Surprise Quotes - Page 17

• Marriage is a lot like the army, everyone complains, but you'd be surprise at the large number that re-enlist.

  James Garner

  Best Love, Army, Numbers

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• When one would make a surprise attack on the enemy, he should avoid the major roads and seek out the lesser ones. Then attack.

  Takeda Nobushige

  War, Enemy, Should

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• Repeatedly place your pet opinions and prejudices before God. He will surprise you by showing you that the best of them need refining and some the purification of destruction.

  Charles Brent

  Prayer, Pet, Prejudice

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• Sometimes we do get taken by surprise. For example, when the Internet came along, we had it as a fifth or sixth priority.

  Bill Gates

  Taken, Priorities, Example

  Bill Gates' Speech at the University of Washington, archive.fortune.com. July 20, 1998.

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• ~One surprise of motherhood for me was how little control I have. I thought it would be a blissful romance with me at the helm, cuddling this little creature. It's been bittersweet and humbling to let her lead and to not try to be perfect myself.~

  Amanda Peet

  Parenting, Motherhood, Cuddling

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• Despite our preparation, indeed, despite our age, [the death of a parent] dislodges things deep in us, sets off reactions that surprise us and may cut free memories and feelings that we thought had gone to ground long ago. We might, in that indeterminate period they call mourning, be in a submarine, silent on the ocean's bed, aware of the depth charges, now near and now far, buffeting us with recollections.

  Joan Didion

  Memories, Ocean, Cutting

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• Expect the best, plan for the worst, and prepare to be surprised.

  Denis Waitley

  Motivational, Success, Disappointment

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• Buying my wife a gun sort of like me saying, ' You know, I kinda want to kill myself, but I want it to be a surprise'.

  Marc Maron

  Suicidal, Gun, Wife

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• The nicest Father's Day surprise of all for Dad would be if you handed him a box, and he unwrapped it, and there, inside, sitting on a bed of folded tissue, was the pair of his undershorts that somebody threw away six months ago (without asking Dad) because they had reached the stage where they were 3 percent undershorts and 97 percent holes. Dad misses those undershorts. They were his Faithful Undershorts Companion.

  Dave Barry

  Fathers Day, Dad, Missing

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• That small circle of earth became a second home to both of us. Gardening boring? Never! It has surprise, tragedy, startling developments - a soap opera growing out of the ground. I'd forgotten that tremolo of expectation produced by a tiny forest of sprouts.

  Paul Fleischman

  Home, Garden, Circles

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• Tennis is like a wonderful, longstanding relationship with a husband. Golf is a tempestuous, lousy lover; it's totally unpredicatable, a constant surprise.

  Dinah Shore

  Husband, Golf, Tennis

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• With some basic skills, ambition and persistence, then there is little limit to what you can achieve, and by trying you can often surprise yourself.

  Joe Gold

  Ambition, Persistence, Skills

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• Whenever I meet with anything agreeable in this world it surprises me so much - and pleases me so much (when my passions are not interested in one way or the other) that I go on wondering for a week to come.

  Lord Byron

  Passion, Please Me, Goes On

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• Life is a series of surprises.

  Ralph Waldo Emerson

  Life, Anticipation, Series

  Ralph Waldo Emerson (1983). “Essays and Lectures”, p.483, Library of America

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• The great man is too often all of a piece; it is the little man that is a bundle of contradictory elements. He is inexhaustible. You never come to the end of the surprises he has in store for you.

  W. Somerset Maugham

  Greatness, Men, Pieces

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• It's shocking the things we call love.

  Deb Caletti

  Shocking Things, Shocking

  Deb Caletti (2010). “The Secret Life of Prince Charming”, p.83, Simon and Schuster

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• and yet, you never knew wwhat you were capable of until you arrived at that given moment. Life was just a whole string of spots where you continued to surprise yourself.

  Jodi Picoult

  Moments, Strings, Spots

  Jodi Picoult (2006). “The Tenth Circle: A Novel”, p.270, Simon and Schuster

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• Oh, if I had had a friend at this moment, a friend in an attic room, dreaming by candlelight and with a violin lying ready at his hand! How I should have slipped up to him in his quiet hour, noiselessly climbing the winding stair to take him by surprise, and then with talk and music we should have held heavenly festival throughout the night!

  Hermann Hesse

  Dream, Lying, Night

  Hermann Hesse (2013). “Steppenwolf: A Novel”, p.36, Macmillan

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• He lifed his head and looked down at her seriously. "Could you," he began, then he had to clear his throat. "Could you learn to be fond of me?" he asked. "With enough time?" She looked at him in surprise. It was the first time in all their acquaintance that she'd heard him sound the least bit hesitant. "I don't need to learn anything," she said, before she thought better of it.

  Lynn Kurland

  Sound, Enough Time, Needs

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• Well, hello there, Mother,” Sebastian said in a voice like silk. “Surprised to see me?

  Cassandra Clare

  Mother, Voice, Hello

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• I love you, I know this must come as something of a surprise, since all I’ve ever done is scorn you and degrade you and taunt you, but I have loved you for several hours now, and every second, more. I thought an hour ago that I loved you more than any woman has ever loved a man, but a half hour after that I knew that what I felt before was nothing compared to what I felt then. But ten minutes after that, I understood that my previous love was a puddle compared to the high seas before a storm.

  William Goldman

  Love You, Men, Sea

  William Goldman (2013). “The Princess Bride”, p.44, A&C Black

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• Has the dark shadow really disappeared? Or is it inside me, concealed, waiting for its chance to reappear? Like a clever thief hidden inside a house, breathing quietly, waiting until everyone’s asleep. I have looked deep inside myself, trying to detect something that might be there. But just as our consciousness is a maze, so too is our body. Everywhere you turn there’s darkness, and a blind spot. Everywhere you find silent hints, everywhere a surprise is waiting for you.

  Haruki Murakami

  Clever, Dark, Breathing

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• A brown spotted lady-bug climbed the dizzy height of a grass blade, and Tom bent down close to it and said, "Lady-bug, lady-bug, fly away home, your house is on fire, your children's alone," and she took wing and went off to see about it -- which did not surprise the boy, for he knew of old that this insect was credulous about conflagrations, and he had practised upon its simplicity more than once.

  Mark Twain

  Children, Home, Boys

  Mark Twain (2012). “Adventures of Tom Sawyer Companion”, p.124, BookCaps Study Guides

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• Life catches you by surprise. It always does. But there's good mixed in with the bad. It's there. You just have to recognize it.

  Susan Beth Pfeffer

  Doe

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• When you've lived as long as I have, nothing much surprises you.

  Michael Scott

  Long

  Michael Scott (2007). “Alchemist”, Delacorte Books for Young Readers

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