And, of course, other people’s words are far more powerful than mine. Funnier, too.

“There never was a rule that didn’t have to be broken at some time, and the man who doesn’t know when to break a rule is a fearful pain in the neck.” –William Feather

“The price one pays for pursuing any profession or call, is an intimate knowledge of its ugly side.” –James Baldwin

“Not to know is bad; not to wish to know is worse.” –West African Proverb

“Children, I grant, should be innocent; but when the epithet is applied to men or women, it is but a civil term for weakness.” –Mary Wollstonecraft*

“So live that you wouldn’t be ashamed to sell the family parrot to the town gossip.” –Will Rogers

“. . . he who does not increase his knowledge diminishes it; he who refuses to learn, merits extinction.” –Talmud

“A mind all logic is like a knife all blade. It makes the hand bleed that uses it.” –Tagore

“I guess the definition of a lunatic is a man surrounded by them.” –Ezra Pound

“I hasten to laugh at everything for fear of being obliged to weep at it.” –Pierre De Beaumarchair

“You don’t look in the mirror to see life; you gotta look out of the window.” –Drew Brown

“We do not really know anything at all until a long time after we have learned it.” –Joseph Joubert

“Happiness is not the absence of conflict, but the ability to cope with it.” –Anonymous

“Do not assume that the other fellow has intelligence to match yours. He may have more.” –Terry-Thomas

“He who is firmly seated in authority soon learns to think security, and not progress, the highest lesson of statecraft.” –J.R. Lowell

“Do not fear when your enemies criticize you. Beware when they applaud.” –Vo Dong Giang

“Earnest people are often people who habitually look on the serious side of things that have no serious side.” –Van Wyck Brooks

“It’s the most unhappy people who most fear change.” –Mignon McLaughlin

“Eccentricity is like having an accent. It’s what “other” people have.” –Oliver Sacks

“Some people crave baseball. I find this unfathomable; however, I do understand how someone could get excited about playing a bassoon.” –Frank Zappa

“Sometimes I think war is God’s way of teaching us geography.” — Paul Rodriguez

“A headline is not an act of journalism; it is an act of marketing.” –Harold Evans

“Take a rest; a field that has rested gives a beautiful crop.” –Ovid

“If a man does not work passionately – even furiously – at being the best in the world at what he does, he fails his talent, his destiny, and his God.” –George Lois

“All of us are mad. If it weren’t for the fact that every one of us is slightly abnormal, there wouldn’t be any point in giving each person a separate name.” –Ugo Bette

A good quotation is an education, isn’t it. Sometimes, a really good one can make my skin tingle and my brain light up in one of those big areas we never use. Maybe a really good combination of words is the spark we need to heat up those empty lobes and see what’s going on in there.

*Bonus points if you know what she wrote!

Mamacita, Scheiss Weekly

Fortunately, as John Donne liked to remind us, no man is an island.  This is the key to all education, no matter what our age.  No man is an island, and that means CONNECTIONS.

Education is about learning to make connections.  Understand that one point and you’ll know how to keep on learning until they carry you out feet first.  The sooner we learn it, the better off we are.

We are human, and humans mess up.  That doesn’t mean – it NEVER means – that we should give up when we mess up.  No, no, no, no, no.  No matter how many times we mess up, we must try to pull ourselves up and try again.  And if it’s just too hard to pull ourselves up, we need to give our families and friends the privilege of helping us do it.

Never give up, and never surrender.  No matter what “it” is, never give up.  We can do it.  Life likes to hit us below the belt sometimes, but we don’t have to let it get by with that.  Never give up.  Never surrender.  And it doesn’t matter how many times we’re down, either.  Each time, get back up and vow again to never surrender.  Eventually the lesson will sink in.  And if it doesn’t  happen soon, or when we think it should, well, keep on trying anyway.

We are all surrounded by people who love us, in real life or online – and what does that say for social media that some of our best friends are online friends – and together we will always be stronger than anything that doesn’t love us.  We might have to wait for it.  It might be late.  We might worry that it’s not coming at all.  But be patient, for love really does conquer all.  It does.  Never give up.  Never surrender.

1. Superman’s not brave. You can’t be brave if you’re indestructible. It’s every day people, like you and me, that are brave knowing we could easily be defeated but still continue forward. — Unknown

2. No horse gets anywhere until he is harnessed. No stream or gas ever drives anything until it is confined. No Niagara ever turned light and power until it is tunneled. No life ever grows great until it is focused, dedicated, disciplined. –Harry Emerson Fosdick

3. People are hungry for messages of hope and life. What are you broadcasting? — Morgan Brittany

4. Whoever you are, there is some younger person who thinks you are perfect. There is some work that will never be done if you don’t do it. there is someone who would miss you if you were gone. There is a place that you alone can fill. –Jacob M. Braude

5. Our greatest weakness lies in giving up. The most certain way to succeed is always to try just one more time. –Thomas Edison

6. Shame is guilt in overdrive. If it helps, think of the difference between shame and guilt as this: shame says “I’m bad, I’m flawed,” and guilt says “What I did was harmful to myself and/or others, and I can do better than that.” Thoughts of healthy, unbiased guilt are how you converse with your conscience, while feelings of shame don’t even let the conversation begin. — Renee Bledsoe

7. Most of the important things in the world have been accomplished by people who have kept on trying when there seemed to be no hope at all. — Dale Carnegie

8. Forget past mistakes. Forget failures. Forget about everything except what you’re going to do now – and do it. — William Durant

9. If we did the things we are capable of, we would astound ourselves. –Thomas Edison

10. You don’t have to control your thoughts; you just have to stop letting them control you. — Dan Millman

11. Ninety percent of the world’s woe comes from people not knowing themselves, their abilities, their frailities, and even their real virtues. Most of us go almost all the way through life as complete strangers to ourselves. — Sydney J. Harris

12. If you are aware of your weaknesses and you are constantly learning, your potential is virtually limitless. — Jay Sidhu

13. You can come out of the furnace of trouble two ways: if you let it consume you, you come out a cinder, but there is a kind of metal which refuses to be consumed, and comes out a star. — Jean Church

14. Every defeat, every heartbreak, every loss, contains its own seed, its own lesson on how to improve your performance the next time. — Og Mandino

15. Facing it, always facing it; that’s the way to get through. Face it. — Joseph Conrad

16. Though no one can go back and make a brand new start, anyone can start from now and make a brand new ending. — Carl Bard

17. Life is very interesting. In the end, some of your greatest pains become your greatest strengths. — Drew Barrymore

18. Courage is not the absence of fear, but rather the judgment that something else is more important than fear. — Ambrose Redmoon

19. Success is to be measured not so much by the position that one has reached in life, as by the obstacles one has overcome trying to succeed. — Booker T. Washington

20. You may have to fight a battle more than once to win it. — Margaret Thatcher

21. Determination, patience and courage are the only things needed to improve any situation. — Peter Sinclair

22. Always bear in mind that your own resolution to success is more important than any other one thing. — Abraham Lincoln

23. Fall seven times, stand up eight. — Japanese proverb

24. Move out of your comfort zone. You can only grow if you are willing to feel awkward and uncomfortable when you try something new. — Brian Tracy

25. It’s never too late to be what you might have been. — George Eliot

26. We must accept finite disappointment, but we must never lose infinite hope. — Martin Luther King Jr.

27. Sometimes when I consider what tremendous consequences come from little things, I am tempted to think, there are no little things. — Bruce Barton

28. Don’t let life discourage you; everyone who got where he is had to begin where he was. — Richard L. Evans

29. Just cause you got the monkey off your back doesn’t mean the circus has left town. — George Carlin

30. How lovely to think that no one need wait a moment, we can start now, start slowly changing the world! How lovely that everyone, great and small, can make their contribution toward introducing justice straightaway. And you can always, always give something, even if it is only kindness! — Anne Frank

31. Dreams are renewable. No matter what our age or condition, there are still untapped possibilities within us and new beauty waiting to be born. — Helen Keller

32. Just as despair can come to one only from other human beings, hope, too, can be given to one only by other human beings. — Elie Weisel

33. To accomplish great things, we must not only act, but also dream; not only plan, but also believe. — Anatole France

34. When everything seems like an uphill struggle, just think of the view from the top. — Unknown

35. He who has hope has everything. — Arabian proverb

36. Decide that you want it more than you are afraid of it. — Bill Cosby

37. History, despite its wrenching pain, cannot be unlived, but if faced with courage, need not be lived again. — Maya Angelou

38. When you’re going through hell, keep going. — Winston Churchill

39. Even if happiness forgets you a little bit, never completely forget about it. — Jacques Prevert

40. Every worthwhile accomplishment, big or little, has its stages of drudgery and triumph; a beginning, a struggle, and a victory. — Ghandi

41. Real heroes are men who fall and fail and are flawed, but win out in the end because they’ve stayed true to their ideals and beliefs and commitments. — Kevin Costner

42. It is one of the most beautiful compensations in life that no man can sincerely try to help another without helping himself. — Ralph Waldo Emerson

43. What do we live for, if it is not to make life less difficult for each other? — George Elliot

44. A life isn’t significant except for its impact on other lives. — Jackie Robinson

45. The only people with whom you should try to get even are those who have helped you. -–John E. Southard

46. In everyone’s life, at some time, our inner fire goes out. It is then burst into flame by an encounter with another human being. We should all be thankful for those people who rekindle the inner spirit.–-Albert Schweitzer

47. No one is as capable of gratitude as one who has emerged from the kingdom of night.–-Elie Wiesel

48. Nothing in this world can take the place of persistence. Talent will not; nothing is more common than unsuccessful people with talent. Genius will not; unrewarded genius is almost a proverb. Education will not; the world is full of educated derelicts. Persistence and determination alone are omnipotent. The slogan “press on” has solved and always will solve the problems of the human race. — Calvin Coolidge

49. When life knocks you down you have two choices- stay down or get up. — Tom Krause

50. Nobody trips over mountains. It is the small pebble that causes you to stumble. Pass all the pebbles in your path and you will find you have crossed the mountain. — Unknown

* Bonus points if you know the source.  Kudos, too, because it’s a cool source.

That’s my story and I’m sticking to it.

I hate it when the grass gets high.  I feel as if I’m drowning.  There are places in the low parts of the lawn that are mashed down sideways flat, where the ponds and creeks have overflowed.  We usually see a big snapper or two in weather like this, but so far even the animals have had sense enough not to try to come out in the rain.  Even the deer are huddling under the trees.

1. A crown is merely a hat that lets the rain in. — Frederick The Great

2. A poet is someone who stands outside in the rain hoping to be struck by lightning. — James Dickey

3. I do pity unlearned people on a rainy day. — Lucius C. Falkland

4. I love to walk in the rain, because nobody can see my tears. –Charlie Chaplin

5. It always rains on tents. Rainstorms will travel thousands of miles, against prevailing winds for the opportunity to rain on a tent. — Dave Barry

6. We will never be an advanced civilization as long as rain showers can delay the launching of a space rocket. — George Carlin

7. Criticism, like rain, should be gentle enough to nourish a man’s growth without destroying his roots. — Frank A Clark

8. There’s always a period of curious fear between the first sweet-smelling breeze and the time when the rain comes cracking down. — Don Delillo

9. Do not, on a rainy day, ask your child what he feels like doing, because I assure you that what he feels like doing, you won’t feel like watching. — Fran Lebowitz

10. Don’t pray when it rains if you don’t pray when the sun shines.– Satchel Paige

11. Some people walk in the rain; others just get wet. — Roger Miller

12. Sunshine is delicious, rain is refreshing, wind braces us up, snow is exhilarating; there is really no such thing as bad weather, only different kinds of good weather. — John Ruskin

13. The drop of rain maketh a hole in the stone, not by violence, but by oft falling. — Hugh Latimer

14. The best thing one can do when it’s raining is to let it rain. — Henry Wadsworth Longfellow

15. I’m singing in the rain
Just singing in the rain
What a glorious feelin’
I’m happy again
I’m laughing at clouds
So dark up above
The sun’s in my heart
And I’m ready for love
Let the stormy clouds chase
Everyone from the place
Come on with the rain
I’ve a smile on my face
I walk down the lane
With a happy refrain
Just singin’,
Singin’ in the rain

“>One of the best movies of all time.

Back in the days of Greek mythology, the ancients understood the connection between what we now call “science” and “literature.”  One of the nine Muses was Urania, who was in charge of astronomy.  No one can study astronomy without also studying the stories behind each of the constellations, planets, and stars; anything that can be seen by the naked eye was charted and named by the ancients, named after a hero, god, goddess, creature, or storyline that the pattern of stars reminded these ancient celestial map-makers of.  A good, imaginative instructor will combine these two; a poor, unimaginative one will believe they are separate entities.

I am sharing with you quotations about the stars.

1. We had the sky up there, all speckled with stars, and we used to lay on our backs and look up at them, and discuss about whether they was made or only just happened. — Mark Twain

2. I have … a terrible need … shall I say the word? … of religion. Then I go out at night and paint the stars. — Vincent van Gogh

3. If people sat outside and looked at the stars each night, I’ll bet they’d live a lot differently. — Bill Watterson

4. If the stars should appear but one night every thousand years how man would marvel and stare. — Ralph Waldo Emerson

5. For my part I know nothing with any certainty, but the sight of the stars makes me dream. — Vincent van Gogh

6. I met in the street a very poor young man who was in love. His hat was old, his coat worn, his cloak was out at the elbows, the water passed through his shoes, – and the stars through his soul. — Victor Hugo

7. I can find in my undergraduate classes, bright students who do not know that the stars rise and set at night, or even that the Sun is a star. — Carl Sagan

8. I’ve loved the stars too fondly to be fearful of the night. –Galileo Galilei

9. Set your course by the stars, not by the lights of every passing ship. — Omar N. Bradley

10. What is the good of your stars and trees, your sunrise and the wind, if they do not enter into our daily lives? — E. M. Forster

11. I have long thought that anyone who does not regularly – or ever – gaze up and see the wonder and glory of a dark night sky filled with countless stars loses a sense of their fundamental connectedness to the universe. — Brian Greene

12. The sun, the moon and the stars would have disappeared long ago… had they happened to be within the reach of predatory human hands. — Henry Ellis

13. There they stand, the innumerable stars, shining in order like a living hymn, written in light. — N.P. Willis

14. Metaphor for the night sky: A trillion asterisks and no explanations. –Robert Brault

15. No sight is more provocative of awe than is the night sky. –Llewelyn Powys

16. Whoever thinks of going to bed before twelve o’clock is a scoundrel. –Samuel Johnson

17. Astronomy compels the soul to look upward, and leads us from this world to another. — Plato

18. I think a future flight should include a poet, a priest and a philosopher . . . we might get a much better idea of what we saw. — Michael Collins

19. How quickly do we grow accustomed to wonders. I am reminded of the Isaac Asimov story Nightfall, about the planet where the stars were visible only once in a thousand years. So awesome was the sight that it drove men mad. We who can see the stars every night glance up casually at the cosmos and then quickly down again, searching for a Dairy Queen. — Roger Ebert

20. What the space program needs is more English majors. — Michael Collins

21. To confine our attention to terrestrial matters would be to limit the human spirit. — Stephen Hawking

22. Human interest in exploring the heavens goes back centuries. This is what human nature is all about. — Dennis Tito

23. I have a hunch the most important reason we’re going to space is not known now. — Burt Rutan

24. Two things inspire me to awe—the starry heavens above and the moral universe within. — Albert Einstein

25. I know that I am mortal and ephemeral. But when I search for the close-knit encompassing convolutions of the stars, my feet no longer touch the earth, but in the presence of Zeus himself I take my fill of ambrosia which the gods produce. — Ptolemy

26. We do not ask for what useful purpose the birds do sing, for song is their pleasure since they were created for singing. Similarly, we ought not to ask why the human mind troubles to fathom the secrets of the heavens … The diversity of the phenomena of Nature is so great, and the treasures hidden in the heavens so rich, precisely in order that the human mind shall never be lacking in fresh nourishment. — Johannes Kepler

27. Observing quasars is like observing the exhaust fumes of a car from a great distance and then trying to figure out what is going on under the hood. — Carole Mundell

28. Those who study the stars have God for a teacher. — Tycho Brahe (He was so in awe of
the Maker of the Universe that he put on his court robes whenever he went to his telescope.) (One eye was also larger than the other, from his years of star-gazing.)

Add to your eyes a pair of binoculars, and your night sky wonders will increase more than you could ever imagine.  Those first telescopes, remember, weren’t nearly as powerful as those pink Happy Meal binoculars on the floor of your van.  If you have powerful big-boy/girl binoculars, all the better.

Without a telescope – with just binoculars – you’ll be able to see several of Jupiter’s moons, and Saturn’s rings (if it’s turned the right way) and Venus & Mars as discs, not just dots.

Remember how to spot a planet:  they don’t twinkle as stars do.  Only objects that shine with their own light will twinkle; the objects that shine with reflected light will just shine; they won’t twinkle.  Think about it: a twinkling moon would be more than just a little big scary!

This week’s quotations all have to do with the universe.  Today (Saturday) is the 20th birthday of the Hubble Telescope, and the pictures this fabulous thing has been sending back all these years have been a source of a LOT of awe for and from me.  But then, I used to be a little girl who sneaked outside late at night to lie on top of the car and scan the sky with those very same pink plastic binoculars.

Thank you, Santa, for granting my only wish that Christmas.  I still have the telescope; it’s leaning in the corner in the living room.  Thank the elves for me, too; they did a great job.

So yes, I have known what it feels like to have a genuine wish come true.  While other little girls crossed their fingers and shut their eyes and hoped for Barbie under the tree that year, all I wanted was a telescope.  And I got it.  I can still remember the sensation of realizing my wish had been granted.

And with it, I could watch the universe, unfolding, closer and clearer than ever.  It’s not all science, you know.  It’s everything.  Science just helps us make sense of it.

1. There are no extra pieces in the universe. Everyone is here because he or she has a place to fill, and every piece must fit itself into the big jigsaw puzzle. — Deepak Chopra

2. Somewhere, something incredible is waiting to be known. — Dr. Carl Sagan

3. The Sun, with all the planets revolving around it, and depending on it, can still ripen a bunch of grapes as though it had nothing else in the Universe to do. — Galileo Galilei

4. The universe is full of magical things, patiently waiting for our wits to grow sharper. — Eden Phillpotts

5. Music in the soul can be heard by the universe. — Lao Tzu

6. I’m astounded by people who want to ‘know’ the universe when it’s hard enough to find your way around Chinatown. — Woody Allen

7. Things are as they are. Looking out into it the universe at night, we make no comparisons between right and wrong stars, nor between well and badly arranged constellations. — Alan Watts

8. When we try to pick out anything by itself, we find it hitched to everything else in the universe. — John Muir

9. I look for what needs to be done. After all, that’s how the universe designs itself. — R. Buckminster Fuller

10. Sometimes I think we’re alone in the universe, and sometimes I think we’re not. In either case the idea is quite staggering. — Arthur C. Clarke

11. I have long thought that anyone who does not regularly – or ever – gaze up and see the wonder and glory of a dark night sky filled with countless stars loses a sense of their fundamental connectedness to the universe. — Brian Greene

12. Through literacy you can begin to see the universe. Through music you can reach anybody. Between the two there is you, unstoppable. — Grace Slick

13. Man is always marveling at what he has blown apart, never at what the universe has put together, and this is his limitation. — Loren Eiseley

14. Equipped with his five senses, man explores the universe around him and calls the adventure Science. — Edwin Powell Hubble

15. Do not look at stars as bright spots only. Try to take in the vastness of the universe. — Maria Mitchell

16. We are so bound together that no man can labor for himself alone. Each blow he strikes in his own behalf helps to mold the universe. — Jerome K. Jerome

17. The universe is made of stories, not of atoms. — Muriel Rukeyser

18. Do not lose hope in what the universe has placed you here to do. — Darren L. Johnson

19. When I learn something new-and it happens every day-I feel a little more at home in this universe, a little more comfortable in the nest. — Bill Moyers

20. Nothing that I can do will change the structure of the universe. But maybe, by raising my voice I can help the greatest of all causes — goodwill among men and peace on earth. — Albert Einstein

21. t has been rightly said that nothing is unimportant, nothing powerless in the universe; a single atom can dissolve everything, and save everything! What terror! There lies the eternal distinction between good and evil. – Gerard De Nerval

22. My own suspicion is that the universe is not only queerer than we suppose, but queerer than we can suppose. — John B. S. Haldane

23. It suddenly struck me that that tiny pea, pretty and blue, was the Earth. I put up my thumb and shut one eye, and my thumb blotted out the planet Earth. I didn’t feel like a giant. I felt very, very small. — Neil Armstrong

24. To confine our attention to terrestrial matters would be to limit the human spirit. — Stephen Hawking

25. The celestial order and the beauty of the universe compel me to admit that there is some excellent and eternal Being, who deserves the respect and homage of men. — Cicero

26. Each small task of everyday is part of the total harmony of the universe. — St. Theresa of Lisieux

27. The center of the universe is everywhere. — Native American Proverb

28. Within our bodies course the same elements that flame in the stars. — Susan Eschiefelbein

29. If you believe that God created the whole universe and everything that it contains, do you really think he cares about what you wear? — Anne Frank

30. The more clearly we can focus our attention on the wonders and realities of the universe about us the less taste we shall have for the destruction of our race. Wonder and humility are wholesome emotions, and they do not exist side by side with a lust for destruction. — Rachel Carson

31. When we look into the heart of a flower, we see clouds, sunshine, minerals, time, the earth, and everything else in the cosmos in it. Without clouds, there could be no rain, and there would be no flower. Without time, the flower could not bloom. In fact, the flower is made entirely of non-flower elements; it has no independent, individual existence. It ‘inter-is’ with everything else in the universe. –Thich Nhat Hanh

32. When science discovers the center of the universe, a lot of people will be disappointed to find they are not it. — Bernard Baily

33. Perhaps there are somewhere in the infinite universe beings whose minds outrank our minds to the same extent as our minds surpass those of the insects. Perhaps there will once somewhere live beings who will look upon us with the same condescension as we look upon amoebae. — Ludwig von Mises

34. A lot of prizes have been awarded for showing the universe is not as simple as we might have thought.
— Stephen W. Hawking

35. A man said to the universe:
‘Sir, I exist!’
‘However,’ replied the universe,
‘The fact has not created in me
A sense of obligation.’
–Stephen Crane

36. Astronomy concerns itself with the whole of the visible universe, of which our earth forms but a relatively insignificant part; while Geology deals with that earth regarded as an individual. Astronomy is the oldest of the sciences, while Geology is one of the newest. But the two sciences have this in common, that to both are granted a magnificence of outlook, and an immensity of grasp denied to all the rest. — Charles Lapworth

37. But, on the other hand, every one who is seriously involved in the pursuit of science becomes convinced that a spirit is manifest in the laws of the Universe—a spirit vastly superior to that of man, and one in the face of which we with our modest powers must feel humble. — Albert Einstein

38. In some respects, science has far surpassed religion in delivering awe. How is it that hardly any major religion has looked at science and concluded, ‘This is better than we thought! The Universe is much bigger than our prophets said, grander, more subtle, more elegant. God must be even greater than we dreamed’? Instead they say, ‘No, no, no! My god is a little god, and I want him to stay that way.’ — Carl Sagan

39. Joy in the universe, and keen curiosity about it all—that has been my religion. — John Burroughs

40. The parts of the universe … all are connected with each other in such a way that I think it to be impossible to understand any one without the whole. — Blaise Pascal

41. We should do astronomy because it is beautiful and because it is fun. We should do it because people want to know. We want to know our place in the universe and how things happen. — John N. Bahcall

42. W]hen Galileo discovered he could use the tools of mathematics and mechanics to understand the motion of celestial bodies, he felt, in the words of one imminent researcher, that he had learned the language in which God recreated the universe. Today we are learning the language in which God created life. We are gaining ever more awe for the complexity, the beauty, the wonder of God’s most divine and sacred gift. — William Jefferson (Bill) Clinton

43. Every great scientific truth goes through three states: first, people say it conflicts with the Bible; next, they say it has been discovered before; lastly, they say they always believed it. — Louis Agassiz

44. What blessedness it is to dwell amidst this transparent air, which the eye can pierce without limit, amidst these floods of pure, soft, cheering light, under this immeasureable arch of heaven, and in sight of these countless stars! An infinite universe is each moment opened to our view. And this universe is the sign and symbol of Infinite Power, Intelligence, Purity, Bliss, and Love. — William Ellery Channing

45. Oh man! There is no planet sun or star could hold you, if you but knew what you are. — Ralph Waldo Emerson

46. If God creates a world of particles and waves, dancing in obedience to mathematical and physical laws, who are we to say that he cannot make use of those laws to cover the surface of a small planet with living creatures? — Martin Gardner

47. Since, in the long run, every planetary civilization will be endangered by impacts from space, every surviving civilization is obliged to become spacefaring–not because of exploratory or romantic zeal, but for the most practical reason imaginable: staying alive… If our long-term survival is at stake, we have a basic responsibility to our species to venture to other worlds. — Carl Sagan

48. The earth is the cradle of humankind, but one cannot live in the cradle forever. — Konstantin Tsiolkovsky

49. When a finger points to the moon, the imbecile looks at the finger. — Chinese Proverb

50. A country so rich that it can send people to the moon still has hundreds of thousands of its citizens who can’t read. That’s terribly troubling to me. — Charles Kuralt

So, here they are: the short quotations.

1. The best love affairs are those we never had. — Norman Lindsay

2. Knowledge comes, but wisdom lingers. — Alfred, Lord Tennyson

3. Do not try to live for ever. You will not succeed. — George Bernard Shaw

4. Most people would die sooner than think; in fact, they do. — Bertrand Russell

5. The first thing we do, let’s kill all the lawyers. — William Shakespeare

6. Like many women my age, I am 28 years old. — Mary Schmich

7. I couldn’t wait for success, so I went ahead without it. — Jonathan Winters

8. Old age is no place for sissies. — Bette Davis

9. I love humanity but I hate people. — Edna St. Vincent Millay

10. The truth is more important than the facts. — Frank Lloyd Wright

11. We need not think alike to love alike. — Francis David

12. True friends stab you in the front. — Oscar Wilde

13. A goal without a plan is just a wish. — Antoine de Saint-Exupery

14. Failure is success if we learn from it. — Malcolm Forbes

15. Great ideas often receive violent opposition from mediocre minds. — Albert Einstein

16. Distrust any enterprise that requires new clothes. — Henry David Thoreau

17. The years teach much which the days never knew. Ralph Waldo Emerson

18. Life is short, God’s way of encouraging a bit of focus. –Robert Brault

19. Live every day as if it were your last and then some day you’ll be right. — H.H. “Breaker” Morant

20. Spend the afternoon. You can’t take it with you. –Annie Dillard

21. Why always “not yet”? Do flowers in spring say “not yet”? –Norman Douglas

22. As if you could kill time without injuring eternity. — Henry David Thoreau

23. There is no cure for birth and death save to enjoy the interval. — George Santayana

24. To change one’s life: Start immediately. Do it flamboyantly. No exceptions. –William James

25. Why must conversions always come so late? Why do people always apologize to corpses? — David Brin

26. You will never find time for anything. If you want time you must make it. –Charles Buxton

27. You may delay, but time will not. –Benjamin Franklin

28. Every day of our lives we are on the verge of making those slight changes that would make all the difference. –Mignon McLaughlin

29. Warning: Dates in Calendar are closer than they appear. –Author Unknown

30. Every second is of infinite value. –Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

31. Middle age is when your age starts to show around your middle. — Bob Hope

32. If all else fails, immortality can always be assured by spectacular error. — John Kenneth Galbraith

33. Violence is the last refuge of the incompetent. — Issac Asimov

34. Always forgive your enemies; nothing annoys them so much. — Oscar Wilde

35. The art of being wise is knowing what to overlook. — William James

36. Years teach us more than books. — Berthold Auerbach

37. The more a man knows, the more he forgives. — Catherine the Great

38. Imagination is more important than knowledge. — Albert Einstein

39. It is good to rub and polish our brains against that of others. — Michel de Montaigne

40. Where all think alike, no one thinks very much. — Walter Lipman

41. The aim of education should be to teach us how to think, rather than what to think. — James Beattie

42. The less men think, the more they talk. — Baron Montesquieu

43. Happiness is where we find it, but rarely where we seek it. — J. Petit Senn

44. Time and space are fragments of the infinite for the use of finite creatures. — Henri Frederic Amiel

45. We can always redeem the man who aspires and strives. — Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

46. I find that the harder I work, the more luck I seem to have. — Thomas Jefferson

47. It’s kind of fun to do the impossible. — Walt Disney

48. The important thing is not so much that every child should be taught, as that every child should be given the wish to learn. — John Lubbock

49. To know how to suggest is the great art of teaching. — Henri Frederic Amiel

50. Education is the transmission of civilization. — Will Durant

1. Behavior is a mirror in which every one displays his own image. –Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

2. The true test of character is not how much we know how to do, but how we behave when we don’t know what to do. — John W. Holt, Jr.

3. If I have made an appointment with you, I owe you punctuality, I have no right to throw away your time, if I do my own. — Richard Cecil

4. If people are good only because they fear punishment, and hope for reward, then we are a sorry lot indeed. — Albert Einstein

5. When man learns to understand and control his own behavior. . . he may be justified in believing that he has become civilized. — Ayn Rand

6. I believe that you control your destiny, that you can be what you want to be. You can also stop and say, ‘No, I won’t do it, I won’t behave his way anymore. I’m lonely and I need people around me, maybe I have to change my methods of behaving,’ and then you do it. — Leo F. Buscaglia

7. Behavior is what a man does, not what he thinks, feels, or believes. — Unknown

8. The behavior of some children suggests that their parents embarked on the sea of matrimony without a paddle. — Unknown

9. The man of character, sensitive to the meaning of what he is doing, will know how to discover the ethical paths in the maze of possible behavior. — Earl Warren

10. Children lose their innocence the very moment they are forced to make excuses for their parent’s bad behavior. — Krista Delle Femine

11. Children follow your footsteps, not your advice. — Krista Delle Femine

12. A cigarette in the hands of a Hollywood star on screen is a gun aimed at a 12 or 14-year-old. — Joe Eszterhas

13. You want to raise your child in such a way that you don’t have to control him, so that he will be in full possession of himself at all times. Upon that depends his good behavior, his health, his sanity. — L. Ron Hubbard

14. The value of marriage is not that adults produce children, but that children produce adults. — Peter de Vries

15. You want to be a parent? Shut up and do your job. — ‘Dr. Robert Romano’ from E.R.

16. Children have never been very good at listening to their elders, but they have never failed to imitate them. — James Baldwin

17. Live so that when your children think of fairness and integrity, they think of you. — H. Jackson Brown Jr.

18. Setting an example is not the main means of influencing another, it is the only means. — Albert Einstein

19. There is a sobering side to eccentricity. Odd behavior can flourish only in a tolerant society and that it often produces radical new ideas by virtue of its willingness to cast off accepted norms. Blessed are the cracked, for they shall let in the light. — Unknown

20. Someone will always be looking at you as an example of how to behave. Don’t let them down. — Unknown

21. About all you have to do to get a man to behave right is expect him to. — The Country Sage, newspaper clipping, Albert W. Daw Collection

22. The test of a man or woman’s breeding is how they behave in a quarrel. — George Bernard Shaw

23. If a man does not control his temper, it is a sad admission that he is not in control of his thoughts. He then becomes a victim of his own passions and emotions, which lead him to actions that are totally unfit for civilized behavior. — Ezra Taft Benson

24. When a woman behaves like a man, why can’t she behave like a nice man? –
Dame Edith Evans

25. It is a waste of energy to be angry with a man who behaves badly, just as it is to be angry with a car that won’t go. — Bertrand Arthur William Russell

Oh, I could keep going for hours.

My point is, if everyone in the world simply behaved properly, the whole world would be vastly improved and infinitely easier to go about in.

Since that’s never going to happen, the next best thing would be if the penalties for misbehavior were so severe you’d have to be certifiably nuts to misbehave.

Yes, lady woman in Kmart today who just watched and laughed as her two daughters raced around the store with that tricycle. Were you paying attention when the manager took it away and carried it off and all the other customers applauded?

And yes, we were all looking at YOU and passing judgment, and I bet we all agreed.

I’m not.  There will never be an end to my constant climbing and searching for new things to “know.”  How else would I blow my siblings out of the water during trivia contests?  They’re all smart, and they know tons of awesome stuff.  Even so, I couldn’t stop seeking answers if I tried.  I don’t WANT to stop.  There’s always something else around the bend and I HAVE to find out what it is.

However, I know people who wouldn’t care if they never learned another new thing.  I pity them, because when learning stops, stagnation begins.  Those stinky little ponds all over southern Indiana, covered with scum and mosquitoes?  They stopped moving, and now they are dead and dead things stink.  When people stop learning, they might as well be buried and get it over with, for they are as good as dead. I consider a person who is content to allow his/her head to be stuffed full of other people’s opinions as good as dead, also.

Thinking can be hard. Some people just aren’t willing to put forth the effort. Besides, thinking sometimes makes us question our choices, values, and beliefs. Horrors.

Harsh?  Sure.  But it’s how I roll.  One of the many things I despise about most of our public schools is the fact that they pretty much beat the curiosity out of our children.  Often, children are punished for wanting to know MORE and refusing to stop once ONE answer or solution is reached.  Of course, as Professor Umbridge says, the important thing about school is taking tests, and tests are concerned only with predetermined answers, not curiosity.  “Next year, Billy,” a teacher might promise.  But when next year comes, Billy soon learns that the new year is just like the old year: day after day of sitting and waiting for other kids to catch up, with never anything for the kids who already know, and detention or worse for the child who dared experiment with his lunch or the ink in his pen or the clay or a poem or story or the paints in the art room.  Sigh.

Curiosity:  Let’s encourage it in our children, for the curious thinkers and scientists and writers and dreamers are the hope of the universe.

As for unimaginative and uncurious adults. . . .  I should be a lot sorrier for them than I am, but it’s their own fault.  Life is full of choices, and there’s more than one kind of Easy Street.

There will be a lot of Einstein.

1. Intellectual growth should commence at birth and cease only at death. — Einstein

2. Sometimes questions are more important than answers. — Nancy Willard

3. It is a miracle that curiosity survives formal education. — Einstein

4. Curiosity is the very basis of education and if you tell me that curiosity killed the cat, I say only the cat died nobly. — Arnold Edinborough

5. The important thing is not to stop questioning. Curiosity has its own reason for existing. One cannot help but be in awe when he contemplates the mysteries of eternity, of life, of the marvelous structure of reality. It is enough if one tries merely to comprehend a little of this mystery every day. Never lose a holy curiosity. — Einstein

6. The greatest virtue of man is perhaps curiosity. — Anatole France

7. When you’re curious, you find lots of interesting things to do. — Walt Disney

8. Curiosity is lying in wait for every secret. — Ralph Waldo Emerson

9. A good scientist is a person in whom the childhood quality of perennial curiosity lingers on. Once he gets an answer, he has other questions. — Frederick Seitz

10. I think, at a child’s birth, if a mother could ask a fairy godmother to endow it with the most useful gift, that gift should be curiosity. — Eleanor Roosevelt

11. I find that a great part of the information I have was acquired by looking up something and finding something else on the way. — Franklin P. Adams

12. Millions saw the apple fall, but Newton asked why. — Bernard Baruch

13. The cure for boredom is curiosity. There is no cure for curiosity. — Dorothy Parker

14. It is, in fact, nothing short of a miracle that the modern methods of instruction have not entirely strangled the holy curiosity of inquiry. — Einstein

15. I could not, at any age, be content to take my place by the fireside and simply look on. Life was meant to be lived. Curiosity must be kept alive. One must never, for whatever reason, turn his back on life. — Eleanor Roosevelt

16. Only barbarians are not curious about where they come from, how they came to be where they are, where they appear to be going, whether they wish to go there, and if so, why, and if not, why not. — Isaiah Berlin

17. Anyone who has never made a mistake has never tried anything new. — Einstein

18. The only thing that interferes with my learning is my education. — Einstein

19. The most beautiful thing we can experience is the mysterious. It is the source of all true art and all science. He to whom this emotion is a stranger, who can no longer pause to wonder and stand rapt in awe, is as good as dead: his eyes are closed. — Einstein

20. Only the curious will learn and only the resolute overcome the obstacles to learning. The quest quotient has always excited me more than the intelligence quotient. — Eugene S. Wilson

21. Children are remarkable for their intelligence and ardor, for their curiosity, their intolerance of shams, the clarity and ruthlessness of their vision. — Aldous Huxley

22. Curiosity about life in all of its aspects, I think, is still the secret of great creative people. — Leo Burnett

23. Curiosity killed the cat, but where human beings are concerned, the only thing a healthy curiosity can kill is ignorance. — Harry Lorayne

24. For infants and toddlers learning and living are the same thing. If they feel secure, treasured, loved, their own energy and curiosity will bring them new understanding and new skills. — Amy Laura Dombro

25. Joy in the universe, and keen curiosity about it all – that has been my religion. — John Burroughs

26. One of the secrets of life is to keep our intellectual curiosity acute. — William Lyon Phelps

27. Satisfaction of one’s curiosity is one of the greatest sources of happiness in life.
– Linus Pauling

28. I have no special talents. I am only passionately curious. –Albert Einstein

29. Be curious always, for knowledge will not acquire you; you must acquire it. –Sudie Back

30. Fear paralyzes; curiosity empowers. Be more interested than afraid. – Patricia Alexander

31. If a child is to keep alive his inborn sense of wonder, he needs the companionship of at least one adult who can share it, rediscovering with him the joy, excitement and mystery of the world we live in. — Rachel Carson

32. Every man ought to be inquisitive through every hour of his great adventure down to the day when he shall no longer cast a shadow in the sun. For if he dies without a question in his heart, what excuse is there for his continuance? — Frank Moore Colby

33. I suppose the one quality in an astronaut more powerful than any other is curiosity. They have to get some place nobody’s ever been. — John Glenn

34. The alchemists in their search for gold discovered many other things of greater value. — Arthur Schopenhauer

35. You can teach a student a lesson for a day; but if you can teach him to learn by creating curiosity, he will continue the learning process as long as he lives. — Unknown

36. Mere curiosity adds wings to every step. — Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

37. I never teach my pupils. I only attempt to provide the conditions in which they can learn. — Einstein

38. While we are born with curiosity and wonder and our early years full of the adventure they bring, I know such inherent joys are often lost. I also know that, being deep within us, their latent glow can be fanned to flame again by awareness and an open mind. — Sigurd Olson

39. So as I thought about it, the most important “tool” you can have today in business is insatiable curiosity. The minute you lose it, you’re dead. — Steve Rubel

40. This I believe: that the free, exploring mind of the individual human is the most valuable thing in the world. And this I would fight for: the freedom of the mind to take any direction it wishes, undirected. And this I must fight against: any idea, religion, or government which limits or destroys the individual. — John Steinbeck

41. Intellectual growth should commence at birth and cease only at death. — Einstein

42. Only the curious will learn and only the resolute overcome the obstacles to learning. The quest quotient has always excited me more than the intelligence quotient. — Abdel Aziz Rantissi

43. Seize the moment of excited curiosity on any subject to solve your doubts; for if you let it pass, the desire may never return, and you may remain in ignorance. — Agung Laksono

44. We were lucky enough to grow up in an environment where there was always much encouragement to children to pursue intellectual interests; to investigate what ever aroused curiosity. — Orville Wright

45. Effective questioning brings insight, which fuels curiosity, which cultivates wisdom. — Chip Bell

46. One should never count the years — one should instead count one’s interests. I have kept young trying never to lose my childhood sense of wonderment. I’m glad I still have a vivid curiosity about the world I live in. — Helen Keller

47. Youth is not measured by the age of a person, but by the curiosity a person keeps. — Salvador Pániker

48. All my life through, the new sights of nature made me rejoice like a child. — Marie Curie

49. Equipped with his five senses, man explores the universe around him and calls the adventure Science. — Edwin Powell Hubble

50. The most exciting phrase to hear in science, the one that heralds the most discoveries, is not “Eureka!” (I found it!) but “That’s funny…” — Isaac Asimov

51. The important thing in science is not so much to obtain new facts as to discover new ways of thinking about them. –William Lawrence Bragg

52. Men love to wonder, and that is the seed of science. — Ralph Waldo Emerson

53. What is a scientist after all? It is a curious man looking through a keyhole, the keyhole of nature, trying to know what’s going on. — Jacques Cousteau

54. Be curious, not judgmental. — Walt Whitman

55. Education would be so much more effective if its purpose were to ensure that by the time they leave school every boy and girl should know how much they don’t know, and be imbued with a lifelong desire to know it. — Sir William Haley

Bonus points if you know who the little boy in both pictures is.

Oh, and you know what “they” say. . .that’s the omnipotent antecedentless “they” of the ages. . .if you are offended by a quotation, you probably need to evaluate your own belief system, paying special attention to values, norms, and what you REALLY do all day.

1.  Nations have recently been led to borrow billions for war; no nation has ever borrowed largely for education.  Probably, no nation is rich enough to pay for both war and civilization.  We must make our choice; we cannot have both.  — Abraham Flexner

2.  The problems we face cannot be solved at the same level of thinking we were at when we created them.  –Albert Einstein

3.  The door of a bigoted mind opens outwards so that the only result of the pressure of facts upon it is to close it more snugly.  –Ogden Nash

4.  A belief which leaves no place for doubt is not a blief; it is a superstition  –Jose Bergamin

5.  If you hold a cat by the tail, you learn things that cannot be learned in any other way.  –Mark Twain

6.  Words, like eyeglasses, obscure everything they do not make clear.  –Joseph Joubert

7.  Be yourself.  Everyone else is already taken.  — James Joyce

8.  The propagandist’s purpose is to make one set of people forget that certain other sets of people are human.  — Aldous Huxley

9.  What a distressing contrast there is between the radiant intelligence of the child and the feeble mentality of the average adult.  — Sigmund Freud

10.  Do not condemn the judgment of another because it differs from your own.  You may both be wrong.  — Dandamis

11.  I have lived in this world just long enough to look carefully the second time into things that I am most certain of the first time.  –Josh Billings

12.  Your greatness is measured by your kindness; your education and intellect by your modesty; your ignorance is betrayed by your suspicions and prejudices, and your real caliber is measured by the consideration and tolerance you have for others.  — William J. H. Boetcker

13.  Never, never be afraid to do what’s right, especially if the well-being of a person or animal is at stake.  Society’s punishments are small compared to the wounds we inflict on our soul when we look the other way.   — Martin Luther King Jr.

14.  Do you wish to rise?  Begin by descending.  YOu plan a tower that will pierce the clouds?  Lay first the foundation of humility.  — St. Augustine

15.  People are always blaming their circumstances for what they are.  I don’t believe in circumstances.  The people who get on in this world are the people who get up and look for the circumstances they want, and if they can’t find them, they make them.  — George Bernard Shaw

16.  My father didn’t tell me how to live; he lived, and let me watch him do it.  — Clarance B. Kelland

17.  If a man would register all his opinions upon love, politics, religion, learning, etc., beginning from his youth and so go on to old age, what a bundle of inconsistencies and contradictions would appear at last!  — Jonathan Swift

18.  Evil is like a shadow – it has no real substance of its own, it is simply a lack of light.  You cannot cause a shadow to disappear by trying to fight it, stamp on it, by railing against it, or any other form of emotional or physical resistance.  IN order to cause a shadow to disappear, you must shine light on it.  — Shakti Gawain

19.  Every normal man must be tempted at times to spit on his hands, hoist the black flag, and begin slitting throats.  — H.L. Mencken

20.  Analyzing humor is like dissecting a frog – few people are interested, and the frog dies.  — E.B. White

21.  Everybody is a potential murderer.  I’ve never killed anyone, but I frequently get satisfaction reading the obituary notices.  — Clarance Darrow

22.  Any child can tell you that the sole purpose of a middle name is so he can tell when he’s in trouble.  — Dennis Fakes

23.  Puritan:  Someone who is afraid that, somewhere, someone else is having a good time.  — H.L. Mencken

24.  Too often we enjoy the comfort of opinion without the discomfort of thought. — John F. Kennedy

25.  The most pathetic man in the world is someone who has sight, but has no vision.  — Helen Keller

26.  Beware of false knowledge; it is more dangerous than ignorance.  — George Bernard Shaw

27.  A little government and a little luck are necessary in life, but only a fool trusts either of them.  — P.J. O’Rourke

28.  A lot of disappointed people have been left standing on the street corner waiting for the bus marked Perfection.  — Donald Kennedy

29.  To one who has faith, no explanation is necessary.  To one without faith, no explanation is possible.  — St. Thomas Aquinas

30.The whole purpose of education is to turn mirrors into windows. — Sydney J. Harris

31. You can get all A’s and still flunk life. — Walker Percy

32. Repetition does not transform a lie into a truth. — FDR

33. I’m glad I am a woman who once danced naked in the Mediterranean Sea at midnight. — Mercedes McCambridge

34. Vegetables are a must on a diet. I suggest carrot cake, zucchini bread, and pumpkin pie. — Jim Davis

35. Sex is good, but not as good as fresh, sweet corn. — Garrison Keillor

36. It’s bizarre that the produce manager is more important to my children’s health than the pediatrician. — Meryl Streep

37. We are living in a world today where lemonade is made from artificial flavors and furniture polish is made from real lemons. — Alfred E. Newman

38. In the presence of eternity, the mountains are as transient as the clouds. — Robert Green Ingersoll,

39. If people are good only because they fear punishment, and hope for reward, then we are a sorry lot indeed. — Albert Einstein

40. It is impossible to defeat an ignorant man in argument. — William G. McAdoo

41. The world in which you were born is just one model of reality. Other cultures are not failed attempts at being you; they are unique manifestations of the human spirit. –Wade Davis

42. Finding the right answer is only the beginning. There are other right answers if one can change one’s perspective. –Judy Wellington

43. Here’s to the crazy ones. The misfits. The rebels. The troublemakers. The round pegs in the square hole. The ones who see things differently. They’re not fond of rules. And they have no respect for the status quo. You can quote them, disagree with them, glorify or vilify them. About the only thing you can’t do is ignore them. Because they change things. They push the human race forward. And while some may see them as the crazy ones, we see genius. Because the people who are crazy enough to think they can change the world, are the ones who do. — Apple Computer Inc

44. We all live in suspense, from day to day, from hour to hour; in other words, we are the hero of our own story. — Mary McCarthy

45. It’s the friends you can call up at 4 am that matter. — Marlene Dietrich

46. Learn from the mistakes of others. You can’t live long enough to make them all yourself. — Eleanor Roosevelt

47. I know not with what weapons World War III will be fought, but World War IV will be fought with sticks and stones. — Albert Einstein

48. How far you go in life depends on your being tender with the young, compassionate with the aged, sympathetic with the striving and tolerant with the weak and wrong…because sometime in your life you will have been all of these. — George Washington Carver

49. The only thing I regret about my past is the length of it. If I had to live my life again, I’d make the same mistakes, only sooner. — Tallulah Bankhead

50. The greatness of a nation and its moral progress can be judged by the way its animals are treated. — Gandhi

51. No one in the world needs a mink coat but a mink. — Murray Banks

52. Make the most of yourself, for that is all there is of you. — Ralph Waldo Emerson

53. You can stand tall without standing on someone. You can be a victor without having victims. — Harriet Woods

54. If you look at what you do not have in life; you don’t have anything. If you look at what you have in life; you have everything. — Unknown

55. Whether you think you can, or think you can’t, you’re right. — Henry Ford

56. Always be a first-rate version of yourself, instead of a second-rate version of somebody else. — Judy Garland

57. Never think you are too small to make a difference…ever been to bed with a mosquito — ” Ita Buttrose

58. A gourmet who thinks of calories is like a tart who looks at her watch. –James Beard

59. As for butter versus margarine, I trust cows more than chemists. — Joan Gussow

60. The opposite of love is not hate, it’s indifference. — Elie Wiesel

P.S.  Yes, I realize I’ve used many of these before, but the fact that you noticed makes me really, really happy.  Thank you!

And since it’s temporary, it’s bloody awesome.  It’s after 3  in the morning and I’ve got the music cranked up to eleven.  I’m wearing flannel pants with skulls on them.  (I was going to post a picture but maybe your imagination is better, here.)  I’m eating pecans and caramel dip.  With a spoon.  Out of the container.  Diabetes, hold thy tongue, because I’m going to make popcorn in a few minutes.  With extra butter.  I’ll blame any weight gain on my stupid former gym that moved the treadmills upstairs where I can’t access them. The dryer keeps beeping but I’m ignoring it, because it’s full of towels and I’m not folding them today.  I’m surfing the net and commenting and writing articles and daydreaming about sleeping in.  I’ve been reading and petting the cats and answering emails and doing pretty much everything except housework and grading essays.  I haven’t worn shoes since Thursday night class.  Really, the only normal thing I’ve done all day is shower, because even when I’m alone, you know, pew and stuff?

So what better topic for this weekend’s Quotation Saturday than The Weekend itself?  Maybe, even, some odd quotes about The Weekend?

1. Living up to ideals is like doing everyday work with your Sunday clothes on. –Ed Howe

2. Every man has a right to a Saturday night bath. — Lyndon B. Johnson  (If you know the history behind this quote, it’s even better.)

3. Only Robinson Crusoe had everything done by Friday. — Author Unknown

4. Weekends don’t count unless you spend them doing something completely pointless. — Bill Watterson

5. If I do not return to the pulpit this weekend, millions of people will go to hell. — Jimmy Swaggart (My apologies for including this one, but I can’t help laughing at anything he ever said.)

6. Every Friday I used to have about fifty, sixty kids who would wait for me on Sunset Boulevard and I’d take them all to dinner. All runaways. — Al Lewis

7. There is nothing, I think, more unfortunate than to have soft, chubby, fat-looking children who go to watch their school play basketball every Saturday and regard that as their week’s exercise. — John Fitzgerald Kennedy

8. I don’t know what your childhood was like, but we didn’t have much money. We’d go to a movie on a Saturday night, then on Wednesday night my parents would walk us over to the library. It was such a big deal, to go in and get my own book. — Robert Redford

9. The dog doesn’t know the difference between Saturday, Sunday, and Monday, so I have to walk the dog early those days too. — Donna Shalala

10. On a lazy Saturday morning when you’re lying in bed, drifting in and out of sleep, there is a space where fantasy and reality become one. Are you awake, or are you dreaming? You see people and things; some are familiar; some are strange. You talk, you feel, but you move without walking; you fly without wings. Your mind and your body exist, but on separate planes. Time stands still. For me, this is the feeling I have when ideas come. — Lynn Johnston

11. Poetry is truth in its Sunday clothes. — Joseph Roux

12. What is to be done with people who can’t read a Sunday paper without messing it all up?… Show me a Sunday paper which has been left in a condition fit only for kite flying, and I will show you an antisocial and dangerous character who has left it that way. — Robert Benchley

13. Do not let Sunday be taken from you.  If your soul has no Sunday, it becomes an orphan. — Albert Schweitzer

14. Measure not men by Sundays, without regarding what they do all the week after. — Thomas Fuller

15. I don’t like to be gone all weekend and at night too. Because for 20 years, I’ve had children who are in school. — Meryl Streep

16. I much prefer working with kids whose life could be completely upended by a reading of a book over a weekend. You give them a book to read – they go home and come back a changed person. And that is so much more interesting and exciting. — Russell Banks

17. If all the cars in the United States were placed end to end, it would probably be Labor Day Weekend. — Doug Larson

18. “- “I’ve been thinking Hobbes –”
- “On a weekend?”
- “Well, it wasn’t on purpose…” — Bill Watterson.

19. The rhythm of the weekend, with its birth, its planned gaieties, and its announced end, followed the rhythm of life and was a substitute for it. — F. Scott Fitzgerald

20. Can’t anything be done about calling these guys student athletes? That’s like referring to Attila the Hun’s cavalry as “weekend warriors.” — Russell Baker

21. I used to get a haircut every Saturday so I would never miss any of the comic books. I had practically no hair when I was a kid! — R. L. Stine

22. Later, in the early teens, I used to ride my bike every Saturday morning to the nearest airport, ten miles away, push airplanes in and out of the hangars, and clean up the hangars. — Alan Shepard

23. Middle age is when you’re sitting at home on a Saturday night and the telephone rings and you hope it isn’t for you. — Ogden Nash

24. The worst thing about Saturday Night Live now is that, in the last 10 to 15 years, they’ve grown to some 40 writers. We had seven. And seven actors. — Chevy Chase

25. Everybody’s working for the weekend. –Loverboy