Numbers Quotes - Page 26

• I'm trying to remember how you tell the time by looking at the sun." -"I should leave it for a while, it's too bright to see the numbers at the moment.

  Terry Pratchett

  Trying, Sun, Remember

  Terry Pratchett (1998). “The Last Continent: A Discworld Novel”, Harpercollins

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• Monsters exist, but they are too few in numbers to be truly dangerous. More dangerous are…the functionaries ready to believe and act without asking questions.

  Primo Levi

  Believe, Asking Questions, Holocaust

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• I wanted to tell them that, in Kabul, we snapped a tree branch and used it as a credit card. Hassan and I would take the wooden stick to the bread maker. He'd carve notches on our stick with his knife, one notch for each loaf of naan he'd pull for us from the tandoor's roaring flames. At the end of the month, my father paid him for the number of notches on the stick. That was it. No questions. No ID.

  Khaled Hosseini

  Father, Flames, Knives

  Khaled Hosseini (2004). “The Kite Runner”, p.104, Penguin

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• There are 10^11 stars in the galaxy. That used to be a huge number. But it's only a hundred billion. It's less than the national deficit! We used to call them astronomical numbers. Now we should call them economical numbers.

  Richard P. Feynman

  Stars, Learning, Science

  "Richard P. Feynman, Teacher". David L. Goodstein, "Physics Today", Volume 42, No. 2, February 1989.

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• If we're mad, we're mad in large numbers, at least larger than yours.

  Shannon Hale

  Mad, Large Numbers, Ifs

  Shannon Hale (2010). “The Goose Girl”, p.80, A&C Black

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• In many places it is literally not safe physically for youngsters to go to school. And in many schools, and its becoming almost generally true, it is spiritually unsafe to attend public schools. Look back over the history of education to the turn of the century and the beginning of the educational philosophies, pragmatism and humanism were the early ones, and they branched out into a number of other philosophies which have led us now into a circumstance where our schools are producing the problems that we face.

  Boyd K. Packer

  Philosophy, Educational, School

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• Every day we're told that we live in the greatest country on earth. And it's always stated as an undeniable fact: Leos are born between July 23 and August 22, fitted queen-size sheets measure sixty by eighty inches, and America is the greatest country on earth. Having grown up with this in our ears, it's startling to realize that other countries have nationalistic slogans of their own, none of which are 'We're number two!

  David Sedaris

  Country, Queens, Two

  David Sedaris (2000). “Me talk pretty one day”

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• The paper does not provide the exact number of penises eaten by ducks, but the author says there have been enough over the years to prompt the coining of a popular saying: 'I better get home or the ducks will have something to eat.

  Mary Roach

  Sex, Home, Years

  Mary Roach (2009). “Bonk: The Curious Coupling of Science and Sex”, p.192, W. W. Norton & Company

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• You mean they killed her?" asked David. They ate her," said Brother Number One. "With porridge. That's what 'ran away and was never seen again' means in these parts. It means 'eaten.'" Um and what about 'happily ever after'?" asked David, a little uncertainly. "What does that mean?" Eaten quickly," said Brother Number One.

  John Connolly

  Brother, Mean, Doe

  John Connolly (2006). “The Book of Lost Things: A Novel”, p.129, Simon and Schuster

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• It was strictly forbidden to preach to other prisoners. It was understood that whoever was caught doing this received a severe beating. A number of us decided to pay the price for the privilege of preaching, so we accepted their [the communists' ] terms. It was a deal; we preached and they beat us. We were happy preaching. They were happy beating us, so everyone was happy.

  Richard Wurmbrand

  Pay The Price, Privilege, Communist

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• Tom had traveled around the sun eleven times when the delivery truck brought his mother's newest fridge, but a number doesn't really describe his age.

  N.D. Wilson

  Mother, Age, Sun

  N. D. Wilson (2008). “Leepike Ridge”, p.2, Random House Books for Young Readers

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• Jokes of the proper kind, properly told, can do more to enlighten questions of politics, philosophy, and literature than any number of dull arguments.

  Isaac Asimov

  Wise, Philosophy, Political

  Isaac Asimov (1991). “Isaac Asimov's Treasury of Humor: A Lifetime Collection of Favorite Jokes, Anecdotes, and Limericks with Copious Notes on how to Tell Them and why”, p.9, Houghton Mifflin Harcourt

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• Isn't it so weird how the number of dead people is increasing even though the Earth stays the same size, so that one day there isn't going to be room to bury anyone anymore?

  Jonathan Safran Foer

  People, One Day, Earth

  Jonathan Safran Foer (2013). “Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close: A Novel”, p.3, Houghton Mifflin Harcourt

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• Publishers are notoriously slothful about numbers, unless they're attached to dollar signs - unlike journalists, quarterbacks, and felony criminal defendants who tend to be keenly aware of numbers at all times.

  Hunter S. Thompson

  Criminals, Dollars, Quarterback

  Hunter S. Thompson (2012). “Songs of the Doomed: More Notes on the Death of the American Dream”, p.291, Pan Macmillan

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• We all have a vast number of areas in which we have no talent or skill and little chance of becoming even mediocre. In those areas a knowledge workers should not take on work, jobs and assignments. It takes far more energy to improve from incompetence to mediocrity than it takes to improve from first-rate performance to excellence.

  Peter Drucker

  Jobs, Skills, Excellence

  Peter Drucker, Alan Kantrow, Rick Wartzman, Julia Kirby (2016). “Get the Right Things Done: The Drucker Collection (6 Items)”, p.12, Harvard Business Review Press

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• I can't even dial one phone number right away. But you strained your own body to go and see them. I was surprised. The frightened little me had always wondered how to swim through the vast ocean, but you didn't even want a ship. You wanted wings. I thought you were amazing.

  Arina Tanemura

  Ocean, Wings, Phones

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• the number 108 is held to be the most auspicious, a perfect three-digit multiple of three, its components adding up to 9, which is three threes. And 3, of course, is the number representing supreme balance.

  Elizabeth Gilbert

  Perfect, Balance, Three

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• The holiday season is a time for storytelling, and whether you are hearing the story of a candelabra staying lit for more than a week, or a baby born in a barn without proper medical supervision, these stories often feature miracles. Miracles are like pimples, because once you start looking for them you find more than you ever dreamed you'd see, and this holiday story features any number of miracles, depending on your point of view.

  Daniel Handler

  Baby, Holiday, Views

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• EVERY ENDING IS A NEW BEGINNING. YOUR LUCKY NUMBER IS NONE. YOUR LUCKY COLOUR IS DEAD. Motto: LIKE FATHER, LIKE SON.

  Neil Gaiman

  Father, New Beginnings, Son

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• I am your number one fan.

  Stephen King

  Fans, Horror

  Stephen King (2016). “Insomnia”, p.689, Simon and Schuster

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• You've used up all your school sick days," he said, persuing my file. "You've requested to leave school one hundred and thirty days out of the one hudred and forty days of school so far." So thirty-one might be the magic number?" Principal Reed and Raven

  Ellen Schreiber

  School, Ravens, Sick

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• I knew chemistry would be worse, because I'd seen a big card of the ninety-odd elements hung up in the chemistry lab, and all the perfectly good words like gold and silver and cobalt and aluminum were shortened to ugly abbreviations with different decimal numbers after them.

  Sylvia Plath

  Perfectly Good, Gold, Different

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• As a child, my number one best friend was the librarian in my grade school. I actually believed all those books belonged to her.

  Erma Bombeck

  Children, Book, School

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• All of that is true,’ responded Don Quixote, ‘but we cannot all be friars, and God brings His children to heaven by many paths: chivalry is a religion, and there are sainted knights in Glory.’ Yes,’ responded Sancho, ‘but I’ve heard that there are more friars in heaven than knights errant.’ That is true,’ responded Don Quixote, ‘because the number of religious is greater than the number of knights.’ There are many who are errant,’ said Sancho. Many,’ responded Don Quixote, ‘but few who deserve to be called knights.

  Miguel de Cervantes

  Religious, Children, Knights

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• Is despair wrong? Isn’t it the natural condition of life after a certain age? … After a number of events, what is there left but repetition and diminishment? Who wants to go on living? The eccentric, the religious, the artistic (sometimes); those with a false sense of their own worth. Soft cheeses collapse; firm cheeses endurate. Both go mouldy.

  Julian Barnes

  Religious, Despair, Age

  Julian Barnes (1985). “Flaubert's parrot”, Alfred a Knopf Inc

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