"If, after I depart this vale, you ever remember me and have thought to please my ghost, forgive some sinner, and wink your eye at some homely girl."

HL Menken's epitaph.

"Be bold and mighty forces will come to your aid." - Goethe

From Meet the Press - July 02, 2006

Dana Priest and Bill Bennet:

PRIEST: Well, it’s not a crime to publish classified information. And this is one of the things Mr. Bennett keeps telling people that it is. But, in fact, there are some narrow categories of information you can’t publish, certain signals, communications, intelligence, the names of covert operatives and nuclear secrets.

Now why isn’t it a crime? I mean, some people would like to make casino gambling a crime, but it is not a crime. Why isn’t it not a crime? Because the framers of the Constitution wanted to protect the press so that they could perform a basic role in government oversight, and you can’t do that. Look at the criticism that the press got after Iraq that we did not do our job on WMD. And that was all in a classified arena. To do a better job—and I believe that we should’ve done a better job—we would’ve again, found ourselves in the arena of...


As the camera pulls back, I am pretty sure that you can see Bennet mouth the word "Motherfucker."

Mike Wallace - What about the drugs?

Kinky Friedman - What about 'em? Look I think You have to figure out what you like in life and let it kill you.

If you tell the truth, have one foot in the stirrup - Kinky Friedman quoting an old Turkish proverb.

I wake and feel the fell of dark, not day.
And I have asked to be
Where no storm come.
Gerard Manly Hopkins

From Into the Woods by Bill Bryson : Hunters will tell you that a moose is a wily and ferocious forest creature. Nonsense. A moose is a cow drawn by a three-year old.

"The first thing I saw was a butterfly. And of course, I stomped it. Hard." Michael Swanwick, Cigar Box Faust and other Miniatures

No, your not a bad mother; you're just a barking lunatic. From the film About a Boy.

"Is life so dear or peace so sweet as to be purchased at the price of chains and slavery? Forbid it, Almighty God! I know not what course others may take, but as for me, give me liberty or give me death!" Patrick Henry

From the same Vonnegut interview:

You know, I taught writing for a while and whenever somebody would tell me they were going to write about their dad, I would tell them they might as well go write about killing puppies because neither story was going to work.

Q: So is this really the final book? Timequake was supposed to be your farewell, and then Dr. Kevorkian came along.

Vonnegut: I don't fucking know. I keep thinking I'll die. Why do you think I smoke so much?

Q: How many packs are you up to a day?

Vonnegut: Never mind. It's none of your fucking business. Fuck off — you know what I'm saying?

Penn Jillette on Fahrenheit 911:

I didn't learn anything from it other than Shaggy was a Marine, but I love that that movie exists.

From Arthur:
Not all of us who drink are poets. Some of us drink because we're not poets.

"I wasted time, and now doth time waste me."
- William Shakespeare, King Richard II, Act V, Scene V

What precisely are the most important things that must be understood and kept in mind at a tea gathering?'
Sen Rikyu answered: 'Make a delicious bowl of tea; lay the charcoal so that it heats the water; arrange the
flowers as they are in the field; in summer suggest coolness; in winter, warmth; do everything ahead of time;
prepare for rain; and give those with whom you find yourself every consideration.'

The disciple, somewhat dissatisfied with this answer because he could not find anything in it of such great
importance that it should be deemed a secret of the practice, said, 'That much I already know....'
Rikyu replied, 'Then if you can host a tea gather ing without deviating from any of the rules I have just stated, I
will become your disciple

"What is man, when you come to think upon him, but a minutely set, ingenious machine for turning with infininite artfulness, the red wine of Shiraz into urine?"
Isak Dineson, SEVEN GOTHIC TALES

"Let's just
say that if complete and utter chaos was lightning,
then he'd be the sort to stand on a hilltop in a
thunderstorm wearing wet copper armour and
Shouting "All gods are bastards". "
Terry Pratchet, The Colour of Magic