On a peanut farm in Asia with no floor.
— Andrew Yang, 3rd Democratic Debate
Things happen by accident, but nothing gets left by accident.
— Emily Eveleth recounting something her husband says
You could research the stuff and use it. You didn't have to know it.
— Sid on his Dictionary of Foreign Quotations by Robert and Mary Collison
Smothered mate.
— Alex, a chess player in Washington Square Park
Washington's contemporaries recognized that compulsive note taking, this itch to record every action, went to the very essence.
— Ron Chernow, Washington: A Life
When Gilbert Stuart painted them a more brilliant blue, he explained that in a hundred years they would fade to the right color.
— Ron Chernow, Washington: A Life
I loved that it was so shit! It was so out of style to collect these nostalgic things but also so in style to have a Damien Hirst and I kept playing with that. It was like alchemy... I was getting into pairs of objects too, I'd bought 2 of everything wherever I could and I used them as pairs in this piece. I love the confidence you get with two shit things, it makes them good. If you make a horrible painting then paint it again and hang both side by side it becomes super hard to dismiss it, or them.
— @damienhirst
Its growing number of directorates and departments were producing mountains of information that had no clear purpose, application, or meaning.
— Masha Gessen, The Man Without a Face: The Unlikely Rise of Vladimir Putin
Mythology distracts us everywhere. For the great enemy of the truth is very often not the lie: deliberate, contrived, and dishonest. But the myth: persistent, persuasive, and unrealistic.
— JFK, Introductory Segment from Kennedy Library & Museum Rededication Film (1993), rearranged sentances from JFK's commencement address at Yale on June 11, 1962
Close reading takes time! What a great format for a course.
— @phillipdenny on @johnmcmorrough's post about "Arch 603: Reading: Delirious New York"
"It seems like something that could easily be misconstrued," he said, adding, "In a world without any discrimination, understanding human behavior is a noble goal, but we don't live in that world."
— Pam Belluck quoting Steven Reilly, "Many Genes Influence Same-Sex Sexuality, Not a Single ‘Gay Gene’," The New York Times
Pope Francis told the crowd he was stuck in an elevator for 25 minutes.
— Sylvia Poggioli, NPR
Ike's unusual ability to think like his superiors paid dividends.
— Jean Edward Smith, Eisenhower: In War and Peace
I kind of like things that play you.
— David
So we start fighting all of that by doing error correcting codes and... there's this whole set of technology about how you work with unreliable systems.
— John Carmack, "Joe Rogan Experience #1342 - John Carmack"
As it happened, he had become interested in democratic constitutions and over the holidays had read all then in force.
— William Manchester, American Caesar: Douglas MacArthur 1880 - 1964
It's the placebo that works.
— A*
There is a universal sameness in the emotions of men.
— Douglas MacArthur, via William Manchester, American Caesar: Douglas MacArthur 1880 - 1964
Oh hi, I was about to reach out to you.
— Lily picking up the phone after I lost her in Target
What could possibly be so interesting?
— Lily as I stop to take a photo of a porch railing