterance."
-- Oswald Chambers
"The tears of those who never cry, the calm, the levelheaded ones, are terrible to see."
-- John Crowley, Little, Big
Don't worry, it only seems kinky the first time.
Love is not soft like water.
It is hard like rock, on which the waves of hatred beat in vain.
Be a lamp in the chamber if you cannot be a star in the sky.
A few great bumper stickers...
You're just jealous because the voices only talk to me.
I'm not suffering from insanity, I'm quite enjoying it.
I'm not a complete idiot. Some parts are missing.
Out of my mind...Back in five minutes.
Lord, save me from your followers.
The gene pool could use a little chlorine.
Consciousness: that annoying time between naps.
You can't run a circus without any clowns.
If you pay peanuts, you get monkeys.
Too many clowns, not enough circuses.
Chaos, panic, disorder-my work here is done.
