Quotations (13)

1 to 13 of 13 items
Joseph Conrad said that if you wanted to know the age of the earth , look upon the sea in a storm ; if you want to know the age of the Powder River country , just be on the wrong side of a coal train . A guy who worked for the Burlington…
“ He as good as they say ? ” I waited and listened . “ When I hired him I told him two things : no man has any sense till age thirty - five and damn few afterwards . . === “ Never go after a man to arrest him unless you are certain you are…
“ About a third of all motel owners in the U.S . are called Patel — it’s a surname that indicates that they’re members of a Gujarati Hindu subcaste . ” I looked up at his confused face and figured I might as well educate him on the subject…
With more than thirty thousand suicides a year , the act is the tenth leading cause of death in the United States . The rates for those above sixty - five years of age are much higher than the average , and Holman was sixty - seven . Fifty…
We came around one of those big , sweeping turns and the thing just decided it wanted to go to Nebraska . . . She didn’t have on her belt and flew out on the first roll . ” === His ears went up at the word ham ; they say dogs have a…
“ Did Mom have any problems along these lines when she had me ? ” As always , I dropped back and punted with humor , even though the panes of my heart were cracking like ice in a warm glass . “ No , she dropped you in the field and kept…
“ Have you ever been married before ? ” “ A short period of time back , but I don’t think either one of us took it very seriously — like my great grandfather used to say , nobody misses a slice off an already - cut cake . ” === “ Don’t you…
Where the hell is Johnston Atoll ? ” I sipped my coffee , enjoying her full attention . “ Seven hundred and fifty nautical miles west of Hawaii on a coral reef platform ; it’s one of the United States ’ minor outlying islands — about 1.3…
“ Sometimes I get to where I feel like I’m the only one getting it in the shorts in this life , you know ? ” === “ Spasms . They gave me muscle relaxers and a brace . They said to take the medication before it starts really hurting . ” “…
It can take three to four minutes for the average train , which weighs more than three thousand tons , to pass through a crossing . It takes a full mile or more for a train to stop ; that’s sixteen football fields ; that’s even after it’s…
I was sweating like a bottle of beer in a biker bar . === “ I warned her that you were like a gun ; that we had to be careful where we pointed you . . . ” === I thought about shooting the lock as they do on TV shows like Steadfast…
The whole case wasn’t ending the way I’d hoped it would , but that was usually the scenario in my line of work . === It was a lonely pursuit we had chosen and one that always finished with reading one more report , making one more phone…
She stopped and turned to look at me , the slight wind pulling at her hair and long wool coat as if we were in some Brontë novel . She stood there like an unfinished phrase . === New Year’s Day and therefore the Mummers Parade === “ We’re…