Opinion On Birds Quotes

See, this is my opinion: we all start out knowing magic. We are born with whirlwinds, forest fires, and comets inside us. We are born able to sing to birds and read the clouds and see our destiny in grains of sand.

You know, I do believe in magic. I was born and raised in a magic time, in a magic town, among magicians. Oh, most everybody else didn’t realize we lived in that web of magic, connected by silver filaments of chance and circumstance. But I knew it all along. When I was twelve years old, the world was my magic lantern, and by its green spirit glow I saw the past, the present and into the future. You probably did too; you just don’t recall it. See, this is my opinion: we all start out knowing magic. We are born with whirlwinds, forest fires, and comets inside us. We are born able to sing to birds and read the clouds and see our destiny in grains of sand. But then we get the magic educated right out of our souls. We get it churched out, spanked out, washed out, and combed out. We get put on the straight and narrow and told to be responsible. Told to act our age. Told to grow up, for God’s sake. And you know why we were told that? Because the people doing the telling were afraid of our wildness and youth, and because the magic we knew made them ashamed and sad of what they’d allowed to wither in themselves. After you go so far away from it, though, you can’t really get it back. You can have seconds of it. Just seconds of knowing and remembering. When people get weepy at movies, it’s because in that dark theater the golden pool of magic is touched, just briefly. Then they come out into the hard sun of logic and reason again and it dries up, and they’re left feeling a little heartsad and not knowing why. When a song stirs a memory, when motes of dust turning in a shaft of light takes your attention from the world, when you listen to a train passing on a track at night in the distance and wonder where it might be going, you step beyond who you are and where you are. For the briefest of instants, you have stepped into the magic realm. That’s what I believe. The truth of life is that every year we get farther away from the essence that is born within us. We get shouldered with burdens, some of them good, some of them not so good. Things happen to us. Loved ones die. People get in wrecks and get crippled. People lose their way, for one reason or another. It’s not hard to do, in this world of crazy mazes. Life itself does its best to take that memory of magic away from us. You don’t know it’s happening until one day you feel you’ve lost something but you’re not sure what it is. It’s like smiling at a pretty girl and she calls you “sir.” It just happens. These memories of who I was and where I lived are important to me. They make up a large part of who I’m going to be when my journey winds down. I need the memory of magic if I am ever going to conjure magic again. I need to know and remember, and I want to tell you.

See, this is my opinion: we all start out knowing magic. We are born with whirlwinds, forest fires, and comets inside us. We are born able to sing to birds and read the clouds and see our destiny in grains of sand. But then we get the magic educated right out of our souls. We get it churched out, spanked out, washed out, and combed out. We get put on the straight and narrow and told to be responsible. Told to act our age. Told to grow up, for God's sake. And you know why we were told that? Because the people doing the telling were afraid of our wildness and youth, and because the magic we knew made them ashamed and sad of what they'd allowed to wither in themselves.

Whenever an occasion arose in which she needed an opinion on something in the wider world, she borrowed her husband's. If this had been all there was to her, she wouldn't have bothered anyone, but as is so often the case with such women, she suffered from an incurable case of of pretentiousness. Lacking any internalized values of her own, such people can arrive at a standpoint only by adopting other people's standards or views. The only principle that governs their minds is the question "How do I look?

Most of all, differences of opinion are opportunities for learning.

I have an opinion about holy war, which in general I must keep to myself. I have no wish to be known as a heretic. It is....that if a war can be holy, then God cannot. At best a war can only be necessary.

Many scholars forget, it seems to me, that our enjoyment of the great works of literature depends more upon the depth of our sympathy than upon our understanding. The trouble is that very few of their laborious explanations stick in the memory. The mind drops them as a branch drops its overripe fruit. ... Again and again I ask impatiently, "Why concern myself with these explanations and hypotheses?" They fly hither and thither in my thought like blind birds beating the air with ineffectual wings. I do not mean to object to a thorough knowledge of the famous works we read. I object only to the interminable comments and bewildering criticisms that teach but one thing: there are as many opinions as there are men.

As far as I could see, she had no opinion at all about anything that was not set directly in front of her (and in fact, she was extremely nearsighted).

And kid, you’ve got to love yourself. You’ve got wake up at four in the morning, brew black coffee, and stare at the birds drowning in the darkness of the dawn. You’ve got to sit next to the man at the train station who’s reading your favorite book and start a conversation. You’ve got to come home after a bad day and burn your skin from a shower. Then you’ve got to wash all your sheets until they smell of lemon detergent you bought for four dollars at the local grocery store. You’ve got to stop taking everything so goddam personally. You are not the moon kissing the black sky. You’ve got to compliment someones crooked brows at an art fair and tell them that their eyes remind you of green swimming pools in mid July. You’ve got to stop letting yourself get upset about things that won’t matter in two years. Sleep in on Saturday mornings and wake yourself up early on Sunday. You’ve got to stop worrying about what you’re going to tell her when she finds out. You’ve got to stop over thinking why he stopped caring about you over six months ago. You’ve got to stop asking everyone for their opinions. Fuck it. Love yourself, kiddo. You’ve got to love yourself.

The more noise you make the more likely you are to be eaten. If you’ve no way to escape you keep silent. If birds couldnt fly they wouldnt sing. When you’re defenseless you keep your opinions to yourself.

Like a bird, fly against the wind of opinions to reach your destination.

Morning birdsong filled the room. For all his high opinion of birds, privileged among God's creatures, still, deep in his heart, the Emperor did not trust them, just as he did not trust artists.

In response to my father-in-law's view, I offered no opinion. He was not looking for my opinion. He had merely been spouting his belief, a conviction that would remain unchanged for all eternity.

Nature has no opinion, no agenda. Nature provides a playing field, a not particularly level one, on which we compete with all creatures great and small. It’s more that nature’s playing field is full of traps.

And what does a person with such a romantic temperament seek in the study of the classics? He asked this as if, having had the good fortune to catch such a rare bird as myself, he was anxious to extract my opinion while I was still captive in his office. 'If by romantic you mean solitary and introspective,' I said, 'I think romantics are frequently the best classicists.' He laughed. 'The great romantics are often failed classicists. But that's beside the point, isn't it?

The bird looked much smaller dead than alive. Jody felt a little mean pain in his stomach, so he took out his pocketknife and cut off the bird's head. Then he disemboweled it, and took off its wings; and finally he threw all the pieces into the brush. He didn't care about the bird, or its life, but he knew what older people would say if they had seen him kill it; he was ashamed because of their potential opinion.

In my opinion, it was chiefly owing to their deep contemplation in their silent retreats in the days of youth that the old Indian orators acquired the habit of carefully arranging their thoughts. They listened to the warbling of birds and noted the grandeur and the beauties of the forest. The majestic clouds—which appear like mountains of granite floating in the air—the golden tints of a summer evening sky, and the changes of nature, possessed a mysterious significance. All of this combined to furnish ample matter for reflection to the contemplating youth.

[Maisie] "Tell me, Dr. Dene, if you were to name one thing that made the difference between those who get well quickly and those who don't, what would it be?" [Dr. Dene] "...In my opinion, acceptance has to come first. Some people don't accept what has happened. They think, 'Oh, if only I hadn't...' or... 'If only I'd known...' They are stuck at the point that caused the injury. "...I would say that it's threefold: One is accepting what has happened. Three is having a picture, an indea of what they will do when they are better or improved. Then in the middle, number two is a path to follow.

Most human beings I've met have a rather negative opinion of science. They think it is dull and abstruse, possibly even dangerous. But everyone, even on EARTH, is a scientist, really, whether he realizes it or not. Anyone who has ever watched and wondered how a bird flies, or a leaf unfurls, or concluded anything on the basis of his own observations, is a scientist. Science is a part of life.

Animals might whimper if they're hungry or cold. But they dont start screaming. It's a bad idea. The more noise you make the more likely you are to be eaten. If you've no way to escape you keep silent. If birds couldnt fly they wouldnt sing. When you're defenseless you keep your opinions to yourself.

He asked as if, having had the good fortune to catch such a rare bird as myself, he was anxious to extract my opinion while I was still captive in his office.

Noontime was absolutely the perfect time for a duel in the dragon’s opinion as this was also lunchtime, his favorite part of the day. As the saying went, he could kill two birds with one stone.

It is indeed a tricky name. It is often misspelt, because the eye tends to regard the "a" of the first syllable as a misprint and then tries to restore the symmetrical sequence by triplicating the "o"- filling up the row of circles, so to speak, as in a game of crosses and naughts. No-bow-cough. How ugly, how wrong. Every author whose name is fairly often mentioned in periodicals develops a bird-watcher's or caterpillar-picker's knack when scanning an article. But in my case I always get caught by the word "nobody" when capitalized at the beginning of a sentence. As to pronunciation, Frenchmen of course say Nabokoff, with the accent on the last syllable. Englishmen say Nabokov, accent on the first, and Italians say Nabokov, accent in the middle, as Russians also do. Na-bo-kov. A heavy open "o" as in "Knickerbocker". My New England ear is not offended by the long elegant middle "o" of Nabokov as delivered in American academies. The awful "Na-bah-kov" is a despicable gutterism. Well, you can make your choice now. Incidentallv, the first name is pronounced Vladeemer- rhyming with "redeemer"- not Vladimir rhyming with Faddimere (a place in England, I think).

It is foolish to wish for beauty.  Sensible people never either desire it for themselves or care about it in others.  If the mind be but well cultivated, and the heart well disposed, no one ever cares for the exterior.  So said the teachers of our childhood; and so say we to the children of the present day.  All very judicious and proper, no doubt; but are such assertions supported by actual experience? We are naturally disposed to love what gives us pleasure, and what more pleasing than a beautiful face—when we know no harm of the possessor at least?  A little girl loves her bird—Why?  Because it lives and feels; because it is helpless and harmless?  A toad, likewise, lives and feels, and is equally helpless and harmless; but though she would not hurt a toad, she cannot love it like the bird, with its graceful form, soft feathers, and bright, speaking eyes.  If a woman is fair and amiable, she is praised for both qualities, but especially the former, by the bulk of mankind: if, on the other hand, she is disagreeable in person and character, her plainness is commonly inveighed against as her greatest crime, because, to common observers, it gives the greatest offence; while, if she is plain and good, provided she is a person of retired manners and secluded life, no one ever knows of her goodness, except her immediate connections.  Others, on the contrary, are disposed to form unfavourable opinions of her mind, and disposition, if it be but to excuse themselves for their instinctive dislike of one so unfavoured by nature; and visa versâ with her whose angel form conceals a vicious heart, or sheds a false, deceitful charm over defects and foibles that would not be tolerated in another. 

When the mountain streams are frozen and the Nor'land winds are out; when the winter winds are drifting the bitter sleet and snow; when winter rains are making out-of-door life unendurable; when season, weather and law combine to make it "close time" for beast, bird and man, it is well that a few congenial spirits should, at some favorite trysting place, gather around the glowing stove and exchange yarns, opinions and experiences.

Let every young man and woman be warned by my example, and understand that good handwriting is a necessary part of education. I am now of the opinion that children should first be taught the art of drawing before learning how to write. Let the child learn his letters by observation as he does different objects, such as flowers, birds, etc., and let him learn handwriting only after he has learnt to draw objects. He will then write a beautifully formed hand.

All opinions that I allegedly paint dreams come from journalists. In my life, maybe I've tried to paint one dream, a fragment of a dream in my early youth. But I never use dreams. Maybe I said on occasion that all I have in common with the surrealists is this oneiric method of creativity. I never wonder why I am painting a bird sitting on someone's shoulder, it can happen spontaneously, just like in a dream. My creation is easy going. If it fits, just leave it there. It doesn't mean anything.

I am, as you know, a fan of nature, said Reginald. And yet, nature doesn't find ways to do anything. Nature has no opinion, no agenda. Nature provides a playing field, a not particularly level one, on which we compete with all creatures great and small.

it all along. When I was twelve years old, the world was my magic lantern, and by its green spirit glow I saw the past, the present, and into the future. You probably did too; you just don’t recall it. See, this is my opinion: we all start out knowing magic. We are born with whirlwinds, forest fires, and comets inside us. We are born able to sing to birds and read the clouds and see our destiny in grains of sand. But then we get the magic educated right out of our souls. We get it churched out, spanked out, washed out, and combed out. We get put on the straight and narrow and told to be responsible. Told to act our age. Told to grow up, for God’s sake. And you know why we were told that? Because the people doing the telling were afraid of our wildness and youth, and because the magic we knew made them ashamed and sad of what they’d allowed to wither in themselves.

Animals might whimper if they’re hungry or cold. But they dont start screaming. It’s a bad idea. The more noise you make the more likely you are to be eaten. If you’ve no way to escape you keep silent. If birds couldnt fly they wouldnt sing. When you’re defenseless you keep your opinions to yourself.

But where should he begin? - Well, then, the trouble with the English was their: Their: In a word, Gibreel solemnly pronounced, their weather. Gibreel Farishta floating on his cloud formed the opinion that the moral fuzziness of the English was meteorologically induced. 'When the day is not warmer than the night,' he reasoned, 'when the light is not brighter than the dark, when the land is not drier than the sea, then clearly a people will lose the power to make distinctions, and commence to see everything - from political parties to sexual partners to religious beliefs - as much-the-same, nothing-to-choose, give-or-take. What folly! For truth is extreme, it is so and not thus, it is him and not her; a partisan matter, not a spectator sport. It is, in brief, heated. City,' he cried, and his voice rolled over the metropolis like thunder, 'I am going to tropicalize you.' Gibreel enumerated the benefits of the proposed metamorphosis of London into a tropical city: increased moral definition, institution of a national siesta, development of vivid and expansive patterns of behaviour among the populace, higher-quality popular music, new birds in the trees (macaws, peacocks, cockatoos), new trees under the birds (coco-palms, tamarind, banyans with hanging beards). Improved street-life, outrageously coloured flowers (magenta, vermilion, neon-green), spider-monkeys in the oaks. A new mass market for domestic air-conditioning units, ceiling fans, anti-mosquito coils and sprays. A coir and copra industry. Increased appeal of London as a centre for conferences, etc.: better cricketeers; higher emphasis on ball-control among professional footballers, the traditional and soulless English commitment to 'high workrate' having been rendered obsolete by the heat. Religious fervour, political ferment, renewal of interest in the intellegentsia. No more British reserve; hot-water bottles to be banished forever, replaced in the foetid nights by the making of slow and odorous love. Emergence of new social values: friends to commence dropping in on one another without making appointments, closure of old-folks' homes, emphasis on the extended family. Spicier foods; the use of water as well as paper in English toilets; the joy of running fully dressed through the first rains of the monsoon. Disadvantages: cholera, typhoid, legionnaires' disease, cockroaches, dust, noise, a culture of excess. Standing upon the horizon, spreading his arms to fill the sky, Gibreel cried: 'Let it be.

I hope it's the good kind of dilemma," Reginald broke Patricia's reverie. "Whatever one you're on the horns of." ... "I was just thinking," she said. "There are so many scary problems in the world. Like, I was just reading that we could be seeing the last of the bees in North America soon. And if that happened, food webs would just collapse, and tons more people would starve. But suppose you had the power to change things? You still might not be able to fix anything, because every time you solve a problem you'd create another problem. And maybe all these plagues and droughts are nature's way of striking a balance. We humans don't have any natural predators left, so nature has to find another way to handle us." ... "I am, as you know, a fan of nature," said Reginald. "And yet, nature doesn't 'find ways' to do anything. Nature has no opinion, no agenda. Nature provides a playing field, a not particularly level one, on which we compete with all creatures great and small. It's more that nature's playing field is full of traps.

he disclosed that he had been set upon by two Bedlamites, both of whom had jumped out from behind a bush, roaring at him like a couple of ferocious wild beasts ... The Sergeant cast a doubtful glance at Lieutenant Ottershaw, for, in his opinion, this had a false ring. His men, as he frequently informed them, put him forcibly in mind of many things, ranging from gape-seeds, hedge-birds, slush-buckets, and sheep-biters, to beetles, tailless dogs, and dead herrings, but none of them, least of all the two raw dragoons in question, had ever reminded him of a ferocious wild beast. Field-mice, yes, he thought, remembering the sad loss of steel in those posted to watch the Dower House; but if the young gentleman had detected any resemblance to ferocious wild beasts in his assailants, the Sergeant was prepared to take his Bible oath they had not been the baconbrained knock-in-the-cradles he had posted (much against his will) within the ground of Darracott place. But Sergeant Hoole had never, until this disastrous evening, set eyes on Mr. Claud Darracott. Lieutenant Ottershaw had beheld that Pink of the Ton picking his delicate way across the cobbles in Rye, clad in astonishing but unquestionably modish raiment, and holding a quizzing-glass up to his eye with one fragile white hand, and it did not strike him as remarkable that this Bartholomew baby should liken two overzealous dragoons to wild beasts.

Of course there is no denying that all these primordial dreams appear, in the opinion of nonmathematicians, to have been suddenly realized in a form quite different from the original fantasy. Baron Munchhausen’s post horn was more beautiful than our canned music, the Seven-League boots more beautiful than a car, Oberon’s kingdom lovelier than a railway tunnel, the magic root of the mandrake better than a telegraphed image, eating of one’s mother’s heart and then understanding birds more beautiful than an ethologic study of a bird’s vocalizing. We have gained reality and lost dream. No more lounging under a tree and peering at the sky between one’s big and second toes; there’s work to be done. To be efficient, one cannot be hungry and dreamy but must eat steak and keep moving. It is exactly as though the old, inefficient breed of humanity had fallen asleep on an anthill and found, when the new breed awoke, that the ants had crept into its bloodstream, making it move frantically ever since, unable to shake off that rotten feeling of antlike industry.

So wrongdoing must be understood by standing it against righteousness" explained Abdel Hamid, holding out his hands "like right against left". He turned one hand over and then the other. He paused to take note of whether Rustam Bey was still with him. "Righteousness is good morality but it is also that about which the soul feels tranquil and the heart feels tranquil. This is what the Prophet said to Wabisah bin Ma'bad. As for wrongdoing Nawas bin Sam'an said he heard the Prophet saying that wrongdoing is that which wavers in the soul and which you dislike people finding out about, and Wabisah bin Ma'bad said that he heard the Prophet saying that wrongdoing is that which wavers in the soul and moves to and fro in the breast even though people again and again have given you their legal opinion in its favour. Both of these traditions came from imams with a good chain of authorities, one from Imam Ahmad Ibn Hanbal and the other from Imam Al-Darimi, may God be pleased with them both. So no doubt that these things were said by the Prophet, peace be upon him.

And Swedenborg himself saw birds during his sojourns in the Spirit World and it was revealed to him that — in the Grand Man — rational concepts are seen as birds. Because the head corresponds to the heavens and the air. He actually experienced in his body the fall of certain angels who had formed wrong opinions in their community about thoughts and influx — he felt a terrible tremor in his sinews and bones — and saw one dark and ugly bird and two fine and beautiful. And these solid birds were the thoughts of the angels, as he saw them in the world of his senses, beautiful reasonings and ugly falses. For at every level everything corresponds, from the most purely material to the most purely divine in the Divine Human.

We feel that our actions are voluntary when they follow a decision, and involuntary when they happen without decision. But if decision itself were voluntary, every decision would have to be preceded by a decision to decide–an infinite regression which fortunately does not occur. Oddly enough, if we had to decide to decide, we would not be free to decide. We are free to decide because decision “happens.” We just decide without having the faintest understanding of how we do it. In fact, it is neither voluntary nor involuntary. To “get the feel” of this relativity is to find another extraordinary transformation of our experience as a whole, which may be described in either of two ways. I feel that I am deciding everything that happens, or, I feel that everything, including my decisions, is just happening spontaneously. For a decision–the freest of my actions-just happens like hiccups inside me or like a bird singing outside me. Such a way of seeing things is vividly described by a modern Zen master, the late Sokei-an Sasaki: One day I wiped out all the notions from my mind. I gave up all desire. I discarded all the words with which I thought and stayed in quietude. I felt a little queer–as if I were being carried into something, or as if I were touching some power unknown to me … and Ztt! I entered. I lost the boundary of my physical body. I had my skin, of course, but I felt I was standing in the center of the cosmos. I spoke, but my words had lost their meaning. I saw people coming towards me, but all were the same man. All were myself! I had never known this world. I had believed that I was created, but now I must change my opinion: I was never created; I was the cosmos; no individual Mr. Sasaki existed.7 It would seem, then, that to get rid of the subjective distinction between “me” and “my experience”–through seeing that my idea of myself is not myself–is to discover the actual relationship between myself and the “outside” world. The individual, on the one hand, and the world, on the other, are simply the abstract limits or terms of a concrete reality which is “between” them, as the concrete coin is “between” the abstract, Euclidean surfaces of its two sides. Similarly, the reality of all “inseparable opposites”–life and death, good and evil, pleasure and pain, gain and loss–is that “between” for which we have no words.

It is foolish to wish for beauty. Sensible people never either desire it for themselves or care about it in others. If the mind be but well cultivated, and the heart well disposed, no one ever cares for the exterior. So said the teachers of our childhood; and so say we to the children of the present day. All very judicious and proper, no doubt; but are such assertions supported by actual experience? We are naturally disposed to love what gives us pleasure, and what more pleasing than a beautiful face--when we know no harm of the possessor at least? A little girl loves her bird--Why? Because it lives and feels; because it is helpless and harmless? A toad, likewise, lives and feels, and is equally helpless and harmless; but though she would not hurt a toad, she cannot love it like the bird, with its graceful form, soft feathers, and bright, speaking eyes. If a woman is fair and amiable, she is praised for both qualities, but especially the former, by the bulk of mankind: if, on the other hand, she is disagreeable in person and character, her plainness is commonly inveighed against as her greatest crime, because, to common observers, it gives the greatest offence; while, if she is plain and good, provided she is a person of retired manners and secluded life, no one ever knows of her goodness, except her immediate connections. Others, on the contrary, are disposed to form unfavourable opinions of her mind, and disposition, if it be but to excuse themselves for their instinctive dislike of one so unfavoured by nature; and visa versa with her whose angel form conceals a vicious heart, or sheds a false, deceitful charm over defects and foibles that would not be tolerated in another. They that have beauty, let them be thankful for it, and make a good use of it, like any other talent; they that have it not, let them console themselves, and do the best they can without it: certainly, though liable to be over-estimated, it is a gift of God, and not to be despised.

The winged human glanced towards Retina briefly. “It’s okay Dr. Blade. Scientists should never be blown away from the nature of facts.” Roma smiled. “And by scientists, are you one?” “That is dependent on your opinion Dr. Hill. I’m well versed by Dr. Sangha.” Roma moved towards him, narrowing his eyes. “It is my opinion that no respectable scientist will allow himself to be a subject of ridicule by turning in his human DNA to become a freak, a beast or whatever the hell it is you think you are.” The winged human was unaffected. “I’m sure Dr. Hill that freak or beast doesn’t apply.” Roma drew his head back slightly, studying the demeanor of the winged human. “What’s your name?” “I’m Seganus,” he replied humbly. Roma moved a little closer to him wearing a deep frown. “You don’t think the word freak or beast applies?” “No. I don’t think so.” “Is that the carnivorous beaks of the Titanis Walleri I see on you?” “No.” “Can you hold the 360 Degrees field of view of the Woodcock.” “No.” “The long bills of the Australian Pelican?” “No.” “Do you lay the large eggs of the Ostrich?” “Dr. Hill,” Retina cautioned. Lorenzo seemed amused by the situation. He was smiling. “No,” Seganus replied. Roma continued. “Then you’ll say you don’t have those qualities birds posses?” “No.” “You’ll say you’re human?” Seganus blinked before he spoke. “Yes.” Roma moved closer to him. “Then why the freaks are you wearing wings?

Poppy Devine did not deserve cancer. Poppy was sweet and industrious and careful and measured and always, always did the right thing. If anyone deserved cancer it was Julia. Julia was loud and opinionated and disagreeable. Rude, some might even say. She went out with bad men, took unnecessary risks, pushed people to their limits, swore like a sailor and flipped the bird more than any female in the history of the world. It should be her number coming up in the cancer lottery.

We asked him what colour he called it, and he said he didn’t know. He didn’t think there was a name for the colour. The man had told him it was an Oriental design. George put it on, and asked us what we thought of it. Harris said that, as an object to hang over a flower-bed in early spring to frighten the birds away, he should respect it; but that, considered as an article of dress for any human being, except a Margate nigger, it made him ill. George got quite huffy; but, as Harris said, if he didn’t want his opinion, why did he ask for it?

Mrs. Alingsby was tall and weird and intense, dressed rather like a bird-of-paradise that had been out in a high gale, but very well connected. She had long straight hair which fell over her forehead, and sometimes got in her eyes, and she wore on her head a scarlet jockey-cap with an immense cameo in front of it. She hated all art that was earlier than 1923, and a considerable lot of what was later. In music, on the other hand, she was primitive, and thought Bach decadent: in literature her taste was for stories without a story, and poems without metre or meaning. But she had collected round her a group of interesting outlaws, of whom the men looked like women, and the women like nothing at all, and though nobody ever knew what they were talking about, they themselves were talked about. Lucia had been to a party of hers, where they all sat in a room with black walls, and listened to early Italian music on a spinet while a charcoal brazier on a blue hearth was fed with incense… Lucia’s general opinion of her was that she might be useful up to a point, for she certainly excited interest.

...I knew at times I have a loud chirp for such a petite bird, a chirp that some think is slanted, opinionated, and way too unladylike coming from a mouth as prim-looking as mine. Until I open it and the space between my two front teeth shoes. It's the space that everyone blames for my outspokenness, and although my parents don't really believe it, they use it, too. Whenever I say things that embarrass them, they're the first to tell people, 'It's that space between her two front teeth. Things just slip out of it, and she can't help it. We don't know what to do about it.

See, this is my opinion: we all start out knowing magic. We are born able to sing to birds and read the clouds and see our destiny in grains of sand. But then we get the magic educated right out of our souls. We get it churched out, spanked out, washed out, and combed out. We get put on the straight and narrow and told to be responsible. Told to act our age. Told to grow up, for God's sake. And you know why we were told that? Because the people doing the telling were afraid of our wildness and youth, and because the magic we knew made them ashamed and sad of what they'd allowed to wither in themselves.

See this is my opinion: we all start out knowing magic. We are born with whirlwinds, forest fires, and comets inside us. We are born able to sing to birds and read the clouds and see our destiny in grains of sand. But then we get the magic educated right out of our souls. We get it churched out, spanked out, washed out, and combed out. We get put on the straight and narrow and told to be responsible. Told to act our age. Told to grow up, for God's sake. And you know why we were told that? Because the people doing the telling were afraid of our wildness and youth, and because the magic we knew made them ashamed and sad of what they'd allowed to wither in themselves.

See, this is my opinion: we all start out knowing magic. We are born with whirlwinds, forest fires, and comets inside us. We are born able to sing to birds and read the clouds and see our destiny in grains of sand. But then we get the magic educated right out of our souls. We get it churched out, spanked out, washed out, and combed out. We get put on the straight and narrow and told to be responsible. Told to act our age. Told to grow up, for God’s sake. And you know why we were told that? Because the people doing the telling were afraid of our wildness and youth, and because the magic we knew made them ashamed and sad of what they’d allowed to wither in themselves.

It was a dream about children crying. When I woke up they were still crying. It just got farther away. I dont think that it had stopped. I just couldnt hear it anymore. I hadnt been around babies much. But I got to wondering why they cried all the time. I think they cry for different reasons. Dont they? They’re wet, or they’re hungry. I thought there had to be more to it. Animals might whimper if they’re hungry or cold. But they dont start screaming. It’s a bad idea. The more noise you make the more likely you are to be eaten. If you’ve no way to escape you keep silent. If birds couldnt fly they wouldnt sing. When you’re defenseless you keep your opinions to yourself.

I do not know if you have ever examined how you listen, it doesn't matter to what, whether to a bird, to the wind in the leaves, to the rushing waters, or how you listen to a dialogue with yourself, to your conversation in various relationships with your intimate friends, your wife or husband. If we try to listen we find it extraordinarily difficult, because we are always projecting our opinions and ideas, our prejudices, our background, our inclinations, our impulses; when they dominate we hardly listen to what is being said. In that state there is no value at all. One listens and therefore learns, only in a state of attention, a state of silence in which this whole background is in abeyance, is quiet; then, it seems to me, it is possible to communicate.

Now one hears the admonitions that one "is to honor all opinions and convictions," that "every conviction is authorized," that one must be "tolerant to the views of others," etc. But "your thoughts are not my thoughts, and your ways are not my ways." Or rather, I mean the reverse: Your thoughts are my thoughts, which I dispose of as I will, and which I strike down unmercifully; they are my property, which I annihilate as I list. I do not wait for authorization from you first, to decompose and blow away your thoughts. It does not matter to me that you call these thoughts yours too, they remain mine nevertheless, and how I will proceed with them is my affair, not a usurpation. It may please me to leave you in your thoughts; then I keep still. Do you believe thoughts fly around free like birds, so that every one may get himself some which he may then make good against me as his inviolable property? What is flying around is all—mine.

Still, Einstein would never count Oppenheimer as one of his close friends, “perhaps partly because our scientific opinions are fairly diametrically different.” Back in the 1930s, Oppie had once called Einstein “completely cuckoo” for his stubborn refusal to accept quantum theory. All of the young physicists Oppenheimer brought to Princeton were wholly convinced of Bohr’s quantum views—and uninterested in the questions that Einstein posed to challenge the quantum view of the world. They could not fathom why the great man was working indefatigably to develop a “unified field theory” to replace what he saw as the inconsistencies of quantum theory. It was lonely work, and yet he was still quite satisfied to defend “the good Lord against the suggestion that he continuously rolls the dice”—his thumbnail critique of Heisenberg’s uncertainty principle, one of the foundations of quantum physics. And he didn’t mind that most of his Princeton colleagues “see me as a heretic and a reactionary who has, as it were, outlived himself.

If there was any consistency to his opinions, it was the consistent lack of consistency, and if he had a worldview, it was a view that proclaimed his lack of a worldview. But these very absences were what constituted his intellectual assets. Consistency and an established worldview were excess baggage in the intellectual mobile warfare that flared up in the mass media’s tiny time segments, and it was his great advantage to be free of such things. He had nothing to protect, which meant that he could concentrate all his attention on pure acts of combat. He needed only to attack, to knock his enemy down. Noboru Wataya was an intellectual chameleon, changing his color in accordance with his opponent’s, ad-libbing his logic for maximum effectiveness, mobilizing all the rhetoric at his command. I had no idea how he had acquired these techniques, but he clearly had the knack of appealing directly to the feelings of the mass audience. He knew how to use the kind of logic that moved the great majority. Nor did it even have to be logic: it had only to appear so, as long as it aroused the feelings of the masses.

It’s not a serious project,” Laurence said as they crossed Castro Street. “Milton doesn’t think the human race will still be here in a hundred years, much less a few thousand. This is just his way of hedging his bets. Or assuaging his conscience.” “It’s gotten me three free trips to Greenland,” Isobel said. “Honestly, I think Milton’s opinions depend on how many interns he’s killed today.” She half-winked, to indicate this was a joke and Milton killed no interns. During the dinner, Isobel talked more about her career transition, from rockets to Milton’s Ten Percent Project. “I used to dream about rockets.” Isobel scooped a corn chip into the communal pico de gallo. “Every single night, for months and months. After we pulled the plug on Nimble Aerospace. I had these weird dreams that there was a rocket launch going up any minute, and we’d misplaced the final telemetry. Or we were sending up a rocket, and it looked beautiful and proud shooting up into the air, and then it collided with a jumbo jet. Or worst of all was the dreams where nothing went wrong, rockets just soared for hours, and I sat on the ground watching with tears in my eyes.

As the driver pulled over to attend the injured animal, I sat and watched the sky - an oceanic mass of gray, with islands of steel blue - thinking, yes, certainly, birds must sleep at times while they fly. How ridiculous it was to think otherwise. Yet my brothers' tutor, a man from Oxford with red eyebrows, had informed me the previous morning that no such thing could occur. Such a thing, he'd opined, would be an affront to God, who had blessed birds with the ability to sleep and the ability to fly, but not the ability to sleep while flying or fly while sleeping. Absurd! Moreover, he went on, were it to be case, each morning we would find at our feet heaps of dead birds that had smashed into rooftops or trees in the night. Night after night we would be awakened by this ornithological cacophony, this smashing of beaks against masonry, this violence of feathers and bones. It will not do, he said, to too greatly admire the mysteries of nature. But I remembered that sparrow on the riverbank and secretly held that the world was not so easily explained by a tutor's reason. Indeed, it was then that I first formed the opinion - if childishly, idly - that a person should trust to her own good sense and nature's impenetrable wisdom.

How marvellous useful it is for a man to represent unto himself meats, and all such things that are for the mouth, under a right apprehension and imagination! as for example: This is the carcass of a fish; this of a bird; and this of a hog. And again more generally; This phalernum, this excellent highly commended wine, is but the bare juice of an ordinary grape. This purple robe, but sheep's hairs, dyed with the blood of a shellfish. So for coitus, it is but the attrition of an ordinary base entrail, and the excretion of a little vile snivel, with a certain kind of convulsion: according to Hippocrates his opinion. How excellent useful are these lively fancies and representations of things, thus penetrating and passing through the objects, to make their true nature known and apparent! This must thou use all thy life long, and upon all occasions: and then especially, when matters are apprehended as of great worth and respect, thy art and care must be to uncover them, and to behold their vileness, and to take away from them all those serious circumstances and expressions, under which they made so grave a show. For outward pomp and appearance is a great juggler; and then especially art thou most in danger to be beguiled by it, when (to a man's thinking) thou most seemest to be employed about matters of moment.

book called The Birds, and it sounded just like mine. He was getting all worked up and cross, saying Hitchcock had taken the film from his, and not mine. Then he apparently took Counsel’s Opinion, who said it was no good him doing anything, so luckily he is not to go on with his claim, so-called. But at least three fools in America have made ‘claims’, saying they have written books or stories about savage birds, and my heart began to sink, in case some awful great Main case started up in the US (like that Rebecca thing) and I had to fly out, and give evidence. These brutes just do it for publicity and money, and film people like Hitchcock don’t care; it makes more publicity, and any claim always comes back on the author. There seems to be no protection for well-known authors when this happens, because after all it’s only one’s word against somebody else’s, that one has never read their stupid stories! And as these people are always insolvent, there is no hope of making a counter-claim against them, or getting them to pay costs if they bring a case. Actually, I don’t think anything will come from it all, but I can’t help remembering that awful Rebecca lawsuit. That person’s story was rotten, and not a bit like Rebecca at all, but they were still able to file a lawsuit, and one had to go to America, and do all that witness business.

I will invest my heart's desire and the work of my hands in things that will outlive me. Although it grieves me that houses are burning, I have fallen in love with freedom regardless, and the entitlement of a woman to get a move on, equipped with boots that fit and opinions that might matter. The treasures I carry closest to my heart are things I can't own: the curve of a five-year-old's forehead in profile, and the vulnerable expectation in the hand that reaches for mine as we cross the street. The wake-up call of birds in a forest. The intensity of the light fifteen minutes before the end of day; the color wash of a sunset on mountains; the ripe sphere of that same sun hanging low in a dusty sky in a breathtaking photograph from Afghanistan. In my darkest times I have to walk, sometimes alone, in some green place. Other people must share this ritual. For some I suppose it must be the path through a particular set of city streets, a comforting architecture; for me it's the need to stare at water until my mind comes to rest on nothing at all. Then I can go home. I can clear the brush from a neglected part of the garden, working slowly until it comes to me that here is one small place I can make right for my family. I can plant something as an act of faith in time itself, a vow that we will, sure enough, have a fall and a winter this year, to be followed again by spring. This is not an end in itself, but a beginning. I work until my mind can run a little further on its tether, tugging at this central pole of my sadness, forgetting it for a minute or two while pondering a school meeting next week, the watershed conservation project our neighborhood has undertaken, the farmer's market it organized last year: the good that becomes possible when a small group of thoughtful citizens commit themselves to it...Small change, small wonders - these are the currency of my endurance and ultimately of my life.

Syra had to bite back a laugh at the bird's nest comment and opted for a more characteristic gesture that summed up her thoughts on his opinion of her hair with one finger.

I am, as you know, a fan of nature,” said Reginald. “And yet, nature doesn’t ‘find ways’ to do anything. Nature has no opinion, no agenda. Nature provides a playing field, a not particularly level one, on which we compete with all creatures great and small. It’s more that nature’s playing field is full of traps.

The Happy Crow Once upon a time, there lived a crow in a forest. This crow was absolutely satisfied and happy with its life. One day it happened to go to a pond to drink water. It looked at its reflection in the water and turned its face this way and that. It preened its wings and thought about how shiny they were. The crow was convinced of its beauty. But then he saw a white swan swim by. Some ducks standing near the pond laughed at the crow for its black color and complimented and praised the swan. The crow was full of admiration for the swan. He told the swan that it was beautiful and also added, “you must be the happiest bird in the world.” The swan, however, did not appear so happy. When the crow asked her the reason the swan replied, “I also thought that I was the most beautiful and the happiest bird around, until I saw the parrot. You will not believe it. You and I have just one color, but the parrot has two, green and red. In my opinion, the parrot must be the happiest bird in the world.” The crow was intrigued and went to meet the parrot. When he saw the parrot, he too was convinced that it was indeed the most beautiful bird in the forest. When the crow asked the parrot, “you must be the happiest bird in the forest,” the parrot laughed and said, “I too lived under the same illusion, until I saw the peacock. You won’t believe how beautiful the peacock is. I have never seen a more colorful bird.” The inquisitive crow now went to meet the peacock and indeed it was the most colorful bird anyone could imagine. It danced happily with its wings spread and the crow watched mesmerized. However, a bird catcher hiding in the bush too had the same reaction and he captured the colorful peacock. The colorful parrot and the white swan too could not escape this fate. However, the crow with its shiny feathers and lustrous wings escaped this fate. The society’s bias against dark color saved the crow. The peacock, parrot, and swan looked at the crow flying about freely and thought “this must be the happiest bird in the world.

When she was a girl, Eleanor had completely believed the tale. That Zephyr brought her back from Africa with him, a pearl that he'd swallowed, that had remained hidden deep within his jaw when he was shot, skinned, sold, and shipped, during the decades his pelt was put on proud display at the big house and through his subsequent repair to reduced circumstances at the Lake House. It was there, one day, when the tiger's head was tilted just so, that the pearl rolled out of his lifeless mouth and became lost in the long weave of the library carpet. It was trodden on, bypassed, and all but forgotten, until one dark night, while the household slept, it was found by fairies on a mission of theft. They took the pearl deep into the woods, where it was laid on a bed of leaves, studied and pondered and tentatively stroked, before being stolen by a bird, who mistook it for an egg. High in the treetops, the pearl began to grow and grow and grow, until the bird became frightened that her own eggs would be crushed and she rolled the argent orb back down the side of the tree, where it landed with a soft thud on a bed of leaf fall. There, in the light of the full moon, surrounded by curious fairy folk, the egg began to hatch and a baby emerged. The fairies gathered nectar to feed her and took turns rocking the babe to sleep, but soon no amount of nectar was enough, and even fairy magic could not keep the child content. A meeting was held and it was decided the woods were no place for a human child and she must be returned to the house, laid on the doorstep in a wrap of woven leaves. As far as Eleanor was concerned, it explained everything: why she felt such an affinity with the woods, why she'd always been able to glimpse the fairies in the meadows where other people saw only grass, why birds had gathered on the ledge outside the nursery window when she was an infant. It also explained the fierce tiger rage that welled up inside her at times, that made her spit and scream and stomp, so that Nanny Bruen hissed and told her she'd come to no good if she didn't learn to control herself. Mr. Llewellyn, on the other hand, said there were worse things in life than a temper, that it only proved one had an opinion. And a pulse, he added, the alternative to which was dire! He said a girl like Eleanor would do well to keep the coals of her impudence warm, for society would seek to cool them soon enough.

The bottom line: higher-level taxonomy is usually unhelpful for birding. Species-level taxonomy is a matter of opinion. But in between, at the levels of family and genus, that’s where taxonomy can be really helpful for birding.

There is, however, one natural feature of this country, the interest and grandeur of which may be fully appreciated in a single walk: it is the ‘virgin forest’. Here no one who has any feeling of the magnificent and the sublime can be disappointed; the sombre shade, scarce illumined by a single direct ray even of the tropical sun, the enormous size and height of the trees, most of which rise like huge columns a hundred feet or more without throwing out a single branch, the strange buttresses around the base of some, the spiny or furrowed stems of others, the curious and even extraordinary creepers and climbers which wind around them, hanging in long festoons from branch to branch, sometimes curling and twisting on the ground like great serpents, then mounting to the very tops of the trees, thence throwing down roots and fibres which hang waving in the air, or twisting round each other form ropes and cables of every variety of size and often of the most perfect regularity. These, and many other novel features – the parasitic plants growing on the trunks and branches, the wonderful variety of the foliage, the strange fruits and seeds that lie rotting on the ground – taken altogether surpass description, and produce feelings in the beholder of admiration and awe. It is here, too, that the rarest birds, the most lovely insects, and the most interesting mammals and reptiles are to be found. Here lurk the jaguar and the boa-constrictor, and here amid the densest shade the bell-bird tolls his peal.

[Maisie] Tell me, Dr. Dene, if you were to name one thing that made the difference between those who get well quickly and those who don't, what would it be? [Dr. Dene] ...In my opinion, acceptance has to come first. Some people don't accept what has happened. They think, 'Oh, if only I hadn't...' or... 'If only I'd known...' They are stuck at the point that caused the injury. ...I would say that it's threefold: One is accepting what has happened. Three is having a picture, an indea of what they will do when they are better or improved. Then in the middle, number two is a path to follow.

[Maisie] Tell me, Dr. Dene, if you were to name one thing that made the difference between those who get well quickly and those who don't, what would it be? [Dr. Dene] ...In my opinion, acceptance has to come first. Some people don't accept what has happened. They think, 'Oh, if only I hadn't...' or... 'If only I'd known...' They are stuck at the point that caused the injury. ...I would say that it's threefold: One is accepting what has happened. Three is having a picture, an idea of what they will do when they are better or improved. Then in the middle, number two is a path to follow.

In many ways, the work of a critic is easy. We risk very little, yet enjoy a position over those who offer up their work and their selves to our judgment. We thrive on negative criticism, which is fun to write and to read. But the bitter truth we critics must face is that, in the grand scheme of things, the average piece of junk is probably more meaningful than our criticism designating it so. But there are times when a critic truly risks something, and that is in the discovery and defense of the new. The world is often unkind to new talent, new creations. The new needs friends. Last night, I experienced something new, an extraordinary meal from a singularly unexpected source. To say that both the meal and its maker have challenged my preconceptions about fine cooking is a gross understatement. They have rocked me to my core. In the past, I have made no secret of my disdain for Chef Gusteau's famous motto: 'Anyone can cook.' But I realize, only now do I truly understand what he meant. Not everyone can become a great artist, but a great artist can come from anywhere. It is difficult to imagine more humble origins than those of the genius now cooking at Gusteau's, who is, in this critic's opinion, nothing less than the finest chef in France. I will be returning to Gusteau's soon, hungry for more.

It is illegal to portal anyone while they are under duress,I could lose my license if I were to do so." "You're going to lose a lot more than that if you don't tell me where my twin went," I said in a low, mean voice. "Mayling, please. I must insist that you allow me to be the bad cop," Gabriel said as I slid the dagger at my ankle out of its sheath. "I have never subscribed to the sexist belief that women have to be good cop," I said, twirling the dagger around one finger. "Nonetheless, you are far more suited to the good cop role," Gabriel insisted. "I'm going to have to go against popular opinion and side with Mei Ling on this," Savian said, watching us with a delighted twinkle in his eye. "She looks like she knows how to use that blade. What is that, a stiletto?" "Sicilian castrating knife," I said with a smile at the portal man. "She wins," Savian told Gabriel. "Er..." Jarilith said, his expression starting to slide into worry. "I am a wyvern! I can do far more to this man than merely remove his genitalia," Gabriel answered in an outraged tone, a little tendril of smoke emerging from between his lips as he spoke. "Eh..." Jarilith said, taking a step backward. "Hmm. He's a weaver," Savian said thoughtfully as he examined the portalist. "Those are immortal, aren't they? So he could survive a castration, but the question is would a dragon barbeque be enough to finish him off?" "Absolutely," Gabriel said. He smiled. It wasn't a nice smile. "Threatening a weaver is strictly prohibited by law," Jarilith said indignantly, but the fight had gone out of him. His gaze was flickering back and forth from Gabriel to Savian to the dagger I held casually. "I could have the watch on you for what you're saying!" "Oh, please," I said with a dramatic roll of my eyes. "Just about every thief taker in this hemisphere is after me. I've already been sentenced to banishment to the Akasha. You think one little murder is going to make that any worse? Not likely." Jarilith's eyes widened. "It's true," Savian said. "The price on her head has already gone over six figures." The color washed out of the portalist's face. "Erm..." "Mate," Gabriel said sternly. "I must insist that you refrain from slicing and dicing this man." Jarilith nodded quickly. "Listen to the dragon." "It is my place to destroy those who stand in your way," Gabriel continued, the pupils in his eyes narrowing as he turned to the now hastily backing away Jarilith. "Let's not lose our heads, here," the latter said in a rush. "I don't think it's your head the lady has in mind," Savian said as he looked pointedly at the portalist's crotch. Jarilith's hands hovered protectively over his fly. "Such an atrocity would constitute torture. You wouldn't do that to an innocent man, would you?" "What makes you think I'd stop at the castration?" I twirled the knife around my fingers again. "This little jobby fillets, as well." "She went to Paris," Jarilith said quickly as he dashed for a door to a back room. "Your portal is ready in room number three. Have a pleasant journey..." His voice trailed off as he bolted. I turned a frown on Gabriel. "You really wouldn't have let me be bad cop? I'm very good at it, as you can see." "I'm sorry," he said, his dimples belying the grave look he was trying to maintain.."Wyverns have some standards to maintain with their mates, and one of them is always being the bad cop.Although I do admit that you have a particularly effective manner. Would you really have castrated him to get the information about your twin?" "Would you really have burnt him to acrisp for not answering?" "Such a bloodthirsty little bird," he said fondly, giving my butt a little pinch. Savian stood still for a moment, giving us an odddisbelieving look before shaking his head and following. "You two are the strangest couple I've ever met. And I have to tell you-I've met some real weirdos

I'll now fall back a furlong or two in me chair, while me larned but misguided collagues r-read th' Histhry iv Iceland to show ye how wrong I am. But mind ye, what I 've said goes. I let thim talk because it exercises their throats, but ye 've heard all th' decision on this limon case that'll get into th' fourth reader.' A voice fr'm th' audjeence, ' Do I get me money back ? ' Brown J. : ' Who ar-re ye ? ' Th' Voice : ' Th' man that ownded th' limons.' Brown J. : ' I don't know.' (Gray J., White J., dissentin' an' th' r-rest iv th' birds concurrin' but fr entirely diff'rent reasons.)

In many ways, the work of a critic is easy. We risk very little, yet enjoy a position over those who offer up their work and their selves to our judgment. We thrive on negative criticism, which is fun to write and to read. But the bitter truth we critics must face, is that in the grand scheme of things, the average piece of junk is probably more meaningful than our criticism designating it so. But there are times when a critic truly risks something, and that is in the discovery and defense of the *new*. The world is often unkind to new talent, new creations. The new needs friends. Last night, I experienced something new: an extraordinary meal from a singularly unexpected source. To say that both the meal and its maker have challenged my preconceptions about fine cooking is a gross understatement. They have rocked me to my core. In the past, I have made no secret of my disdain for Chef Gusteau's famous motto, "Anyone can cook." But I realize, only now do I truly understand what he meant. Not everyone can become a great artist; but a great artist *can* come from *anywhere*. It is difficult to imagine more humble origins than those of the genius now cooking at Gusteau's, who is, in this critic's opinion, nothing less than the finest chef in France. I will be returning to Gusteau's soon, hungry for more.

Everyone is entitled to his or her personal opinion. A wise friend will notice the positive changes and would want to follow you, but a person who derives pleasure in their current misery would find other birds like them that they can flock with together.

Let your voice soar like a bird’s song, unaffected by the thoughts or opinions of others.

willing to close large distances in response to calls. Does that make them stupid? No! Due to the vastness of the landscape these birds often call home, it’s not uncommon for a walk-about tom to respond and come to a live-hen call that barely tickles his eardrums. When calling Merriam’s birds, I prefer to run calls that carry great distances and cut the all-to-often howling western wind. My favorite reach-out-and-touch-their-ears Merriam’s call is a trusty box call. Box calls get a bad rap. When I give seminars, I hear a lot of negative comments about them. They’re too easy to use. Every hunter on the planet hammers away on them. They don’t work on public land. You can’t get the exact pitch you want. I could go on forever with the complaints I’ve heard from hunters about box calls. Here’s my opinion on the matter. They work great to cut the western winds. They also work great when trying to raise the interest of a distant tom. On multiple occasions, I’ve been able to sit behind a quality spotting scope and watch a tom 500 yards away take notice of my box call. Once you master them, box calls can produce pitch-perfect tones. I especially feel this is the case when using a true chalk-on-wood system. Another Merriam’s eardrum ringer is an aluminum pot-and-peg call. I’ve found aluminum pot calls carry great distances. I’m also a fan of glass. What I love about pot-and-peg calls is that I can easily adjust the volume and pitch simply by swapping strikers. And that’s not all. Once you really know what you’re doing, these calls produce, in my opinion, simply the best turkey tones. Like many turkey fanatics, my go-to call is a diaphragm. Through this wonderful

Imam Mawlūd mentions next the concept of divination and foreboding (taṭayyur). When the pre-Islamic Arabs needed to decide upon something, they would run toward a flock of birds. If the flock veered to the left, they took this to be a bad omen; if to the right, it was a good omen. Foreboding is blatant superstition. The Arabic word mutaṭayyir Arabic refers to someone who is a pessimist, who always sees the worst in any given situation. Imam Mawlūd says that superstition is lack of knowledge that everything belongs to God. All affairs are His. Having a good opinion of God produces a view of Him that is impregnable to negative thoughts and behaviors that thrive in the soil of disbelief. To hang on to superstitions is to have a negative understanding of the reality of God and His authority and presence.

Chief Justice Rose Bird, concurring with the majority, wrote an opinion scoffing at the dissenters’ defense of pluralism, which she reduced to defending the right of ‘‘wealthy patrons who prefer to confer largess in a sexually discriminatory fashion.’’ Bird saw Ruth Mallery and people like her not as kindly philanthropists trying to aid society as best they know how, but as a contemptible ‘‘select few’’ who wish to be ‘‘insulated from the 20th century.’’ Bird’s intemperate opinion attacking an altruistic elderly widow became an issue in a reelection battle that ultimately cost Bird her seat on the state supreme court.

The first Vikings to reach Iceland, therefore, did so purely by accident. Viking sailors reckoned through careful observation, and trial and error, not sophisticated navigational tools. Land was found by noting changes in the color of water, differences in the flight patterns of birds, and the presence of driftwood. The Vikings calculated latitude by the midday sun during the day, and by the stars at night. If neither of those two options were available, they relied on instinct. Skippers were notoriously pragmatic. The Laxdæla Saga tells the story of Olaf the Peacock who got hopelessly lost in a fog and drifted for days. When it finally lifted, there was a heated debate about what direction to go. The crew voted for a particular direction and informed Olaf of their choice. The grizzled captain ignored them and told his veteran navigator to pick the direction. 'I want only the shrewdest one to decide', he said, 'because in my opinion, the council of fools is all the more dangerous the more of them there are.

Holly Berries A Confederate Christmas Story by Refugitta There was, first, behind the clear crystal pane, a mammoth turkey, so fat that it must have submitted to be killed from sheer inability to eat and move, hung all around with sausage balls and embowered in crisp white celery with its feathered tops. Many a belated housekeeper or father of a family, passing by, cast loving glances at the monster bird, and turned away with their hands on depleted purses and arms full of brown paper parcels. Then there were straw baskets of eggs, white and shining with the delightful prospect of translation into future eggnogs; pale yellow butter stamped with ears of corn, bee hives, and statuesque cows with their tails in an attitude. But these were all substantials, and the principal attraction was the opposition window, where great pyramids of golden oranges, scaly brown pineapples, festoons of bananas, boxes of figs and raisins with their covers thrown temptingly aside, foreign sauces and pickles, cheeses, and gilded walnuts were arranged in picturesque regularity, jut, as it seemed, almost within reach of one’s olfactories and mouth, until a closer proximity realized the fact of that thick plate glass between. Inside it was just the same: there were barrels and boxes in a perfect wilderness; curious old foreign packages and chests, savory of rare teas and rarer jellies; cinnamon odors like gales from Araby meeting you at every turn; but yet everything, from the shining mahogany counter under the brilliant gaslight, up to the broad, clean, round face of the jolly grocer Pin, was so neat and orderly and inviting that you felt inclined to believe yourself requested to come in and take off things by the pocketful, without paying a solitary cent. I acknowledge that it was an unreasonable distribution of favors for Mr. Pin to own, all to himself, this abundance of good things. Now, in my opinion, little children ought to be the shop keepers when there are apples and oranges to be sold, and I know they will all agree with me, for I well remember my earliest ambition was that my papa would turn confectioner, and then I could eat my way right through the store. But our friend John Pin was an appreciative person, and not by any means forgetful of his benefits. All day long and throughout the short afternoon, his domain had been thronged with busy buyers, old and young, and himself and his assistant (a meager-looking young man of about the dimensions of a knitting needle) constantly employed in supplying their demands. From the Southern Illustrated News.

The view that because our one aim is to proclaim “Christ Crucified” the story of His life does not actually belong to the Gospel, is equally mistaken. The Early Church, rightly, held the opposite opinion, when she called the four books which tell the story of the life of Jesus, “the Four Gospels.” As the life of Jesus can only be rightly understood from the point of view of the cross—the object of the Fourth Gospel is to show this—so, conversely, the Cross of Jesus can only be understood in light of His life, as its culmination.3

♥♥♥ My Guy Nothing you can say, Can take me away, From my guy. Nothing you could do, 'cause I'm stuck like glue, To my guy. I'm sticking to my guy, Like a stamp to a letter, Like birds of a feather, We, stick together, I can tell you from the start, I can't be torn apart from my guy. Nothing you could do, Could make me be untrue, To my guy. (My Guy) Nothing you could buy, Could make me tell a lie, To my guy (My Guy) I gave my guy, My word of honour, To be faithful, And I'm gonna, You'd better be believing, I won't be deceiving, My guy. As a matter of opinion, I think he's tops, My opinion is, He's the cream of the crop, As a matter of taste, To be exact, He's my ideal, As a matter of fact. No muscle bound man, Could take my hand, From my guy. (My guy) No handsome face, Could ever take the place, Of my guy, (My guy) He may not be a movie star, But when it comes to being happy, We are, There's not a man today, Who can take me away, From my guy. No muscle bound man, Could take my hand, From my guy. (My guy) No handsome face, Could ever take the place, Of my guy, (My guy) He may not be a movie star, But when it comes to being happy, We are, There's not a man today, Who can take me away, From my guy. (what'cha say?) There's not a man today, Who could take me away, From my guy. (Tell me more!) There's not a man today, Who could take me away, From my guy.

It sounds disgusting, in my opinion, ‘stuffing,’” she continued. “I’d never heard of it before Rafe told me. To put your fingers inside a raw bird. It’s the sort of thing they did on the frontier, isn’t it.

It’s not how high you jump, how fast you run. All you guys here can run faster, jump higher. But I’ll tell you, I can get my friend Larry Bird and the two of us will play any two of you and when it’s all said and done, we will get the last laugh.

My Guy Nothing you could say Can tear me away from my guy Nothing you could do 'Cause I'm stuck like glue to my guy I'm stickin' to my guy Like a stamp to a letter Like the birds of a feather We stick together I'm tellin' you from the start I can't be torn apart from my guy Nothing you can do Could make me untrue to my guy Nothing you could buy Could make me tell a lie to my guy I gave my guy my word of honor To be faithful and I'm gonna You best be believing I won't be deceiving my guy As a matter of opinion I think he's tops My opinion is he's the cream of the crop As a matter of taste to be exact He's my ideal as a matter of fact No muscle bound man Could take my hand from my guy No handsome face Could ever take the place of my guy He may not be a movie star But when it comes to being happy we are There's not a man today Who could take me away from my guy No muscle bound man Could take my hand from my guy No handsome face Could ever take the place of my guy He may not be a movie star But when it comes to being happy we are There's not a man today Who could take me away from my guy There's not a man today Who could take me away from my guy (Tell me more) There's not a man today Who could take me away from my guy

Syra had to bite back a laugh at the bird's nest comment and opted for a more characteristic gesture that summed up her thoughts on his opinion of her hair with one finger.

And there too was the cause of his happiness. Never far away, when I glanced over, he was standing in the full sun, and he looked bored, picking up small stones from the track and skimming them at a small bird, then absently rubbing a groove in the sand with the toe of his foot. The new boy, same as the old boys – healthy, young, beautiful and almost certainly stupid. Or clever enough to keep his mouth shut and know that opinions are not required of the emperor’s intimate companion. Those who talked least lasted longest. This one, with his thick, light brown hair, the tall fit body, the averted eyes, looked promising. I suppose he was the age Hadrian’s son might have been. Harmless enough. He had walked to the horses where they stood in their shelter and he was suddenly animated, rubbing their muzzles, letting the beasts lower their heads and push against him, taking a handful of grain which he scooped from the bucket, straight from his hand. Sabina said he had been a groom. He was smiling now, the ordinary beauty of youth transformed into something more special, so perhaps it was true. It was a good thing he liked horses; he would need some friends. At that moment I saw the emperor’s head turn across the earnest group of advisers and his eyes watch the boy as he stroked the animals. Perhaps this boy would do; would keep the emperor happy and occupied while they coped with Egypt.

For example, expositor Dr. John Gill in the 1700s said: The lower part of it, the atmosphere above, which are the clouds full of water, from whence rain descends upon the earth; and which divided between them and those that were left on the earth, and so under it, not yet gathered into one place; as it now does between the clouds of heaven and the waters of the sea. Though Mr. Gregory is of the opinion, that an abyss of waters above the most supreme orb is here meant; or a great deep between the heavens and the heaven of heavens.6 Gill agrees that clouds were inclusive of these waters above but that the waters also extend to the heaven of heavens, at the outer edge of the universe. Matthew Poole noted this possibility as well in his commentary in the 1600s: . . . the expansion, or extension, because it is extended far and wide, even from the earth to the third heaven; called also the firmament, because it is fixed in its proper place, from whence it cannot be moved, unless by force.7 Matthew Henry also concurs that this expanse extends to the heaven of heavens (third heaven): The command of God concerning it: Let there be a firmament, an expansion, so the Hebrew word signifies, like a sheet spread, or a curtain drawn out. This includes all that is visible above the earth, between it and the third heavens: the air, its higher, middle, and lower, regions — the celestial globe, and all the spheres and orbs of light above: it reaches as high as the place where the stars are fixed, for that is called here the firmament of heaven Ge 1:14,15, and as low as the place where the birds fly, for that also is called the firmament of heaven, Ge 1:20.8 The point is that a canopy model about the earth is simply that . . . an interpretation. It should be evaluated as such, not taken as Scripture itself.

I heard the echo of a tiny dog voicing his opinion. My lips parted and I found myself tipping back at it under my breath. Gabriel chopped me on the head.

Besides, you need to let boyfriends have opinions about their girls' in their suits. Girls get it all wrong." I wanted to toss my shoe at him.

It was her unscientific opinion that once you’ve slept with one ear open for the sound of a baby, you never quite get over it. It’s the end of your trouble-free sleep for life.

The general opinion of Tai had been voiced long ago by Aadam Aziz's father the gemstone merchant: 'His brain fell out with his teeth'. (But now old Aziz sahib sat lost in bird tweets while Tai simply, grandly, continued)

Oh! Trash!” he cried. “Words, it’s the mechanics again! It’s tiring at first to speak—and then it’s caught by the Others, the savage Others! The poor Me—and Magne is a Me whereas you are a pig, a miscreant Other— the poor Me—there’re maybe 500 of us total on this foul earthly globe!— why can’t they communicate together without straining their larynx!” Nigeot agreed with Kmôhoûn. “And then everything’s…mechanics, effort, on this dung pile of a planet! You have to get dressed and undressed. You can never stay in a state, you always have to change states! Idiots, pigs that we are! You’re comfortable in bed, aren’t you? Oh well, crack! You have to get up! You’re okay when you’re up? Oh well! Bang, bing, bang! You have to go to bed! Get dressed, get undressed! Trash! Mechanics! We lost our fur, our hair, rubbing against it and scraping it with these damn costumes! Look at the monkeys! A lot prettier than us; they look better and have no mechanics to wear. Mechanics, you know, is everything that is against thinking and good old lassitude: movement, stupid moving of arms, arduous stupidity of being a well raised human, no revolt against the stupidities tolerated by the cowardly mob, who’s happy to tyrannize itself when it’s already pestered by the padishahs. Yes, look at the monkeys, the pretty monkeys! No mechanics to wear, lucky devils, good old monkeys! Nothing to do but chuck water on themselves whenever they feel like it!... And when they’re ready! Oh! Real world! Pile of crap where you have to work, even just to button up your shirt! Oh! When will we be in a higher world where they won’t have these appalling paws? Nothing but little things to fly in the warm blue—warm! You know? Little… mechanics… oh! bing! bang! No mechanics—infamy! —little feathery things like the little… things that chuck turds on our heads from up in the trees and after cry out tweet! tweet! in the air, the… what do you call them, the… birds, totally, yes!” And this Mongol who spouted his Polynesian or Gabonese opinions was originally from Saint Etienne, a city that was so busy it was like industrial epilepsy! But, in fact, it was very simple! He was “tired from birth,” as one of my friends used to say who felt the same way, but had nothing to do with Saint Etienne.

Writing taught my father to pay attention; my father in turn taught other people to pay attention and then to write down their thoughts and observations. His students were the prisoners at San Quentin who took part in the creative-writing program. But he taught me, too, mostly by example. He taught the prisoners and me to put a little bit down on paper every day, and to read all the great books and plays we could get our hands on. He taught us to read poetry. He taught us to be bold and original and to let ourselves make mistakes, and that Thurber was right when he said, “You might as well fall flat on your face as lean over too far backwards.” But while he helped the prisoners and me to discover that we had a lot of feelings and observations and memories and dreams and (God knows) opinions we wanted to share, we all ended up just the tiniest bit resentful when we found the one fly in the ointment: that at some point we had to actually sit down and write.

We need resistance to raise us, as it raises the airplane or the bird; we need obstacles against which to sharpen our strength and stimulate our growth. Life without tragedy would be unworthy of a man.

The United States Constitution does not mandate separation of church and state. The phrase “wall of separation” comes from a letter that Jefferson wrote to the Danbury Baptists, and that phrase has no constitutional authority or ground. It was Jefferson’s opinion, which, when he was alive, he had a right to. What the Constitution actually mandates with regard to religion is two-fold: one, the non-establishment of a national church by an act of Congress, and two, non-interference with the free exercise of religion by Congress. Got that? No Church of the United States, comparable to the Church of Denmark, or the Church of England. When the Constitution was ratified, nine of the thirteen colonies had established state churches at the state level. There is no conflict if the national bird is different from the various state birds, or the national flower from the state flowers, and so on. But if one Christian denomination were privileged at the national level, this could and would lead to conflicts with the established churches at the state level. Prior to the War Between the States, the country was governed on true federalist principles, and all this made sense. But get this down. The Constitution prohibits establishing a national denomination and supporting it with tax money. It does not require every branch of civil government, down to the smallest municipalities, to ignore the nature and will of the triune God. Still less does it require them to pretend that Jesus Christ, by His birth in Bethlehem, did not actually come to establish a new humanity in His own person and work.

Setters,” he was saying, “are usually supposed to be the keenest and pointers the strongest, but in my opinion it all depends on the partic’lar dog. Nowadays I hear a good deal about the pointer bein’ the best dog, and I’ve owned some good ones myself. There’s nothing prettier than strong, wiry pointer doublin’ and turnin’ in the brush and freezin’ to a steady point. But for my own part, give me a well-bred Llewellyn setter; they’re the humanist dog they is. They’ve got the bird sense, too. Oh, you can’t beat ‘em.

In a dear little village Remote and obscure A beautiful maiden resided As to whether or not Her intentions were pure Opinions were sharply divided She loved to lie Out 'neath the darkening sky And allow the night breeze To entrance her She whispered her dreams To the birds flying by But seldom received any answer Over the field and along the lane Gentle Alice would love to stray When it came to the end of the day She would wander away Unheeding Dreaming her innocent dreams she strode Quite unaffected by heat or cold Frequently freckled or soaked with rain Alice was out in the lane Who she met there Every day Was a question Answered by none But she'd get there And she'd stay there 'Til whatever she did Was undoubtedly done You might also like Mad Dogs And Englishmen Noël Coward You’re Losing Me (From The Vault) Taylor Swift Cupid (Twin Version) FIFTY FIFTY (피프티피프티) Over the field and along the lane Both her parents would call in vain Sadly, sorrowfully, they'd complain 'Alice is at it again.' Although that dear little village Surrounded by trees Had neither a school, nor a college Gentle Alice acquired From the birds and the bees Some exceedingly practical knowledge The curious secrets that nature revealed She refused to allow to upset her But she thought When observing the beasts of the field That things might have been organised better Over the field and along the lane Gentle Alice would make up And take up Her stand The road was not exactly arterial But it led to a town nearby Where quite a lot of masculine material Caught her rolling eye She was ready to hitchhike Cadillac or motorbike She wasn't proud or choosy All she Was aiming to be Was a pinked-up Minked-up Fly-by-night floozy When old Rogers Gave her pearls as large as Nuts on a chestnut tree All she'd say was 'Fiddle-di-dee! The wages of sin will be the death of me!' Over the field and along the lane Gentle Alice's parents Would wait Hand in hand Her dear old white-headed mother Wistfully sipping champagne Said 'We've spoiled our child Spared the rod Open up the caviar and say "Thank God!" We've got no cause to complain! Alice is at it again!

Little Bird, your opinion is the only one that matters.

The doctor was accustomed to say that his goose was as good as any other man’s goose, as far as he could see as yet; but that he should like some very strong evidence before he allowed himself to express an opinion that the young bird partook, in any degree, of the qualities of a swan. From which it may be gathered that Dr. Finn was a man of common-sense.

This Bird, in my opinion, is a pretty, sweet, dapper songster, being of a nature cheerful; as he is pleasant to the ear, so he is to the eye; and when he sings cocks up his tail, and throws out his notes with so much alacrity and pleasure that I know not any bird of its bigness more delights the sense of hearing.

My mother explains we are not legless birds, mutants. If she'd had a better education she would have know the word "ambiguous," not quite fish, more than snake, but settling into her limitations, she says we are among the few (the Marines?). The last Tuscarora Eel died a generation ago, so we are left Onondaga Eels among the Tuscarora, opinions dismissed by politics of representation, voices silenced in air and water.

Darius was clearly of the opinion that the air was also man's dominion. And that with paddle or fin or pinion we soon or late shall navigate the azure, as now we sail the sea. The thing looks simple enough to me. And if you doubt it, see how Darius reasoned about it. "The birds can fly, an why can't I? Must we give in?" says he with a grin, "that the Blue bird and Feeby Are smarter than we be?" "Just fold our hands and see the Swalla, and the Black bird and the Cat bird beat us holla? Or tell me that chatterin' sassy little wren knows more 'en men? Just show me that. Or prove that the bat has got more brains than's in my hat, an' I'll back down. An' not till then.

Darius was clearly of the opinion that the air was also man's dominion. And that with paddle or fin or pinion we soon or late shall navigate the azure, as now we sail the sea. The thing looks simple enough to me. And if you doubt it, see how Darius reasoned about it. "The birds can fly, an why can't I? Must we give in?" says he with a grin, "that the Blue bird and Feeby Are smarter than we be?" "Just fold our hands and see the Swalla, and the Black bird and the Cat bird beat us holla? Or tell me that chatterin' sassy little wren knows more 'en men? Just show me that. Or prove that the bat has got more brains than's in my hat, an' I'll back down. An' not till then.” From "Darius Green and His Flying Machine

At the beginning of the scene, when called upon to offer his opinion on one side or another of the legal argument, the Earl of Warwick holds back. He may know something about dogs and hawks, he genially declares, but in such highly technical matters—“these nice sharp quillets of the law” (2.4.17)—he professes to be no wiser than a jackdaw, a proverbially stupid bird. But by the scene’s end, in the wake of the formation of the parties, his restraint has vanished: he has plucked the white rose and is eager for blood. “This brawl today,” he prophesies, Grown to this faction in the Temple Garden, Shall send between the red rose and the white A thousand souls to death and deadly night. (2.4.124–28) The obscure legal difference has not fundamentally changed, no new occasion for dispute has arisen, and there does not seem to be an underlying cause such as greed or jealousy. But the party rage seems to have a life of its own. Suddenly everyone seems to be boiling over with potentially murderous aggression. It is as if, in the absence of the dominant figure of the king, the purely conventional and meaningless emblems precipitate a rush of both group solidarity and group loathing. This loathing is an important part of what leads to a social breakdown and, eventually, to tyranny. It makes the voice, even the very thought, of the opponent almost unendurable. You are either with me or against me—and if you are not with me, I hate you and want to destroy you and all of your adherents. Each party naturally seeks power, but seeking power becomes itself the expression of rage: I crave the power to crush you. Rage generates insults, and insults generate outrageous actions, and outrageous actions, in turn, heighten the intensity of the rage. It all begins to spiral out of control.