β
Discipline allows magic. To be a writer is to be the very best of assassins. You do not sit down and write every day to force the Muse to show up. You get into the habit of writing every day so that when she shows up, you have the maximum chance of catching her, bashing her on the head, and squeezing every last drop out of that bitch.
β
β
Lili St. Crow
β
My grandmother's greatest gift was tolerance. Now, in the old days, Indians used to be forgiving of any kind of eccentricity. In fact, weird people were often celebrated. Epileptics were often shamans because people just assumed that God gave seizure-visions to the lucky ones. Gay people were seen as magical too. I mean, like in many cultures, men were viewed as warriors and women were viewed as caregivers. But gay people, being both male and female, were seen as both warriors and caregivers. Gay people could do anything. They were like Swiss Army knives! My grandmother had no use for all the gay bashing and homophobia in the world, especially among other Indians. "Jeez," she said, Who cares if a man wants to marry another man? All I want to know is who's going to pick up all the dirty socks?
β
β
Sherman Alexie (The Absolutely True Diary of a Part-Time Indian)
β
She plunged her snout into my hair and took a deep shuddering breath.
A warm string of drool dripped from her open maw onto my bare shoulder.
I forced myself to stay very calm, and after a moment, she released me.
Giving a bashful shrug, she said, "Sorry. Werewolf thing."
"Hey, no problem," I said, even though all I could think was, Slobber! Werewolf slobber! On my skin!
β
β
Rachel Hawkins (Hex Hall (Hex Hall, #1))
β
Nothing is as irritating to a shy man as a confident girl.
β
β
Mokokoma Mokhonoana
β
She asked in a hesitant whisper, "Do you still think i'm a... A singularly unhorrible demon?"
"No," he said smiling. "I think you're magical, and brave, and exquisite. And..." His voice grew bashful. Only in a dream could he be so bold and speak such words. "I hope you'll let me be in your story.
β
β
Laini Taylor (Strange the Dreamer (Strange the Dreamer, #1))
β
Awkward. Sorry."
"Don't be," Sadie said. "I'll rather enjoy bashing my brother's face in.
β
β
Rick Riordan (The Staff of Serapis (Demigods & Magicians, #2))
β
Emma this is not a joke. Look at your hands! They're... they're... wrinkled!"
"Yes that's because-"
"No way. I'm not going down for this. This isn't my fault."
"Toraf-"
"Galen will find some way to blame me though. He always does. 'You wouldn't have gotten caught if you didn't swim so close to that boat, tadpole.' No it couldn't be the humans fault for fishing in the first place-"
"Toraf."
"Or how about. 'Maybe if you'd stop trying to kiss my sister, she'd stop bashing your head with a rock.' How does my kissing her have anything to do with her bashing my head with a rock? If you ask me, it's just a result of poor parenting-"
"Toraf."
"Oh and my favorite: 'If you play with a lionfish, you're going to get pricked.' I wasn't playing with it! I was just helping it swim faster by grabbing its fins-"
"TOR-AF."
He stops pacing along the water, even seems to remember that I exist. "Yes, Emma? What were you saying?
β
β
Anna Banks (Of Poseidon (The Syrena Legacy, #1))
β
What did you call me?"
"Ah. A chuisle. Gaelic. 'My darling'. I prefer the proper translation, mind you."
"Which is?"
He gave a bashful smile. "My pulse.
β
β
Tabitha McGowan (The Tied Man (The Tied Man, #1))
β
I don't care," Kami informed him. "All you are to me are sex objects that I choose to imagine bashing together at random. Oh, there you go again, look at that, nothing but Lynburn skin as far as the mind's eye can see. Masculine groans fill the air, husky and-"
"Stop it," Ash said in a faint voice. "That isn't fair."
Behind them, Jared was laughing. Kami glanced back at him and caught his eye: for once, it made her smile, as if amusement could still travel back and forth like a spark between them.
"Ash is right, this is totally unfair," Jared told her. "If you insist on this-"
"Oh, I do," Kami assured him.
"Then I insist on hooking up with Rusty instead of Ash. It's the least you can do."
"Ugh," Ash protested. "You guys, stop."
"She's making a point," Jared said blandly. "I recognize her right to do that. But considering the alternative, I want Rusty."
Ash gave this some thought. "Okay, I'll have Rusty too."
The sound of the door opening behind them made them all look up the stairs to where Rusty stood, with one eyebrow raised.
"Don't fight, boys," he remarked mildly. "There's plenty of Rusty to go around.
β
β
Sarah Rees Brennan (Untold (The Lynburn Legacy, #2))
β
And because I still feel like I haven't said enough - because I need to prove just how momentous this is for me, I bash down the barriers I've kept up for eight years, unleashing my aura for Anna to see. I shiver as I bare myself, and I feel Anna holding me tighter. I want her to see my love, like I saw hers once upon a time.
"Oh..." she whispers. "It's beautiful."
I shake my head. Only one thing deserves that word. "You're beautiful.
β
β
Wendy Higgins (Sweet Temptation (Sweet, #4))
β
I was just trying to get his attention!" the man protested at the top of his lungs. "If he'da listened, I wouldn'ta had to bash him.
β
β
J.D. Robb
β
Mind yourself in that guardroom," Gilan told him. Thorn grinned cheerfully. He never had any stomach butterflies before a fight. "I plan to be subtle," he said.
Gilan looked at him, his head tilted curiously. "How's that?"
"Once we go through that door, I'll bash anything that moves. And if they don't move, Stig will bash them."
"You have a strange concept of subtle," Gilan said.
Thorn's grin grew wider, "So I've been told.
β
β
John Flanagan (Slaves of Socorro (Brotherband Chronicles, #4))
β
He whipped the chair around and actually split one of the things in half with the impact, spilling the spray of blood that was reflective, like mercury.
John bellowed, "Anyone else want to donate blood to chair-ity?"
He ducked into the the door and bashed one monster right in the wig, screaming, "There's some dessert! With a chair-y on top!
β
β
David Wong (John Dies at the End (John Dies at the End, #1))
β
If you have never said "Excuse me" to a parking meter or bashed your shins on a fireplug, you are probably wasting too much valuable reading time.
β
β
Sherri Chasin Calvo
β
The lake is lovely," I commented, "And so big. I still find it hard to believe it's artificial."
"Oh, it's artificial, all right. Dive deep and you may bash your head on tree stumps.
β
β
Catherine Marshall (Julie)
β
I felt my hand curl into a fist. Felt my elbow draw back. Felt my arm dart forward, my knuckles crack into Cole's jaw. I couldn't stop myself. His head whipped to the side, and blood leaked from a cut in his lip. Behind me, gasps of shock abounded.
"I'm recovered," I said. "Believe me now?"
Those violet eyes slitted when they found me. "Assault and battery is illegal."
"So have me arrested."
He closed what little distance there was between us. Suddenly I could feel his warmth of his breath caressing my skin. "How about I put you over my lap and spank you instead?"
"How about I knee your balls into your throat?"
"If you're going to play with that particular area, I'd rather you use your hands."
"My hands aren't going near that area ever again."
A pause. Then, "I bet I could change your mind," he whispered huskily.
"I bet I could bash yours." I drew back another fist, but he was ready and caught me midswing. His pupils dilated, a sign of arousal. Another sign: he began to pant. He was acting like I'd tried to unbuckle his jeans rather than smack fire out of him.
"Hit me again," he said, still using the same whispered tone, "and I'll take it as an invitation."
I was just as bad. I trembled with longing I couldn't control and struggled to catch my breath. "An invitation to do what?"
His grip loosened, his fingers rubbing my skin. A caress, not a warning. "I guess we'll find out together.
β
β
Gena Showalter (Through the Zombie Glass (White Rabbit Chronicles, #2))
β
Wow, Angela and Holly,β Ash said, sounding awed. βHot.β
βExcuse me, what is wrong with you?β Kami demanded. βOther peopleβs sexuality is not your spectator sport.β
Ash paused. βOf course,β he said. βButββ
βNo!β Kami exclaimed. βNo buts. Thatβs my best friend youβre talking about. Your first reaction should not be βHot.β β
βItβs not an insult,β Ash protested.
βOh, okay,β Kami said. βIn that case, youβre going to give me a minute. Iβm picturing you and Jared. Naked. Entwined.β
There was a pause.
Then Jared said, βHe is probably my half brother, you know.β
βI donβt care,β Kami informed him. βAll you are to me are sex objects that I choose to imagine bashing together at random. Oh, there you go again, look at that, nothing but Lynburn skin as far as the mindβs eye can see. Masculine groans fill the air, husky and..."
"Stop it," Ash said in a faint voice. "That isn't fair.
β
β
Sarah Rees Brennan (Untold (The Lynburn Legacy, #2))
β
You did this on purpose," I said to Justin as the man continued to strap me in.
"Maybe," he said.
"What is it you're playing at? Your girlfriend is down there at the river."
"Let's jump together."
"Come on Lenah!" Tony called from below.
"If you jump with me, Tracy will know."
Justin stood up. "Know what?"
"I mean , she'll think you did it on purpose."
"I did do it on purpose," he said.
"You two," the bungee man said. "Keep you eyes open if you're jumping together. Don't bash heads or anything. I hate cleaning up blood."
"If you jump with me-" I started to say.
"I don't care anymore.
β
β
Rebecca Maizel (Infinite Days (Vampire Queen, #1))
β
She turns her head, throws the damn thing with a strong flick, and it lands in the side of a wooden heron's head. Holy shit. I can't believe it. Lust bashes me like a sledgehammer, and I suddenly imagine her naked.
"Dude!" Blake yells, snapping me back to reality.
Anna stares down at me like she's conquered me. "You showed your colors!"
"Did not," I reply quickly. But even as I say it, I think I bleedin' well might've.
β
β
Wendy Higgins (Sweet Temptation (Sweet, #4))
β
England once there lived a big
And wonderfully clever pig.
To everybody it was plain
That Piggy had a massive brain.
He worked out sums inside his head,
There was no book he hadn't read.
He knew what made an airplane fly,
He knew how engines worked and why.
He knew all this, but in the end
One question drove him round the bend:
He simply couldn't puzzle out
What LIFE was really all about.
What was the reason for his birth?
Why was he placed upon this earth?
His giant brain went round and round.
Alas, no answer could be found.
Till suddenly one wondrous night.
All in a flash he saw the light.
He jumped up like a ballet dancer
And yelled, "By gum, I've got the answer!"
"They want my bacon slice by slice
"To sell at a tremendous price!
"They want my tender juicy chops
"To put in all the butcher's shops!
"They want my pork to make a roast
"And that's the part'll cost the most!
"They want my sausages in strings!
"They even want my chitterlings!
"The butcher's shop! The carving knife!
"That is the reason for my life!"
Such thoughts as these are not designed
To give a pig great piece of mind.
Next morning, in comes Farmer Bland,
A pail of pigswill in his hand,
And piggy with a mighty roar,
Bashes the farmer to the floorβ¦
Now comes the rather grizzly bit
So let's not make too much of it,
Except that you must understand
That Piggy did eat Farmer Bland,
He ate him up from head to toe,
Chewing the pieces nice and slow.
It took an hour to reach the feet,
Because there was so much to eat,
And when he finished, Pig, of course,
Felt absolutely no remorse.
Slowly he scratched his brainy head
And with a little smile he said,
"I had a fairly powerful hunch
"That he might have me for his lunch.
"And so, because I feared the worst,
"I thought I'd better eat him first.
β
β
Roald Dahl
β
Harriet said, "You shouldn't have reminded me to sign that book, Peter."
"Why ever not? Have you suddenly become bashful about your hard-earned glories?"
"Because it watn's hers," said Harriet. "It was a library copy."
"Stroke of luck for the ratepaers of the City of Westminster," he said, grinning.
β
β
Jill Paton Walsh
β
I'm always gonna protect you. And I'm always gonna protect that little girl. There's no way in hell I'll let that woman get her hands on her."
"Rafael," I said.
"Yeah?"
"You are the most wonderful person I've ever known."
It took him a moment to answer me--and when he did, I though he sounded bashful.
"I'd better be," he said. "Because, you know. That's what you deserve.
β
β
Rose Christo (Why the Star Stands Still (Gives Light, #4))
β
Listen, assholes," he said. "I'm too gay to enjoy this catfight. Knock it off or I'll bash your heads together.
β
β
Andy Weir (Artemis)
β
Actually, I came because I have a last-minute invitation. My friend Erika Gill is having a big party tomorrow night, one of those all-out birthday bashes that girls like. Want to go?"
----------------------------------------
"No. Sorry."
"Since it's a catered thing, at a restaurant, I'll pick you up at- what did you say?"
"I'm sorry. I can't do it."
----------------------------------------
"You're busy?"
"I just can't do it," I said.
β
β
Elizabeth Chandler (The Back Door of Midnight (Dark Secrets, #5))
β
I hurried to the southern corridor, relieved when I was safe in the blackness there. Relieved and horrified. It was really over now.
I'm so afraid, I whimpered.
Before Mel could respond, a heavy hand dropped on my shoulder from the darkness.
"Going somewhere?"
I was so tightly wound that I shrieked in terror; I was so terrified that my shriek was only a breathless little squeal.
"Sorry!" Jared's arm went round my shoulders, comforting. "I'm sorry. I didn't mean to scare you."
"What are you doing here?" I demanded, still breathless.
"Following you. I've been following you all night."
"Well, stop it now."
There was a hesitation in the dark, and his arm didn't move. I shrugged out from under it, but he caught my wrist. His grip was firm; I wouldn't be able to shake free easily.
"You're going to see Doc?" he asked, and there was no confusion in his question. It was obvious that he wasn't talking about a social visit.
"Of course I am." I hissed the words so that he wouldn't hear the panic in my voice. "What else can I do after today?It's not going to get any better. And this isn't Jeb's decision to make."
"I know. I'm on your side."
It made me angry that these words still had the power to hurt me, to bring tears stinging into my eyes. I tried to hold onto the thought of Ian - he was the anchor, as Kyle somehow had been for Sunny - but it was hard with Jared's hand touching me, with the smell of him in my nose. Like trying to make out the song of one violin when the entire percussion section was bashing away...
"Then let me go, Jared. Go away. I want to be alone." The words came out fierce and fast and hard. It was easy to hear that they weren't lies.
"I should come with you."
"You'll have Melanie back soon enough," I snapped. "I'm only asking for a few minutes, Jared. Give me that much."
Another pause; his hand didn't loosen.
"Wanda, I would come to be with you."
The tears spilled over. I was grateful for the darkness.
"It wouldn't feel that way," I whispered. "So there's no point.
β
β
Stephenie Meyer (The Host (The Host, #1))
β
His eyes lit up. "We're on a date?" he asked.
I looked down, feeling bashful. "Don't push it.
β
β
John Green (The Fault in Our Stars)
β
I end up watching this movie about some girl who's supposed to be so smart and edgy and unpopular. She wears glasses, that's how you know she's so smart. And she's the only one that has dark hair in the school- a place that looks like Planet Blond.
Anyway, she somehow ends up going to the prom- hello, gag- and she doesn't wear her glasses, so suddenly she's all beautiful. And she's bashful and shy because she doesn't feel comfortable wearing a dress. But then the guy says something like, "Wow, I never knew you were so pretty," and she feels on top of the world.
So, basically, the whole point is she's pretty. Oh, and smart, too. But what's really important here is that she's pretty.
For a second I think about Katie. About her thin little Clarissa Le Fey.
It must be a pain being fat. There are NO fat people on Planet Blond.
I don't get it. I mean, even movies where the actress is smart- like they seem like they'd be smart in real life, they're all gorgeous. And they usually get a boyfriend somewhere in the story. Even if they say they don't want one. They always, always end up falling in love, and you're supposed to be like, "Oh, good."
I once said this to my mom, and she laughed. "Honey, Hollywood... reality- two different universes. Don't make yourself crazy."
Which made me feel pretty pathetic. Like I didn't know the difference between a movie and the real world.
But then when everyone gets on you about your hair and your clothes and your this and your that, and "Are you fat?" and "Are you sexy?" you start thinking, Hey, maybe I'm not the only one who can't tell the difference between movies and reality.
Maybe everyone really does think you can look like that. And that you should look like that.
Because, you know, otherwise you might not get to go to the prom and fall in love.
β
β
Mariah Fredericks (Head Games)
β
We have more patience for girls who act like boys than boys who act like girls. A tomboy is considered cute. One day sheβll shuck her muddy jeans and put on a dress, and everyone will gasp at her beauty. Theyβll all laugh about her tree-climbing, frog-catching days.
But thereβs no such tolerance for the boy who puts on a dress, who wants a toy kitchen or a baby doll to love. Jung would say that this is because, even culturally, our anima is repressed, hated, derided. We hate our female selves. A boyish girl is perfectly acceptable. A girlish boy? Not so much. In certain places, youβd get your ass kicked, find yourself "gay-bashed." You might even get yourself killed. That's how much we hate our anima.
β
β
Lisa Unger (In the Blood)
β
You did say," Rusty pointed out with a virtuous air, "that you wanted me to teach everyone how to defend themselves."
"Is that what you were doing?" Jared asked, swiping at his bloody mouth. "Teaching?"
"You have to use a firm hand," Rusty said earnestly. "That's how you learn. I'm very dedicated to my craft. And I was not planning on the lesson getting so out of hand. That was your fault. You have absolutely no concept of any sort of fighting technique. You kept trying to bash me with stuff. This is why I never go for blonds. They are all vicious creatures."
"I do have a fighting technique," Jared informed him. "It is a little-known discipline known as 'winning'.
β
β
Sarah Rees Brennan (Untold (The Lynburn Legacy, #2))
β
Italy: It's been a while since I slept with you, Romano.
Romano: Shut up! You should have at least two beds in your place!
Italy: How weird... I usually sleep together with Germany and Japan.
Romano: [Grabs Italy's throat] You still get along with them!
[Repeatedly bashes his head into his brother's]
Italy: Bro, I can't breathe. Bro, I can't breathe!
[Cut to Germany's office; his phone is ringing. He picks it up]
Italy: Germany, save me! I'm on my bed and my brother is- ow!
Romano: Not there!
Italy: It's stuck! OW!
Romano: Put down the phone, you fool!
Italy: TAKE IT OUT!
Romano: Put it down!
[Line goes dead]
Germany: [Slightly disturbed] His brother's... stuck..."ow"... take it out...
[Germany bursts into Italy's room]
Italy: Italy, are you okay! What's going-!
[He realizes the brothers' signature hair curls are merely tangled with each other]
Italy: Germany, you're late!
β
β
Hidekaz Himaruya
β
I think i might love you."
He gave me a smile I'd never seen on him before: bashful and crooked, and big enough to wrinkle the corners of his eyes.
"I thought you were going to tell me a secret. I've known that for ages.
β
β
Crystal Smith (Bloodleaf (Bloodleaf, #1))
β
Evil Hall had been transformed into a magnificent ballroom, glittering with green tinsel, black balloons, thousands of green-flamed candles, and a spinning chandelier streaking wall murals with emerald bursts of light. Around a towering ice sculpture of two entwined snakes, Hort and Dot stumbled through a waltz, Anadil wrapped her arms around Vex, Brone tried not to step on Mona's green feet, and Hester and Ravan swayed and whispered as more villainous couples waltzed around them. Ravan's bunk mates picked up the music on reed violins as more pairs flooded onto the floor, clumsy, bashful, but aglow with happiness, dancing beneath a spangled banner:
THE 1ST ANNUAL VILLAINS "NO BALL
β
β
Soman Chainani (The School for Good and Evil (The School for Good and Evil, #1))
β
"We are an army of lovers because it is we who know what love is." It's saying gay people know more about love than anyone else because they've risked so much to have it: prejudice, bashings, bullying, banishment, disease, death.
β
β
Derek Milman (Swipe Right for Murder)
β
What happened?" I ask. My heart hurts.
"That big guy," he says. His voice is high and tight. "Number forty-six. Jeez, he just bashed his shoulder right into my chest, and when I was on the ground, he steps on my leg with his cleat." He sniffs hard, rubs his nose on his sleeve, doesn't meet my eyes.
"That bastard," I say. "The minute he gets off the field I'm going to kick him in the balls." Oliver laughs a little, his eyes filling up at the same time. "He'll never know what hit him. His balls are gonna go flying, I promise you that. People will wish they brought their catcher's mitts.
β
β
Deb Caletti (The Nature of Jade)
β
When I was little, my granny trained me to say, 'My colors are blush and bashful,' which was adorably cheesy and from Steel Magnolias, of course. Now my colors are more like fuchsia, sunset, and blush, but I've remained a clichΓ©d pink girl for life." Cassie fingered a piece of linen best described as bubblegum pink. "I've avoided Pepto-Bismol at least, so that's a win, right?
β
β
Mary Hollis Huddleston (Without a Hitch)
β
Do we talk about feeling neglected and rejected by the Church? Yes. Do we bash a bishop or two, talk a little trash about the Vatican, moan about a priest who said something dumb about women or gays or both? Sure. But mostly we talk about what faith does for us, how it moves us through life with an awareness of other people's suffering, and drives us to do something about that suffering. It reminds me of a conversation I had with Father Mellow, way back on the first night I spoke to him. "The Church is both sinner and holy," he said. "So are all of us.
β
β
Kaya Oakes (Radical Reinvention: An Unlikely Return to the Catholic Church)
β
I trudged down the stairs and stood on the sidewalk examining my car. Deep scratch in the roof from a misplaced bullet. Hole in windsheild plus embeddedbullet in passenger seat. Bashed-in right rear quarter panel and right passenger-side door from slegehammer. Previous damage from creepy gun attack by insane stalker, And someone had spray painted EAT ME on the driver's side door.
"Your car's a mess,"Lula said. "I don't know what it is with you and cars.
β
β
Janet Evanovich (Eleven on Top (Stephanie Plum, #11))
β
Art", "Bop" and "rock and roll" and whatever is all just a joke and a mistake, just a hunka foolishness so stop treating it with any seriousness or respect at all and just recognize the fact that it's nothing but a wham-o toy to bash around as you please in the nursery, it's nothing but a goddam Bonusburger so just gobble the stupid thing and burp and go for the next one tomorrow; and don't worry about the fact that it's a joke and a mistake and a bunch of foolishness as if that's gonna cause people to disregard it and do it in or let it dry up and die, because it is the strogest, most virulent, most invincible Superjoke in history, nothing could ever destroy it ever, and the reason for that is precisely that it is a joke, a mistake, foolishness. The first mistake of art is to assume that it's serious.
β
β
Lester Bangs (Psychotic Reactions and Carburetor Dung)
β
There are
people everywhere. Lindsay wants to be sick, it's like he can
feel
all their
eyes on him, but he does it anyway and when he finally moves away a
good minute later Valentine seems to have turned from himself into a silly
bashful schoolgirl, blushing and smiling and not quite looking up.
"Oh," he says, like that explains everything.
"Yeah."
"Thank you."
"That's a shit thing to say when somebody's just ripped all his
principles in half to make you feel better."
"Thank you very much?"
"You're welcome.
β
β
Richard Rider (No Beginning, No End (Stockholm Syndrome, #3))
β
Rachel left," he says, sighing. "Says she's never coming back."
Galen nods. "She always says that. It's probably for the better tonight, though." They both wince as Rayna plants the ball of her foot in Emma's back, splaying her across the sea of shards.
"I taught her that," Toraf says.
"It's a good move."
Neither of the combatants seem to care about the rain, lightning, or the whereabouts of their hostess. The storm billows in, drenching the furniture, the TV, the strange art on the wall. No wonder Rachel didn't want to see this. She fussed over this stuff for days.
"So, it kind of threw me when she said she didn't like fish," Toraf says.
"I noticed. Surprised me, too, but everything else is there."
"Bad temper."
"The eyes."
"That white hair is shocking though, isn't it?"
"Yeah, I like it. Shut up." Galen throws a sideways glare at his friend, whose grin makes him ball his fists.
"Hard bones and thick skin, obviously. There's no sign of blood. And she took some pretty hard hits from Rayna," Toraf continues neutrally.
Galen nods, relaxes his fists.
"Plus, you feel the pull-" Toraf is greeted with a forceful shove that sends him skidding on one foot across the slippery marble floor. Laughing, he comes back to stand beside Galen again.
"Jackass," Galen mutters.
"Jackass? What's a jackass?"
"Not sure. Emma called me that today when she was irritated with me."
"You're insulting me in human-talk now? I'm disappointed in you, minnow." Toraf nods toward the girls. "Shouldn't we break this up soon?"
"I don't think so. I think they need to work this out on their own."
"What about Emma's head?"
Galen shrugs. "Seems fine right now. Or she wouldn't have bashed the window into pieces with her forehead.
β
β
Anna Banks (Of Poseidon (The Syrena Legacy, #1))
β
Nim Xik: To start his day off this badly was actually encouraging, he thought. Maybe this would finally be the worst day of his life.
β
β
Dan LaBash (Adventures in Aakbal: The Nagual Heart)
β
If your self-talk leans toward the negative, the continual bashing will become debilitating
β
β
Susan C. Young (The Art of Being: 8 Ways to Optimize Your Presence & Essence for Positive Impact (The Art of First Impressions for Positive Impact, #1))
β
SCREE! the strix yelled, ruffling its feathers.
"What do you mean 'you need to kill us'?" Grover asked.
Meg scowled. "You can talk to it?"
"Well, yes," Grover said. "It's an animal."
"Why didn't you tell us what it was saying before now?" Meg asked.
"Because it was just yelling scree!" Grover said. "Now it's saying scree as in, it needs to kill us."
I tried to move my legs. They seemed to have turned into sacks of cement, which I found vaguely amusing. I could still move my arms and had some feeling in my chest, but I wasn't sure how long that would last.
"Perhaps ask the strix why it needs to kill us?" I suggested.
"Scree!" Grover said.
I was getting tired of the strix language. The bird replied in a series of squawks and clicks.
Meanwhile, out in the corridor, the other strixes shrieked and bashed against the net of plants. Black talons and gold beaks poked out, snapping tomatoes into pico de gallo. I figured we had a few minutes at most until the birds burst through and killed us all, but their razor-sharp beaks sure were cute!
Grover wrung his hands. "The strix says he's been sent to drink our blood, eat our flesh and disembowel us, not necessarily in that order. He says he's sorry, but it's a direct command from the emperor."
"Stupid emperors," Meg grumbled. "Which one?"
"I don't know," Grover said. "The strix just calls him Scree."
"You can translate disembowel," she noted, "but you can't translate the emperor's name?
β
β
Rick Riordan (The Burning Maze (The Trials of Apollo, #3))
β
An hour later, thoroughly appalled with the state of the cabin now that she had given it a thorough assessment, Camilla sailed into the shed. She was armed with a long list.
"You need supplies."
"Hand me that damn wrench."
She picked up the tool and considered herself beyond civilized for not simply bashing him over the head with it. "Your home is an abomination. I'll require cleaning supplies - preferably industrial strength. And if you want a decent meal, I'll need some food to stock the kitchen. You have to go into town."
He battled the bolt into submission, shoved the switch on. And got nothing but a wheezy chuckle out of the generator. "I don't have time to go into town."
"If you want food for your belly and clean sheets on which to sleep, you'll make time.
β
β
Nora Roberts (Cordina's Crown Jewel (Cordina's Royal Family, #4))
β
And if the best you can do is quote the Bible in defence of your prejudice, then have the humility to be consistent. The same book that exhorts against the abomination of one man lying with another also contains exhortations against the eating of pork and shell-fish and against menstruating women daring to come near holy places. Itβs no good functionalistically claiming that kosher diet had its local, meteorological purposes now defunct, or that the prejudice against ovulation can be dispensed with as superstition, the Bible that you bash us with tells you that much of what you do is unclean: donβt pick and choose with a Revealed Text β or if you do, pick and choose the good bits, the bits that say things like βLet he who is without sin cast the first stoneβ, or βLove thy neighbour as thyselfβ.
β
β
Stephen Fry (Moab Is My Washpot (Memoir, #1))
β
You took a seal club and threw it in the water."
Watson's response:
"Well holy shit. The jerk was about to bash in the brains of a baby seal, for Christ's sake, I was not going to stand there and watch it.
β
β
Karen Dawn (Thanking the Monkey: Rethinking the Way We Treat Animals)
β
I think I might love you."
He gave me a smile I'd never seen on him before: bashful and crooked, and big enough to wrinkle the corners of his eyes.
"I thought you were going to tell me a secret. I've known
β
β
Crystal Smith (Bloodleaf (Bloodleaf, #1))
β
The physician said some women don't take to childbirth. Something about too much excitement laid upon the female sensibility. She wasn't herself afterward. The female mind is delicate as it is, you know. She changed during her confinement. She was less biddable, more excitable. More given to hysterics."
Harcroft shrugged. The gesture conveyed helplessness, and Kate's lip curled. Helpless, Harcroft was not. Kate suppressed the urge to lift the nearby oil lamp with her delicate, female hands. She felt excited and unbiddable right now;why, she might slip and use her own delicate, female sensibility to bash all that heavy brass into his head.
β
β
Courtney Milan (Trial by Desire (Carhart, #2))
β
For instance, one thing we'll need to do is create a climate of questioning ideas without evidence. This is not being "mean" or "bashing" or "unprofessional." It's what' professional scientists do. It needs to become our norm.
β
β
Jean Donaldson
β
You know more useless crap, St. Clair. Good thing you're so darn cute," Josh says.
St. Clair smiles. "At least 'cemetary' sounds classier. And you must admit-this place is pretty classy. Or,I'm sorry." He turns back to me. "Would you rather be at the Lambert bash? I hear Dave Higgenbottom is bringing his beer bong."
"Higgenbaum."
"That's what I said. Higgenbum."
"Oh,leave him alone.Besides, by the time this place closes, we'll still have plenty of time to party." I roll my eyes at this last word.None of us have plans to attend,despite what I told Dave yesterday at lunch.
St. Clair nudges me with a tall thermos. "Perhaps you're upset because he won't have the opportunity to woo you with his astonishing knowledge of urban street racing."
I laugh. "Cut it out."
"And I hear he has exquisite taste in film. Maybe he'll take you to a midnight showing of Scooby-Doo 2."
I whack St. Clair with my bag, and he dodges aside,laughing.
β
β
Stephanie Perkins (Anna and the French Kiss (Anna and the French Kiss, #1))
β
Brother, this is not a day on which hunger is to have any sway, thanks to the rich Camacho; get down and look about for a ladle and skim off a hen or two, and much good may they do you." "I don't see one," said Sancho. "Wait a bit," said the cook; "sinner that I am! how particular and bashful you are!" and so saying, he seized a bucket and plunging it into one of the half jars took up three hens and a couple of geese, and said to Sancho, "Fall to, friend, and take the edge off your appetite with these skimmings until dinner-time comes.
β
β
Miguel de Cervantes Saavedra (Don Quixote)
β
Oh, you're right. I'm just a human with thick skin, purple eyes, and hard bones. Which means you can go home. Tell Galen I said hi."
Toraf opens and shuts his mouth twice. Both times it seems like he wants to say something, but his expression tells me his brain isn't cooperating. When his mouth snaps shut a third time, I splash water in his face. "Are you going to say something, or are you trying to catch wind and sail?
A grin the size of the horizon spreads across his face. "He likes that, you know. Your temper."
Yeahfreakingright. Galen's a classic type A personality-and type A's hate smartass-ism. Just ask my mom. "No offense, but you're not exactly an expert at judging people's emotions."
"I'm not sure what you mean by that."
"Sure you do."
"If you're talking about Rayna, then you're wrong. She loves me. She just won't admit it."
I roll my eyes. "Right. She's playing hard to get, is that it? Bashing your head with a rock, splitting your lip, calling you squid breath all the time."
"What does that mean? Hard to get?"
"It means she's trying to make you think she doesn't like you, so that you end up liking her more. So you work harder to get her attention."
He nods. "Exactly. That's exactly what she's doing."
Pinching the bridge of my nose, I say, "I don't think so. As we speak, she's getting your mating seal dissolved. That's not playing hard to get. That's playing impossible to get."
"Even if she does get it dissolved, it's not because she doesn't care about me. She just likes to play games."
The pain in Toraf's voice guts me like the catch of the day. She might like playing games, but his feelings are real. And can't I relate to that? "There's only one way to find out," I say softly.
"Find out?"
"If all she wants is games."
"How?"
"You play hard to get. You know how they say. 'If you love someone, set them free. If they return to you, it was meant to be?'"
"I've never heard that."
"Right. No, you wouldn't have." I sigh. "Basically, what I'm trying to say is, you need to stop giving Rayna attention. Push her away. Treat her like she treats you."
He shakes his head. "I don't think I can do that."
"You'll get your answer that way," I say, shrugging. "But it sounds like you don't really want to know."
"I do want to know. But what if the answer isn't good?" His face scrunches as if the words taste like lemon juice.
"You've got to be ready to deal with it, no matter what."
Toraf nods, his jaw tight. The choices he has to consider will make this night long enough for him. I decide not to intrude on his time anymore. "I'm pretty tired, so I'm heading back. I'll meet you at Galen's in the morning. Maybe I can break thirty minutes tomorrow, huh?" I nudge his shoulder with my fist, but a weak smile is all I get in return.
I'm surprised when he grabs my hand and starts pulling me through the water. At least it's better than dragging me by the ankle. I can't but think how Galen could have done the same thing. Why does he wrap his arms around me instead?
β
β
Anna Banks (Of Poseidon (The Syrena Legacy, #1))
β
No offense, but you're not exactly an expert on judging people's emotions."
"I'm not sure what you mean by that."
"Sure you do."
"If you're talking about Rayna, then you're wrong. She loves me. She just won't admit it."
I roll my eyes. "Right. She's playing hard to get, is that it? Bashing your head with a rock, splitting your lip, calling you squid breath all the time."
"What does that mean? Hard to get?"
"It means she's trying to make you think she doesn't like you, so that you end up liking her more. So you work harder to get her attention."
He nods. Exactly. That's exactly what she's doing.
β
β
Anna Banks (Of Poseidon (The Syrena Legacy, #1))
β
We're going to do everything together until Saul Roso is dead." "But I thought you were angry with me." "Sugar cookie, I'm so fucking pissed at you for so many reasons, it's all I can do to hold onto this phone. I want to bash it into the wall and follow it with my fist." "Oh." "Oh," he replied in a knotted snarl.
β
β
C.P. Rider (Spiked (Sundance, #1))
β
It's all right, Duncan, believe me," he whispered, incomprehensibly. "you're going to be all right." He wiped the blood from the boy's throat wit his hand; nothing at the boy's throat was cut, he could see. He wiped the blood from the boy's temples, and saw that they were not bashed in. He kicked open the driver's side door, to be sure; the door light went on and he could see that one of Duncan's eyes was darting. The eye was looking fr help, but Garp could see that the eye could see. He wiped more blood with his hand, but he could not find Duncan's other eye. "It's okay," he whispered to Duncan, but Duncan screamed even louder.
β
β
John Irving (The World According to Garp)
β
After a brief murmured exchange, the lady's maid opened the door a bit wider, and Phoebe's brother Ivo stuck his head inside.
"Hullo, sis," he said casually. "You look very nice in that gold dress."
"It's ecru." At his perplexed look, she repeated, "Ecru."
"God bless you," Ivo said, and gave her a cheeky grin as he entered the room.
Phoebe lifted her gaze heavenward. "Why are you here, Ivo?"
"I'm going to escort you downstairs, so you don't have to go alone."
Phoebe was so moved, she couldn't speak. She could only stare at the eleven-year-old boy, who was volunteering to take the place her husband would have assumed.
"It was Father's idea," Ivo continued, a touch bashfully. "I'm sorry I'm not as tall as the other ladies' escorts, or even as tall as you. I'm really only half an escort. But that's still better than nothing, isn't it?" His expression turned uncertain as he saw that her eyes were watering.
After clearing her throat, Phoebe managed an unsteady reply. "At this moment, my gallant Ivo, you tower above every other gentleman here. I'm so very honored."
He grinned and offered his arm in a gesture she had seen him practice in the past with their father. "The honor is mine, sis."
In that moment, Phoebe had the briefest intimation of what Ivo would be like as a full-grown man, confident and irresistibly charming.
β
β
Lisa Kleypas (Devil's Daughter (The Ravenels, #5))
β
I felt bashful, like I had when I'd first told him of An Imperial Affliction. "Um, okay. Okay. 'Let us go, trough certain half-deserted streets,/ The muttering retreats/ Of restless nights in one-night cheap hotels/ and sawdust restaurants with oyster shells:/ Streets that follow like a tedious argument/ Of insidious intent/ To lead you to an overwhelming question../Oh, do not ask, "What is it?"/ Let us go and make our visit" "I'm in love with you," he said quietly. "Augustus," I said. "I am, " he said. He was staring at me, and I could see the corners of his eyes crinkling. "I'm in love with you, and I'm not in the business of denying myself the simple pleasure of saying true things. I'm in love with you, and I know that love is just a shout into the void, and that oblivion is inevitable, and that we're all doomed and that there will come a day when all our labor has been returned to dust, and I know the sun will swallow the only earth we'll ever have, and I am in love with you." "Augustus," I said again, not knowing what else to say. It felt like everything was rising up in me, like I was drowning in this wierdly painful joy, but I couldn't say it back. I couldn't say it back. I just looked at him and let him look at me until he nodded, lips pursed, and turned away, placing the side of his head against the window.
β
β
John Green (The Fault in Our Stars)
β
This is the real work of woman of color feminism: to resist acquiescence to fatality and guilt, to become warriors of conscience and action who resist death in all its myriad manifestations: poverty, cultural assimilation, child abuse, motherless mothering, gentrification, mental illness, welfare cuts, the prison system, racial profiling, immigrant and queer bashing, invasion and imperialism at home and at war.
To fight any kind of war, Kahente Horn-Miller writes. "The Biggest single requirement is fighting spirit." I thought much of this as I read Colonize This! since this collection appears in print at a time of escalating world-wide war--In Colombia, Afghanistan, Palestine. But is there ever a time of no-war for women of color? Is there ever a time when our home (our body, our land of origin) is not subject to violent occupation, violent invasion? If I retain any image to hold the heart-intention of this book, it is found in what Horn-Miller calls the necessity of the war dance. This book is one rite of passage, one ceremony of preparedness on the road to consciousness, on the "the war path of greater empowerment.
β
β
Bushra Rehman (Colonize This!: Young Women of Color on Today's Feminism (Live Girls))
β
I was never a child; I never had a childhood. I cannot count among my memories warm, golden days of childish intoxication, long joyous hours of innocence, or the thrill of discovering the universe anew each day. I learned of such things later on in life from books. Now I guess at their presence in the children I see. I was more than twenty when I first experienced something similar in my self, in chance moments of abandonment, when I was at peace with the world. Childhood is love; childhood is gaiety; childhood knows no cares. But I always remember myself, in the years that have gone by, as lonely, sad, and thoughtful.
Ever since I was a little boy I have felt tremendously aloneβand "peculiar".
I don't know why.
It may have been because my family was poor or because I was not born the way other children are born; I cannot tell. I remember only that when I was six or seven years old a young aunt of mind called me vecchioβ"old man," and the nickname was adopted by all my family. Most of the time I wore a long, frowning face. I talked very little, even with other children; compliments bored me; baby-talk angered me. Instead of the noisy play of the companions of my boyhood I preferred the solitude of the most secluded corners of our dark, cramped, poverty-stricken home. I was, in short, what ladies in hats and fur coats call a "bashful" or a "stubborn" child; and what our women with bare heads and shawls, with more directness, call a rospoβa "toad."
They were right.
I must have been, and I was, utterly unattractive to everybody. I remember, too, that I was well aware of the antipathy I aroused. It made me more "bashful," more "stubborn," more of a "toad" than ever. I did not care to join in the games played by other boys, but preferred to stand apart, watching them with jealous eyes, judging them, hating them. It wasn't envy I felt at such times: it was contempt; it was scorn. My warfare with men had begun even then and even there. I avoided people, and they neglected me. I did not love them, and they hated me. At play in the parks some of the boys would chase me; others would laugh at me and call me names. At school they pulled my curls or told the teachers tales about me. Even on my grandfather's farm in the country peasant brats threw stones at me without provocation, as if they felt instinctively that I belonged to some other breed.
β
β
Giovanni Papini (Un uomo finito)
β
Where to?" said the bear.
The boy wobbled back to the rear seat, concentrating as the hull rolled and bounced beneath him. He half sat and half fell onto the hard wooden bench, bashing his wrist painfully against the edge as he landed.
"Ow!" he said. "Just over to the other side, please." He waved his unbashed hand vaguely out across the water without looking up.
"Right you are," said the bear.
β
β
Dave Shelton (A Boy and A Bear in a Boat)
β
Most people can recall schoolyard confrontations with with bullies. Boys were expected to deal with them by standing their ground and slugging it out, even, as one man told me, "if you knew you were going to get your head bashed in. You had to show you could take it, and you'd die rather than cry."
But for girls, the surest and safest way to avoid being picked on or terrorized is to get the bully to like you.
β
β
Victoria Secunda (Women and Their Fathers: The Sexual and Romantic Impact of the First Man in Your Life)
β
Moving on was always the end plan.
New York,he remembered, was a fair distance away.It should be far enough. As for tonight, he was going to have a shot of whiskey in his tea to help smooth out the edges. Then by God, he was going to sleep if he had to bash himself over the head to accpmplish it.
And he wasn't going to give Keeley another thought.
The knock on the door had him cursing under his breath.Though she'd been doing well,his first worry was that the mare with bronchitis had taken a bad turn.He was already reaching for the boots he'd shed when he called out.
"Come in,it's open.Is it Lucy then?"
"No,it's Keeley." One brow lifted, she stood framed in the door. "But if you're expecting Lucy,I can go."
The boots dangled from his fingertips, and those fingertips had gone numb. "Lucy's a horse," he managed to say. "She doesn't often come knocking on my door.
β
β
Nora Roberts (Irish Rebel (Irish Hearts, #3))
β
We are living the true real-life fairy tale,β or the greatest narcissistic ringer of them all, βNo one will ever love you the way I do.β This love bombing can be a bit disarming, but, by and large, it is deeply romanticized. It does feel like a real-life fairy tale, and especially for someone who is young and vulnerableβor even someone who has been bashed in other relationshipsβit can feel like the ship and the prince (or princess) have come in. Love bombing is a classic red flag.
β
β
Ramani S. Durvasula ("Don't You Know Who I Am?": How to Stay Sane in an Era of Narcissism, Entitlement, and Incivility)
β
It gave me a wonderful feeling when I looked into his dark blue eyes and saw how bashful my unexpected visit had made him. I could read his innermost thoughts, and in his face, I saw a look of helplessness and uncertainty as to how to behave, and at the same time a flicker of awareness of his masculinity. I saw his shyness, and I melted. I wanted to say, "Tell me about yourself. Look beneath my chatty exterior." But I found that it was easier to think up questions than to ask them.
β
β
Anne Frank (The Diary of Anne Frank)
β
Why ain't you using your influence to get her out where she can do some good? If she's as quick and noticing and clever as you sayβ"
βIt is dangerous.β
βThen look out for her.β
He stared at her. βI beg your pardon?β
"You heard me. You're good at not getting killed, ain't you? At not being dead when any normal person would be. According to Jason, you been poisoned, bashed in the head, shot at, drowned, stabbed, and Lord only knows what else. Watching out for a mere female should be child's play.
β
β
Loretta Chase (Captives of the Night (Scoundrels, #2))
β
The Woman Poet // Die Dichterin
You hold me now completely in your hands.
My heart beats like a frightened little bird's
Against your palm. Take heed! You do not think
A person lives within the page you thumb.
To you this book is paper, cloth, and ink,
Some binding thread and glue, and thus is dumb,
And cannot touch you (though the gaze be great
That seeks you from the printed marks inside),
And is an object with an object's fate.
And yet it has been veiled like a bride,
Adorned with gems, made ready to be loved,
Who asks you bashfully to change your mind,
To wake yourself, and feel, and to be moved.
But still she trembles, whispering to the wind:
"This shall not be." And smiles as if she knew.
Yet she must hope. A woman always tries,
Her very life is but a single "You . . ."
With her black flowers and her painted eyes,
With silver chains and silks of spangled blue.
She knew more beauty when a child and free,
But now forgets the better words she knew.
A man is so much cleverer than we,
Conversing with himself of truth and lie,
Of death and spring and iron-work and time.
But I say "you" and always "you and I."
This book is but a girl's dress in rhyme,
Which can be rich and red, or poor and pale,
Which may be wrinkled, but with gentle hands,
And only may be torn by loving nails.
So then, to tell my story, here I stand.
The dress's tint, though bleached in bitter lye,
Has not all washed away. It still is real.
I call then with a thin, ethereal cry.
You hear me speak. But do you hear me feel?
β
β
Gertrud Kolmar
β
We're talking Brenda here. Do not give up hope. It is still entirely possible that your mother bashed your father with that frying pan twenty-five years ago, and that he's still deader than a doornail today."
Lisa Livia's lips quirked as she straightened and picked up her glass. "Yeah. No point in hoping that my mother's innocent and my father's alive."
"Exactly." Agnes lifted her glass. "Why look for a silver lining when there might be a cloud? If South Carolina has the death penalty, there could be an orphanage in your future yet.
β
β
Jennifer Crusie (Agnes and the Hitman (The Organization, #0))
β
Instead of asking the old questions like "What is wrong with me?" I would start asking important questions like "What if I only dreamed gardens, what if I ate carrots because what if I were a pleasant rabbit? What if I got a crown for doing nothing but being who I am, what if even just one plant said hi to me or a tree bashfully bowed as I walked by, what if my dog knew what I meant when I wave to him? What if I could always be a little bit on this island in my mind? What if I could always be a little bit naked, a little bit kissing everything, an unplundered trove of my own love?
β
β
Jenny Slate (Little Weirds)
β
Her newly revealed skin was white and luminous, her body tender and abundantly curved... He closed his eyes briefly, striving to subdue this violent passion. When he opened them again, Vivien had moved away from him and hastily climbed into bed, pulling the linens over her nakedness. Her bashfulness was so genuine, so... well, virginal, that he wondered if this was what she had been like long ago, before embarking on her career as a courtesan.
"Don't cover yourself," he murmured. "Your body is too beautiful to be concealed."
The bedsheets did not lower an in inch. "I'm cold," she said breathlessly, her cheeks flushed.
"I'll warm you," he promised with a quick grin, stripping off his coat.
β
β
Lisa Kleypas (Someone to Watch Over Me (Bow Street Runners, #1))
β
Or is it the opposite-that the US has moved so far and so fast toward cultural permissiveness that we've reached a kind of apsidal point? It might be instructive to try seeing things from the perspective of, say, a God-fearing hard-working rural-Midwestern military vet. It's not that hard. Imagine gazing through his eyes at the world of MTV and the content of video games, at the gross sexualization of children's fashions, at Janet Jackson flashing her aureole on what's supposed to be a holy day. Imagine you're him having to explain to your youngest what oral sex is and what it's got to do with a US president. Ads for penis enlargers and Hot Wet Sluts are popping up out of nowhere on your family's computer. Your kids' school is teaching them WWII and Vietnam in terms of Japanese internment and the horrors of My Lai. Homosexuals are demanding holy matrimony; your doctor's moving away because he can't afford the lawsuit insurance; illegal aliens want driver's licenses; Hollywood elites are bashing America and making millions from it; the president's ridiculed for reading his Bible; priests are diddling kids left and right. Shit, the country's been directly attacked, and people aren't supporting our commander in chief.
Assume for a moment that it's not silly to see things this man's way. What cogent, compelling, relevant message can the center and left offer him? Can we bear to admit that we've actually helped set him up to hear "We 're better than they are" not as twisted and scary but as refreshing and redemptive and true? If so, then now what?
β
β
David Foster Wallace (Consider the Lobster and Other Essays)
β
What on earth did we do wrong? What harm did we inflict? What did we do to you? Who are you to judge us?
Who gave you the right? Are you the representatives of mankind, or what? Who appointed you? Was it God? Yourselves? You don't care if someone loves to go bowling or shooting! You don't care if someone wants to be a doctor or a flight attendant! So why can't we love someone of the same gender? What makes you say that the way we love is wrong? Because we're not "normal"? Because we don't abide by the provisions of God? The laws of nature?
Well, fuck you. What a load of bullshit. You want to create a land for God? Good. Then let's bring back the regulations on sex positions first! Don't use condoms, and only fuck in the missionary position, damn it! Since sex should only be for childbirth, and any other pleasure is against the will of God, am I right? Come to think of it, you guys are fucking disgusting. I mean, I know you all fuck doggy-style and blow each other! So I guess you're all going to hell as well! The same goes for singles who don't copulate at all! If the union of man and woman is what is "normal", singles are the most abnormal of all! You're all going to hell, too! On, and let's just kill all the ugly people, fat people, and poor people while we're at it. Then it'll be heaven on earth, with no abnormal beings! Where the normal are free to kill the abnormal! If you ask me, you uneducated, narrow-minded scumbags are the ones that degrade human nobility! You're fucking revolting! Ignorant morons! Do you feel good? Or pissed off? Mad?
Then come at me! Instead of being fucking cowards, bashing someone that's all tied up. Won't it be more fun to beat up a person of color? Kill me before I infect your brains and turn all of you into homosexuals! Kill me first! Stupid scumbags!
β
β
JUNS (Dark Heaven)
β
Uhh, Emerson, are you okay?β Ryker asked as he unfolded his tall frame from the pickup, flickering his attention to Bash.
βSheβs fine,β Bash answered for me.
βI sure as hell am not!β I answered.
"Are you going to stand there while this caveman carries me off?β Bashβs hand tightened across my ass in response.
Ryker tilted his head and sighed. βFuck my life, you two. Youβre not in the same town for a week and youβre already at each other. Bash, are you going to hurt her? Rape her? Lock her away in a cave?β
βDonβt be a pain in my ass, Ryker. Of course not.β
βEmerson, are you honestly scared of Bash?β βWhat? No. Heβs just an asshole! Put me down!β I kicked my foot and Bash grunted. Good. βOkay, well you two kids have a nice night and work your shit out. Emmy, give him hell.β He waved us off and went into the bar where his sister waited.
βLooks like itβs just us, Emmy.β
βYou have to be kidding me,β I groaned.
β
β
Rebecca Yarros (Point of Origin (Legacy, #0.5))
β
He handed me something done up in paper. 'Your mask,' he said. 'Don't put it on until we get past the city-limits.'
It was a frightening-looking thing when I did so. It was not a mask but a hood for the entire head, canvas and cardboard, chalk-white to simulate a skull, with deep black hollows for the eyes and grinning teeth for the mouth.
The private highway, as we neared the house, was lined on both sides with parked cars. I counted fifteen of them as we bashed by; and there must have been as many more ahead, in the other direction.
We drew up and he and I got out. I glanced in cautiously over my shoulder at the driver as we went by, to see if I could see his face, but he too had donned one of the death-masks.
'Never do that,' the Messenger warned me in a low voice. 'Never try to penetrate any other member's disguise.'
The house was as silent and lifeless as the last time - on the outside. Within it was a horrid, crawling charnel-house alive with skull-headed figures, their bodies encased in business-suits, tuxedos, and evening dresses. The lights were all dyed a ghastly green or ghostly blue, by means of colored tissue-paper sheathed around them. A group of masked musicians kept playing the Funeral March over and over, with brief pauses in between. A coffin stood in the center of the main living-room.
I was drenched with sweat under my own mask and sick almost to death, even this early in the game.
At last the Book-keeper, unmasked, appeared in their midst.
Behind him came the Messenger. The dead-head guests all applauded enthusiastically and gathered around them in a ring.
Those in other rooms came in. The musicians stopped the Death Match. The Book-keeper bowed, smiled graciously. 'Good evening, fellow corpses,' was his chill greeting. 'We are gathered together to witness the induction of our newest member.' There was an electric tension. 'Brother Bud!' His voice rang out like a clarion in the silence. 'Step forward.' ("Graves For Living")
β
β
Cornell Woolrich
β
She stiffened and gasped, and the touch was immediately withdrawn.
"Did I hurt you?"
Her lashes lifted. "No," she said in wonder. "In fact, I didn't feel any pain." She strained to look between them. "Is there blood? Perhaps I should-"
"No. Win..." There was a near-comical expression of dismay on his face. "What I just did isn't going to cause pain or blood." A brief pause. "When I do it with my cock, however, it's probably going to hurt like hell."
"Oh." She pondered that for a moment. "Is that the word men use for their private parts?"
"One of the words gadjos use."
"What do Romas say?"
"They call it a kori."
"What does that mean?"
"'Thorn.'"
Win slid a bashful glance at the heavy protrusion straining behind his trousers. "Rather too substantial for a thorn. I should have thought they would use a more fitting word. But I suppose-" She inhaled sharply as his hand moved downward. "I suppose if one wants roses, one must-" his finger had slipped inside her again- "bear the occasional thorn."
"Very philosophical.
β
β
Lisa Kleypas (Seduce Me at Sunrise (The Hathaways, #2))
β
Not until you eat."
"Oh, for God's sake, Aunt Ada-"
"None of that swearing, now. If you mean to be chosen as Chief Magistrate, you can't talk like a dockworker."
With a lift of his eyebrow, he held out his hand. "I won't be chosen as anything if I don't satisfy those who require my help."
"Humph. They can wait a few minutes." Her eyes glittered a warning. "I mean it. Don't make me throw these in the fire."
He flashed her his darkest scowl. "You wouldn't dare."
She set her shoulders. "Try me. And while those black looks of yours might intimidate criminals, they won't work on me. They didn't when you were ten, so they certainly won't now."
"Then I'll have to resort to force." He fought a smile as he stalked toward her. "I outweigh you by a good five stone. I could snatch those papers before you got anywhere near a fire."
"I could bash you over the head with a skillet, too."
The idea of his sweet-natured aunt bashing him over the head with anything made him laugh. He held up his hands. "Fine, I'll eat. But I must make it quick.
β
β
Sabrina Jeffries (A Lady Never Surrenders (Hellions of Halstead Hall, #5))
β
Do you ever feel like you are giving far fewer fucks and yet still caring so much it sometimes feels like there is only the most tissue-thin layer separating your soul from this world?
Like your heart may be broken but your spirit is still rising?
Are you refusing to conform and somehow still fitting just right? Able to look people right in the eye without apology and also like youβre a teenager again, bashful and blushing and off-kilter, like that moment when lips unexpectedly pressed against your head and face buried in your hair fingers trailed down y our arm, the way your stomach can flip-flop like that, even now.
Do you ever walk on purpose even when you have nowhere to go? Do you notice things deeply, like dark red lipstick prints on pristine white coffee mugs? Like the way whiskey burns and cool white sheets feel against your skin at the end of the day?
Are you claiming your identity, clear and strong and true, and also sinking into the vast unknowable mystery of your all? Do your days feel like longing and acquiescence and learning to stop grasping at things that are ready to leave or that choose not to come closer?
Are you making a home of your own skin and inviting the world inside? Are you learning that cultivating solid boundaries and driving into a wide open horizon both feel like freedom, like the harsh desert mountains and the soft ocean wisdom and the road to healing that joins the two?
Does it all feels like solidity, like truth, like forgiveness and recklessness and heat and sexy and holy, all rolled up together? Do you crave the burn of heat from another and the for nothing to be louder than sound of your own heartbeat, all at once?
Do you finally know that you can choose a love and a life that does not break you? That you can claim a softer beauty and a kinder want. That even your animal hunger can soften its rough edges and say a full-throated yes to what is good and kind and holy. Do you remember that insanity is not a prerequisite for passion and that there is another pathway to your art, one that does not demand your pain as payment for its own becoming?
Are you learning to show up? To take up space? To feel the power? Is it full of contradiction, does it feel like fire underwater, are you rising to sing?
β
β
Jeanette LeBlanc
β
Dinner was a family affair. And oh, how she enjoyed it! Who knew there was so much to talk about each day? She loved when the men shared stories about their work in the mines, while she often regaled them with stories about life in the castle when she was a small child or about the types of birds she spotted from the window. And then there were the questions. She found she had many! After staying silent for so long, there was much she longed to know, and she was always interested in learning more about the men and their lives. She wanted to know who had carved the beautiful wooden doorways and furniture around the cottage, and why the deer and the birds seemed to linger at the kitchen window while she prepped meals.
"They must adore you, as we do," gushed Bashful.
"And I you!" Snow would say. She found she could talk to them till the candle burned out each night.
It felt like she was finally waking up and finding her voice after years of silent darkness. And while she promised the men she would not do more than her share of the housework, she couldn't help trying to find small ways to repay them for their kindness when she wasn't busy strategizing. Despite their protests, she prepared a lunch basket for them to take to work each day. She mended tiny socks. And secretly, she was using yarn and needles she had found to knit them blankets for their beds. It might have been summer, but she couldn't help noticing they had few blankets for the winter months.
β
β
Jen Calonita (Mirror, Mirror)
β
This excerpt from When Race Becomes Real: Black and White Writers Confront Their Personal Histories, edited by Bernestine Singley, appeared in 2002 as part of Harvard Magazineβs coverage of recent books by Harvard affiliates. The excerpt concerns author Noel Ignatievβs role in launching a journal βto chronicle and analyze the making, remaking, and unmaking of whiteness.β β¦
The goal of abolishing the white race is on its face so desirable that some may find it hard to believe that it could incur any opposition other than from committed white supremacists. Of course, we expected bewilderment from people who still think of race as biology. We frequently get letters accusing us of being "racists," just like the KKK, and have even been called a "hate group." ...
Our standard response is to draw an analogy with anti-royalism: to oppose monarchy does not mean killing the king; it means getting rid of crowns, thrones, royal titles, etc....
Every group within white America has at one time or another advanced its particular and narrowly defined interests at the expense of black people as a race. That applies to labor unionists, ethnic groups, college students, schoolteachers, taxpayers, and white women. Race Traitor will not abandon its focus on whiteness, no matter how vehement the pleas and how virtuously oppressed those doing the pleading. The editors meant it when they replied to a reader, "Make no mistake about it: we intend to keep bashing the dead white males, and the live ones, and the females too, until the social construct known as 'the white race' is destroyedβnot 'deconstructed' but destroyed.
β
β
Noel Ignatiev
β
He's like a little boy again now for the first time in years because he's like let out of school, no job, the bills paid, nothing to do but gratefully amuse me, his eyes are shining -- In fact ever since he's come out of San Quentin there's been something hauntedly boyish about him as tho prison walls had taken all the adult dark tenseness out of him -- In fact every evening after supper in the cell he shared with the quiet gunman he'd bent his serious head to a daily letter or at least every-other-day letter full of philosophical and religious musings to his mistress Billie... And when you're in bed in jail after lights out and you're not sleepy there's ample time to just remember the world and indeed savor its sweetness if any (altho it's always sweet to remember it in jail tho harder in prison, as Genet shows) with the result that he'd not only come to a chastisement of his bashing bitternesses (and of course it's always good to get away from alcohol and excessive smoking for two years) (and all that regular sleep) he was just like a kid again, but as I say that haunting kidlikeness I think all ex cons seem to have when they've just come out -- In seeking to severely penalize criminals society by putting the criminals away behind safe walls actually provide them with the means of greater strength for future atrocities glorious and otherwise -- "Well I'll be damned" he keeps saying as he sees those bluffs and cliffs and hanging vines and dead trees, "you mean to tell me you ben alone here for three weeks, why I wouldn't dare that... must be awful at night ... looka that old mule down there... man, dig the redwood country way back in... reminds me of old Colorady b'god when I used to steal a car every day and drive out to hills like this with a fresh little high school sumptin" -- "Yum Yum, " says Dave Wain emphatically turning that big goofy look to us from his driving wheel with his big mad feverish shining eyes full of yumyum and yabyum too --
β
β
Jack Kerouac (Big Sur)
β
I was never a child; I never had a childhood. I cannot count among my memories warm, golden days of childish intoxication, long joyous hours of innocence, or the thrill of discovering the universe anew each day. I learned of such things later on in life from books. Now I guess at their presence in the children I see. I was more than twenty when I first experienced something similar in my self, in chance moments of abandonment, when I was at peace with the world. Childhood is love; childhood is gaiety; childhood knows no cares. But I always remember myself, in the years that have gone by, as lonely, sad, and thoughtful.
Ever since I was a little boy I have felt tremendously aloneβand "peculiar".
I don't know why.
It may have been because my family was poor or because I was not born the way other children are born; I cannot tell. I remember only that when I was six or seven years old a young aunt of mind called me [i]vecchio[/i]β"old man," and the nickname was adopted by all my family. Most of the time I wore a long, frowning face. I talked very little, even with other children; compliments bored me; baby-talk angered me. Instead of the noisy play of the companions of my boyhood I preferred the solitude of the most secluded corners of our dark, cramped, poverty-stricken home. I was, in short, what ladies in hats and fur coats call a "bashful" or a "stubborn" child; and what our women with bare heads and shawls, with more directness, call a [i]rospo[/i]βa "toad."
They were right.
I must have been, and I was, utterly unattractive to everybody. I remember, too, that I was well aware of the antipathy I aroused. It made me more "bashful," more "stubborn," more of a "toad" than ever. I did not care to join in the games played by other boys, but preferred to stand apart, watching them with jealous eyes, judging them, hating them. It wasn't envy I felt at such times: it was contempt; it was scorn. My warfare with men had begun even then and even there. I avoided people, and they neglected me. I did not love them, and they hated me. At play in the parks some of the boys would chase me; others would laugh at me and call me names. At school they pulled my curls or told the teachers tales about me. Even on my grandfather's farm in the country peasant brats threw stones at me without provocation, as if they felt instinctively that I belonged to some other breed.
β
β
Giovanni Papini (Un uomo finito)
β
Nick..." She started as his mouth descended to the nest of blond curls. "Nick..."
But he did not listen, completely absorbed in her salt-scented female flesh. His breath filled the moist cleft with steamy heat. A moan rose from her throat, and her wrists twisted in his grasp. His tongue searched through the springy curls until he reached the rosy lips hidden beneath. He licked one side of her sex, then the other, the tip of his tongue teasing delicately.
His mouth ravished her so gently, his tongue slipping over her melting flesh to find the secret entrance to her body, filling her with silky heat... withdrawing... filling. Lottie went weak all over, her sex pulsing urgently. As he nuzzled and played with her, she tried to angle her body so that he would touch the peak that throbbed so desperately. He seemed not to understand what she wanted, licking all around the sensitive spot but never quite reaching it.
"Nick," she whispered, unable to find words for what she wanted. "Please. Please."
But he continued to deny her, until she realized he was doing it deliberately. Frustrated beyond bearing, she reached down to his head, and she felt the puff of his brief laugh against her. Immediately his mouth slid away and traveled downward, tasting the damp creases of her knees, moving to the hollows of her ankles. By the time he made his way back to her loins, her entire body was sweltering. His head hovered over the place between her legs again. Lottie held her breath, aware of a hot trickle of moisture from her body.
His tongue brushed the peak of her sex in a tentative lap. Lottie could not hold back a wild cry as she arched into his mouth.
"No," he murmured against her damp flesh. "Not yet, Lottie. Wait just a little longer."
"I can't, can't, oh, don't stop..." She pulled at his dark head frantically, groaning as he feathered his tongue over her once more.
Catching her wrists, Nick pulled them over her head and settled his body between her thighs, taking care not to crush her. His shaft was cradled in the hot valley between her legs. His dark blue eyes stared directly into hers as he released her hands. "Leave them there," he said, and she obeyed with a sob.
He kissed her breasts, moving from one to the other. With each incendiary swirl of his tongue, she nearly rose off the sheet. His sex slid against her in disciplined thrusts that teased and rubbed and tormented, while his mouth drew hungrily on her nipples. She arched upward with supplicating moans. Stunning pleasure built inside her, gaining intensity... she hovered on the brink, waiting, waiting... oh, please... until the culmination was finally upon her. She cried out in bashful amazement as rich spasms spread from the center of her body.
"Yes," he whispered against her taut throat, his hips working gently over hers.
β
β
Lisa Kleypas (Worth Any Price (Bow Street Runners, #3))
β
Zachariah, mind the palace," Rachel told her beloved before bashing off across three times nine countries. "But DO NOT DO NOT DO NOT enter the lists. No fighting! No barney, mill, contest, set-to, turn-up, battle, match!
β
β
Emma Richler (Be My Wolff)
β
Some' paintings are considered heretical," she said irritably.
"Ah, but that isn't the fault of the painting. It's the prejudice of the viewer. For instance, isn't the fault of your 'dress' that when you turn it looks like a pond rippling beneath a full moon at midnight. Or that you resemble a naiad rising from the depths in it. It is the opinion of this particular viewer."
Her head went back in shock.
And instead of casting her eyes down bashfully again, or fluttering her lashes in coy confusion or responding with a mumbled thank-you... she locked her eyes with his.
Her eyes were so soft. Like the hearts of pansies. But they were also surprisingly intensely searching, and he thought he could feel them probing his soul. Sorting through impressions.
Hot color swept her cheekbones as she absorbed the impact of this observation. She was attempting to decode it.
So she wasn't immune to the compliment. She simply didn't trust it.
In truth, he hadn't fully expected to say it himself. Where on earth had it come from? This was what unnerved him.
And to think he'd once thought her face ordinary.
β
β
Julie Anne Long (What I Did for a Duke (Pennyroyal Green, #5))
β
What are bashed neeps?"
"Neeps hackit with balmagowry.
β
β
Patrick O'Brian (Treason's Harbour (Aubrey & Maturin, #9))
β
If you wouldnβt want to hang out with someone who was constantly bashing you with a barrage of belittling insults, why would you allow them to live in your head?
β
β
Susan C. Young (The Art of Being: 8 Ways to Optimize Your Presence & Essence for Positive Impact (The Art of First Impressions for Positive Impact, #1))
β
Raw persimmon is an acquired taste," he said, handing me a slice, "but I have a feeling you'll like this one."
I resisted the urge to roll my eyes. 'I'm a baker, Ogden,' I wanted to say. 'Of course I know what persimmon tastes like.' I bit into the fruit. It had the texture of a firm heirloom tomato and a heady, semisweet taste as though infused with a tiny drop of honey. I nodded and made a sound of approval.
"You didn't order any, but I brought you a few to try anyway. I wondered if maybe they might inspire a new cupcake flavor for the holidays," Ogden said. He kept his serious brown eyes trained on the persimmon in his hand while he spoke, a gesture that seemed oddly bashful and entirely unlike him. "You'll have to excuse me if that sounds presumptuous. I'll be the first to admit I know nothing about the recipe creation process."
I took another bite of persimmon, considering. Ogden held himself very still as he watched me chew, and I appreciated the restraint he showed in not jumping in to fill the silence. I knew it couldn't have been easy for him.
"You have good instincts," I said finally. "A persimmon cupcake could be a great addition to the menu. Add some chocolate, a little cinnamon and cardamom, some sweet vanilla icing, and I think we'd have a new Christmas favorite."
"You don't think persimmon is too adventurous for your patrons?"
"Nah," I said. It was actually nice to talk to someone who took food as seriously as I did- I only wished he could do so without sounding so pompous. "But we might have to lead with the chocolate. Chocolate Persimmon Spice. That wouldn't offend you, would it? If I promised to use organic chocolate?"
"I think my ego can handle a little organic chocolate," Ogden said.
β
β
Meg Donohue (How to Eat a Cupcake)
β
She felt a pang of excitement as she realized it was not Mr. Hunt but Matthew Swift.
He rose from his chair, and Daisy said bashfully, "No, please, I'm sorry to have interrupted..."
Her voice trailed away as she noticed there was something different about him. He was wearing a pair of thin, steel-framed spectacles.
Spectacles, on that strong-featured face... and his hair mussed as if he had been tugging absently on the front locks. All that combined with a plentitude of muscles and masculine virility was astonishingly... erotic.
"When did you start wearing those?" Daisy managed to ask.
"About a year ago." He smiled ruefully and removed the spectacles with one hand. "I need them to read. Too many late nights poring over contracts and reports."
"They... they are very becoming."
"Are they?" Continuing to smile, Swift shook his head, as if it had not occurred to him to wonder about his appearance.
β
β
Lisa Kleypas (Scandal in Spring (Wallflowers, #4))
β
The garden awoke in spring, glorious. Rhubarb, bellwort, bloodroot, blue squill; violets carpeted the earth, and in the woods, trilliums, twayblade, cowslips, cress, lady's slipper, wild iris, wild ginger, wild pussy willows, wild, wild everything. Robert Trout and his fiancΓ©e, Lavender, walked often there, and by the river. Her mother's old haunts. All of it a wonder to Robert, for his constant travels over the past years had begun to render most landscapes an indistinct blur. He'd not attended closely to the earth's springtime bounties; there was never time. Now he was like a boy, exclaiming over each tender sprout, each clump of new moss, and "Look, here's one with a thousand tiny white stars." Lavender told him the names of the many early blooms. And their meanings. It was her school of flowers, she quipped. "And here is one named especially for you, Robert---a trout lily. For us." They stopped. She showed him its lovely mottled leaves, creamy belled petals. "And see," she continued, "how it bows its head, as if too bashful to reveal its face. And like we humans, these beauties sleep at night and open themselves in morning's light.
β
β
Jeanette Lynes (The Apothecary's Garden)
β
Convert Text Files from Windows Format to Linux Format and Vice-Versa $ dos2unix $ unix2dos Sooner or later you're going to be sent a file or download one that uses a pair of CR (carriage return) and LF (line feed) characters to terminate lines in the file. Β Those type of files are Windows/DOS formatted. Β Unix-like operating systems simply use the LF character to terminate a line. Β Sometimes this can cause issues. Β To convert the file to a unix-like format, use dos2unix. Β To examine the line termination characters use "cat -A" or the "file" command. $
β
β
Jason Cannon (Command Line Kung Fu: Bash Scripting Tricks, Linux Shell Programming Tips, and Bash One-liners)
β
My first instinct was to make an excuse or to get bashful or to change the subject...but then I realized I was in good company. I could be honest, and this guy was the one who seemed to be holding back. "Actually, yeah, that was kind of amazing.
β
β
Tyler Oakley (Binge)
β
IΒ΄m going to make my life work for me. IΒ΄m not going to let it whirl round like a kaleidoscope anymore. ItΒ΄s my life, wich means wrestling i to the floor and bashing it on the head and saying, Take that, life!
β
β
Sophie Kinsella
β
How can I be more positive at work? ATTITUDE ACTIONS: 1. Put a "quote of the day" on everyone's desk. 2. Use positive language. 3. Be willing to do for others without measuring. 4. Be willing to help others without measuring. 5. Be an example for others to follow. 6. Ask one more question before you answer. 7. Don't join the bashing. 8. Don't join the pity party. 9. Don't join the revolt. 10. Solve, rather than complain. 11. Get the third party being talked about negatively into the conversation. 12. Quit whining. 12.5 Start with YES!
β
β
Jeffrey Gitomer (Jeffrey Gitomer's Little Gold Book of Yes! Attitude: How to find, build, and keep a YES! attitude for a lifetime of SUCCESS (Jeffrey Gitomer's Little Book Series))
β
The drug used here- we call it "Resignation-" makes people compliant. Life is better if everyone always listens to the people in charge, am I right?
β
β
Kayla Bashe (Graveyard Sparrow)
β
I'm seeing someone."
It gets quiet enough to hear our breathing.
"You're dating someone?" Aidan asks, sitting back down in my chair. Nadia retakes her spot on my mattress.
I glance down at my hands, feeling my cheeks redden. "Not dating, really. It's more like I have feelings I haven't told her about yet."
"Do we know her?"
I shake my head.
"Who is she?" Nadia inquires. I glance up and instantly hate the look of rejection on her face,
The lies flow out of me too easily. "Her name's Ivy. She lives over in Harraway with her parents."
"Is she our age?"
"Yeah. She's only a year older."
Try a lot older. I'm answering myself again.
"An older woman? Awesome! What does she look like?"
I close my eyes as I remember her human form from my dreams. "She's about my height, has long white-blond hair, and green eyes. Ivy's very beautiful."
Beautiful? More like drop-dead gorgeous.
"She sounds like it." Aidan leans back, putting his hands behind his head. "So where's you meet her?"
"At the hospital in Harraway. Ivy does her service hours there."
"How come we never saw her?"
"You missed each other. She came there at different hours than you guys did."
Nadia sticks her hands up and stretches. "What did you two do?"
"Talk. Just what we do now. Ivy gave me her phone number and email before I left."
"Have you talked to her since?"
"Practically every day. She's a wonderful person. You guys would like her."
That or you would run away in terror.
"So let me get this straight." Aidan scrunches up his face as he thinks everything over. "The reason that you're not gag over Melanie anymore is because of some older chick you met in the hospital?"
"Yep."
Aidan lets out a long, low whistle. "Damn. If she's good enough to kick Melanie off the love pedestal, she has to be worth going after."
I nod. "Yeah. Ivy is. I...I think I like her."
If this were a cartoon, Nadia would have a rain cloud over her headβshe looks that bashed from my news.
β
β
Colleen Boyd (Swamp Angel)
β
He's going to be fine!" "No, he's not. I'm going to bash his head in with a brick.
β
β
Naomi Novik (A Deadly Education (The Scholomance, #1))
β
I was gay bashed in Montreal when I was a kid by a group of grown men. That was terrifying." They'd grown silent.and, there was just the crackling and muttering of the fire in the background as Olivier spoke.
"They hit me with sticks. It's funny, but when I think back that's the most painful part. Not the scrapes & bruises but before they hit me they kind of poked, ya know?"
He jabbed with one arm to mimick their movements. "It was as though I wasn't human."
"That's the necessary first step!" Said Myrna. "They dehumanize their victim. You've put it well" she spoke from experience.
Before coming to Three Pines, she'd been a psychologist in Monteal. And, being black, she knew that singular expression when people saw her as furniture.
β
β
Louise Penny (Still Life (Chief Inspector Armand Gamache, #1))
β
Creating a Simple Installation Script Create a script to install a list of software packages: Open a new file with a .sh extension: nano install-software.sh Add the following lines to the file: #!/bin/bash sudo apt update sudo apt install -y gimp vlc firefox Save and close the file (Ctrl+O, then Ctrl+X). Make the script executable: chmod +x install-software.sh Run the script: ./install-software.sh Final Thoughts
β
β
INFORMAGIC GORDON (Mastering Ubuntu 24.04: The Ultimate Technical Guide to Linux Administration: Ubuntu 24.04 LTS "Noble Numbat")
β
I was gay bashed in Montreal when I was a kid by a group of grown men. That was terrifying." They'd grown silent.and, there was just the crackling and muttering of the fire in the background as Olivier spoke.
"They hit me with sticks. It's funny, but when I think back that's the most painful part. Not the scrapes & bruises but before they hit me they kind of poked, ya know?"
He jabbed with one arm to mimick their movements. "It was as though I wasn't human."
"That's the necessary first step!" Said Myrna. "They dehumanize their victim. You've put it well" she spoke from experience.
Before coming to Three Pines, she'd been a psychologist in Monteal. And, being black, she knew that singular expression when people saw her as furniture.
β
β
Louise Penny (Chief Inspector Gamache: Still Life / A Fatal Grace / The Cruellest Month / A Rule Against Murder / The Brutal Telling (Chief Inspector Armand Gamache, #1-5))
β
Attempt 1: (Thirty seconds after crossing the bridge.) Adrian: βThis place really is kind of beautiful.Β Like, look at this flowerβ¦β (Flower spits acid into his eyes.) Adrian: βOh, gawd!Β Oh, sweet, merciful gawd!Β I think Iβm blind!β (He promptly stumbled over a cliff before Dom could put him out of his misery.) (He screamed the entire way down.) Attempt 19: Dom: βYou should stay behind me.β Adrian: βWhy?Β Last time, nothing was on this trail.Β And did you see these glowing rocksβ" (A panther pounced on him from a low-hanging branch.) Adrian: βAhh!Β Is that my intestine?Β How am I even still alive?β (He somehow survived for a full minute.) (A very loud minute.) Attempt 37: (Adrian walked behind Dom, talking to himself) Adrian: βOkay, this time, Iβm going to be careful.Β Iβm going to stay behind Dom.Β Iβm going to watch my surroundings.Β Iβm not going to sniff the flowers.Β Or actually anything with bright colors.Β Hell, if itβs interesting enough to take a picture of it β it can definitely kill you.Β Ha!Β Thatβs actually pretty goodβ¦Β Hey Dom, I think I just invented the Photograph Ruleββ (Adrian tripped over a root and bashed his head against a tree trunk.) (He then fell into a small pond where he was promptly drained dry by a swarm of leeches.) (They were bright pink.)
β
β
Travis Bagwell (Happy (Awaken Online, #5.5))
β
Strip out Comments and Blank Lines $ grep -E -v "^#|^$" file
β
β
Jason Cannon (Command Line Kung Fu: Bash Scripting Tricks, Linux Shell Programming Tips, and Bash One-liners)