Classic Comments on the Quote

[LLapp]

"The chief reason for drinking is the desire to behave in a certain way, and to be able to blame it on alcohol." ≈ Mignon McLaughlin

bansaisequoia
January 30, 2012, 7:20 pm
It must have been the Vodka talking when she wrote that.

cuji70
October 11, 2013, 6:14 am
Gotten me through 33 years of marriage

skoogie2
August 11, 2014, 5:08 am
So true! I've always maintained that that was the reason!

fishbum
March 30, 2016, 6:46 am
cuji70 and skoogie2 are married?

[LLapp]

"Glory is fleeting, but obscurity is forever." ≈≈ Napoleon Bonaparte

montyb
March 19, 2014, 2:54 pm
At last -- immortality!

[munchlet]

"If you're going to write, don't pretend to write down. It's going to be the best you can do, and it's the fact that it's the best you can do that kills you. "
≈ Dorothy Parker

LLapp
January 25, 2016, 10:33 pm
This quote has stayed with me for years. I think it's one her most profound observations. You rarely see a published writer acknowledge that their book is the best they could do; there is usually a little bit of "Well, I could have put more detail in this chapter but I had to attend to X instead" -- but no, the truth is that it was the best they could do, and that is just so hard to accept. Because the yearning to write is almost always so much grander and more beautiful than the finished product. And that's what grieves the writer. Oh damn, I left my book-editing job a few months ago, and I miss taking care of my authors.

maradnu
August 31, 2016, 10:07 am
A writer once said that a poem is never completed, it is only abandoned. True for most any writing. You write, then rewrite, and if you are ever satisfied, you are deluded.

[montyb]

"Nothing is so bitter that a calm mind cannot find comfort in it."
≈ Seneca

LLapp
June 26, 2018, 11:26 am
Clearly the Stoics never imagined the suffering of solving a cryptogram with only one E.

[oddcouple]

"If you want a wise answer, ask a reasonable question. "
≈ Johann Wolfgang von Goethe


bansaisequoia
July 7, 2010, 10:24 pm
Can The Rock make a god so big, even he can't lift it?
maradnu
September 25, 2012, 7:14 pm
42
JenDiaz72
January 19, 2015, 11:38 am
How many licks does take to get to the center of a tootsie roll pop?
dovid1946
March 21, 2015, 5:07 am
who put the bop in the bop-she-bop-she-bop? would pout the ram in the rama-lama-ding-dong
montyb
June 25, 2015, 4:48 pm
Hey folks, see maradnu's answer above.
kb83
June 19, 2017, 2:23 am
Was it an answer or a question?
fishbum
April 16, 2018, 8:28 am
It was a wise answer to "How many days in 6 weeks?"
LLapp
May 12, 2018, 12:51 pm
Are we here yet?
lertsek
August 15, 2018, 5:10 pm
How do you spell IOU?
newatcryptos
August 19, 2018, 2:29 pm
What color was George Washington's white horse?

[Eureka]

I agree, Roxanne's cat taking over the keyboard, priceless!! (actually posted by LLapp, so I can't take any credit for it)

[montyb]

A Great Example of the Teamwork of Cryptogrammers

"Every truth passes through three stages before it is recognized. In the first it is ridiculed, in the second it is opposed, in the third it is regarded as self evident. "
≈ Arthur Schopenhauer

montyb on October 23rd, 2013
What a silly idea.

universalmom on February 12th, 2014
I oppose it.

Quizzical on April 18th, 2014
I"ll bite. It should be perfectly clear.

[opallady]

(Eureka's post) Roxanne: ROFLMAO!!!!!

[Eureka]

Guillaume Apollinaire

"We cannot carry our father's corpse with us everywhere we go."

Lily H on May 24th, 2011
Why would anyone want to do that?

abra on June 13th, 2012
Nor would we want to. EWWWW.

cellophane on August 6th, 2012
morbid

momof7 on February 24th, 2013
It might start to stink after a day or two.

harmiger on May 9th, 2013
But we do take his ashes everytime we move

gryhnd51 on August 21st, 2013
Perhaps "corpse" is a merely a reference to your father's reputation?

jnoodles on September 1st, 2013
I know exactly what this means and have been doing this since before Dad died. No more. I hope.

SippyGirl on September 9th, 2013
without context, this sounds pretty gruesome

dovid1946 on January 18th, 2015
sounds like the idea for a movie- sequel to 'weekend at Bernie's'

jval on January 30th, 2015
Maybe if we carry his past advice and love, it would be easier to move around.

abra on November 12th, 2015
I know he doesn't mean this literally, it's just more fun to discuss that way.

darkyr on May 17th, 2016
I usually just set him outside on the curb when I run into the 7-Eleven.

nelnose on May 22nd, 2016
Only if he's been cremated.

maradnu on January 7th, 2017
How about if I have him cremated and carry the ashes? Or would I just be making an ash of myself.

Jalapenoman on February 25th, 2017
Dad weighed about fifty pounds more than me, so I have to use a wheelbarrow.

Old Alto on March 26th, 2017
I did for a while, but found it hard to keep a job.

letfreedomring on March 27th, 2017
gryhnd51 seems to have nailed the meaning of this quote. at least, I agree....

LLapp on April 14th, 2017
This is what the coat check room is for.

kb83 on June 14th, 2017
This reminds me of the movie "Little Miss Sunshine", (Abigail Breslin), when Alan Arkin (the grandpa) dies suddenly and they have to take him along in the van to make the Little Miss Sunshine pageant in time. This is one of the funniest movies ever!

skeeter on October 20th, 2017
Because it would be a lot of dead weight.

badbob on May 19th, 2018
weekend at bernie's

DrCryptell on June 24th, 2018
Too heavy unless we use a wheelbarrow, but how could we ride the underground with it?

lertsek on June 30th, 2018
You could use the diamond lanes on the freeway

[LLapp]

And then, suddenly . . .

"The future influences the present just as much as the past." ≈ Friedrich Nietzsche

kb83 on October 6th, 2015
Okay, does this mean that the future influences the present just as much as the past influences the present, or that the future influences the present just as much as it influences the past?

LLapp on May 5th, 2016
Good question. As written it means nothing, because the second verb is implicit but not clearly positioned. It should say either "just as much as it does the past" or "just as much as the past does." Without explicit placement of "does," you don't know which noun -- "the future" or "the past" -- is the actor for it. The translator failed us on this one.

LLapp on December 7th, 2016
Hold on, I just saw the movie "Arrival" and, to quote the tetrapods, there is no time. What Nietzsche is saying here is that Amy Adams is his grandmother.

kb83 on January 9th, 2018
He does have her lips.

LLapp on May 3rd, 2018
How can you tell??

imsoeasy on December 23rd, 2018
There is no future just as there is no past. The idea of future is based on memories of the past. Sci-fi aside, you only live or die now.

jnoodles on February 19th, 2019
imsoeasy There is no present. By the time we experience and process something, it is in the past.

Roxanne on February 20th, 2019
This time it's not the translator's fault. I looked up the quotation, and the original German is "Die Zukunft beeinflusst die Gegenwart genauso wie die Vergangenheit." Notice the definite article 'die' before all three nouns. Just as is the case with 'the' in English, 'die' is 'die' whether the noun it goes with is the subject or the object of the verb. I would like to think of this as ambiguous rather than meaningleннннннннннннннннннннннннннннннннннннннннн нннннннR HTIS IS ROKSANS KATT RITING. IM STANDIN ONN HUR LAPPTOPP. BECUZ IM STARRVIN. ITZ BIN 54 MINNITZ SINS I HADD ENNY FUD. WTF

[oddcouple]

"Don't ever prophesy; for if you prophesy wrong, nobody will forget it; and if you prophesy right, nobody will remember it. "
≈ Josh Billings

locodad on April 20th, 2013
how do you spell prophesy? I thought it was with a c

chopstix on September 12th, 2013
I agree with the c!

oddcouple on October 4th, 2013
Prophesy is a verb. Prophecy is a noun.

Lurker on May 25th, 2014
We went over this in another quote. Oddcouple is right.

Quizzical on June 17th, 2014
As for the quote, Billings is correct even today. The only difference - we have video recordings to remember. No matter how many times someone is correct with predictions, they get ignored.

kb83 on June 1st, 2015
Prophets prophesy prophecies.

marnita on October 6th, 2015
I will never remember which is which. This time I guessed right.

tgreen517 on October 31st, 2015
But do the profit from prophesying prophecies?

kb83 on December 23rd, 2015
tgreen517-- How much profit could a prophet profit from prophesying prophecies if a prophet could profit from prophesying prophecies?

abra on January 18th, 2016
I remember the comments under the other quote. I still got it wrong, but I knew where the error was.

killdozer on August 19th, 2016
Quizzical, who has ever been correct with predictions?

Quizzical on January 23rd, 2018
It depends on your timing, Killdozer. I have been about 50% correct in forecasting yesterday's weather.

blueladyblue on May 31st, 2018
You guys are all weird.

mmfs83 on June 12th, 2018
I was slow because I prophecied.

DrCryptell on September 1st, 2018
I prophesy that someday they'll change the spelling of prophesy, the verb, to conform to prophecy, the noun, if for no other reason, to make it easier to solve cryptograms.

DrCryptell on November 29th, 2018
I phorgot how to spell it.

[LLapp]

WOW - I didn't even notice it was post 1,000! Amazing.

Thanks for that nice note, Oddcouple. Yes, this is still fun. The comments are the prize at the bottom of the box.

Lisa

[oddcouple]

Post number 1001

And Lisa has given us our 1000th post on the thread. Highly appropriate since she started it. Hope it goes another 1000. It's been a lot of fun finding comments to post and to read those that others have found. Thanks, Lisa!

[LLapp]

"He who is not contented with what he has, would not be contented with what he would like to have." ≈ Socrates

puffybob on February 9th, 2013
More quotes about how the poor should pipe down.

jstrider on November 5th, 2013
In a way this is speaking towards those who covet what others have. I've noticed that when I finally get something another person has, I'm not always that happy with it.

montyb on October 22nd, 2014
I agree with jstrider. It seems the person I took it from is always a bit teed off about it. Who needs that?

SippyGurl on September 26th, 2015
lol montyb

jnoodles on October 28th, 2016
Give it back!!!!! Oh well. I guess I should be content with what I have left after montyb robbed me and ran off with my wife in my car. Life is good.

[oddcouple]

"It is impossible for a man to learn what he thinks he already knows."
≈ Epictetus

wvwoman on September 21st, 2012
i know i'm glad i'm not a man with the name epictetus--goodness!!

wolf on March 17th, 2015
Then again, maybe Epicetus is Greek for "Smith".

SippyGurl on October 17th, 2015
your epictetus are showing

LLapp on July 3rd, 2016
They can't be; I had them removed.

killdozer on September 5th, 2016
Yeah, yeah, tell me something I DON'T know.

seastar228 on January 29th, 2018
Don't bother to ask directions either.