Rosie Project Quotes

But why, why, why can't people just say what they mean?

I asked you here tonight because when you realise you want to spend the rest of your life with somebody, you want the rest of your life to start as soon as possible.

Humans often fail to see what is close to them and obvious to others.

If you really love someone,' Claudia continued, 'you have to be prepared to accept them as they are. Maybe you hope that one day they get a wake-up call and make the changes for their own reasons.

But I’m not good at understanding what other people want.’ ‘Tell me something I don’t know,’ said Rosie for no obvious reason. I quickly searched my mind for an interesting fact. ‘Ahhh…The testicles of drone bees and wasp spiders explode during sex.

Restaurants are minefields for the socially inept

You can’t go through life not listening to music.

I haven’t changed my mind. That’s the point! I want to spend my life with you even though it’s totally irrational. And you have short earlobes. Socially and genetically there’s no reason for me to be attracted to you. The only logical conclusion is that I must be in love with you.

And how could I be sure that other people were not doing the same—playing the game to be accepted but suspecting all the time that they were different?

Research consistently shows that the risks to health outweigh the benefits of drinking alcohol. My argument is that the benefits to my mental health justify the risks.

Our first relationship with a male is with our fathers. It affects how we relate to men forever.

You’re unbelievable,’ said Rosie. ‘Look at me when I’m talking.’ I kept looking out the window. I was already over-stimulated. ‘I know what you look like.

How can you tell if someone is a vegan? Just wait ten minutes and they’ll tell you.

I knew so much shit and I still couldn’t fix myself.

Fault! Asperger’s isn’t a fault. It’s a variant. It’s potentially a major advantage. Asperger’s syndrome is associated with organization, focus, innovative thinking, and rational detachment.

And it dawned on me that I had not designed the questionnaire to find a woman I could accept, but to find someone who might accept me.

It would be unreasonable to give you credit for being incredibly beautiful.

Asperger's isn't a fault. It's a variant. It's potentially a major advantage.

What would you like?" "A skinny decaf latte." This is a ridiculous form of coffee, but I did not point it out.

Take notice of your emotions as well as logic. Emotions have their own logic. And try to go with the flow.

I met Rosie at the airport. She remained uncomfortable about me purchasing her ticket, so I told her she could pay me back by selecting some Wife Project applicants for me to date. 'Fuck you,’ she said. It seemed we were friends again.

You know what I like about New York?” he said. “There are so many weird people that nobody takes any notice. We all just fit right in.

Love is a powerful feeling for another person, often defying logic.

It seems right now that all I've ever done in my life is making my way here to you.

Why do we focus on certain things at the expense of others? We will risk our lives to save a person from drowning, yet not make a donation that could save dozens of children from starvation.

I know this song!’ Rosie laughed. ‘If you didn’t, that’d be the final proof that you’re from Mars.

So, to add to a momentous day, I corrected a misconception that my family had held for at least fifteen years and came out to them as straight.

Professor Tillman. Most of us here are not scientists, so you may need to be a little less technical.’ This sort of thing is incredibly annoying. People can tell you the supposed characteristics of a Gemini or a Taurus and will spend five days watching a cricket match, but cannot find the interest or the time to learn the basics of what they, as humans, are made up of.

Then, in this vanishingly small moment in the history of the universe, she took my hand, and held it all the way to the subway.

If Rosie’s mother had known that eye colour was not a reliable indicator of paternity, and organised a DNA test to confirm her suspicions, there would have been no Father Project, no Great Cocktail Night, no New York Adventure, no Reform Don Project—and no Rosie Project. Had it not been for this unscheduled series of events, her daughter and I would not have fallen in love. And I would still be eating lobster every Tuesday night. Incredible.

I need not be visibly odd. I could engage in the protocols that others followed and move undetected among them. And how could I be sure that other people were not doing the same - playing the game to be accepted but suspecting all the time that they were different?

The Apricot Ice-cream Disaster had cost a whole evening of my life, compensated for only by the information about simulation algorithms.

I didn’t have years. But I am a quick learner and was in human-sponge mode. I demonstrated.

I diagnosed brain overload and set up a spreadsheet to analyze the situation.

Do you find me attractive?' Gene told me the next day that I got it wrong. But he was not in a taxi, after an evening of total sensory overload, with the most beautiful woman in the world. I believed I did well. I detected the trick question. I wanted Rosie to like me, and I remembered her passionate statement about men treating women as objects. She was testing to see if I saw her as an object or as a person. Obviously the correct answer was the latter. ‘I haven’t really noticed,’ I told the most beautiful woman in the world.

You want a beer?” she said. A beer! At 3:01 a.m. Ridiculous. “Yes, please.

I had feared that Rosie would not love me. Instead, it was I who could not love Rosie.

I could not see the speedometer, and was not accustomed to travelling in an open vehicle, but I estimated that we were consistently exceeding the speed limit. Discordant sound, wind, risk of death—I tried to assume the mental state that I used at the dentist.

I have heard the word ‘stunning’ used to describe women, but this was the first time I had actually been stunned by one.

Rosie and I were on our way to New York, where being weird is acceptable.

Time’s up. Excellent work. All the rational solutions came from the aspies. Everyone else was incapacitated by emotion.

I have never heard of the Wife Project. But I’m about to. In detail.’ ‘Of course,’ I said. ‘But we should time-share it with pizza-consumption and beer-drinking.’ ‘Of course,’ said Rosie

Why do people value others’ time so little? Now we would have the inevitable small talk. I could have spent fifteen minutes at home practicing aikido.

It must have been almost 2.30 a.m. How could I have lost track of time like that? It was a severe lesson in the dangers of messing with the schedule.

Research has shown that creativity is enhanced when performing straightforward mechanical tasks such as jogging, cooking and driving. Unobstructed thinking time is always useful.

A woman at the rear of the room raised her hand. I was focused on the argument now and made a minor social error, which I quickly corrected. “The fat woman—overweight woman—at the back?

I could have argued that her wanting to do something for me meant she was ultimately acting in her own interests, but it might provoke more of the ‘don’t fuck with me’ behaviour.

I haven’t really noticed,” I told the most beautiful woman in the world.

It was only later that I realised that I had experienced extended close contact with another human without feeling uncomfortable. I attributed it to my concentration on correctly executing the dance steps.

It seems hardly possible to analyse such a complex situation involving deceit and supposition of another person’s emotional response, and then prepare your own plausible lie, all while someone is waiting for you to reply to a question. Yet that is exactly what people expect you to be able to do.

I am able to hug Rosie. This was the issue that caused me the most fear after she agreed to live with me. I generally find body contact unpleasant, but sex is an obvious exception. Sex solved the body contact problem. We are now also able to hug without having sex, which is obviously convenient at times.

Another world, another life, proximate but inaccessible. The elusive . . . Sat-is-fac-tion.

Feel! Feel, feel, feel! Feelings were disrupting my sense of well-being.

I never watch sports. Ever. The reasons are obvious—or should be to anyone who values their time.

What are the symptoms of being fucked-up?’ ‘I’ve got crap in my life that I wish I hadn’t. And I’m not good at dealing with it. Am I making sense?

I became aware of applause. It seemed natural. I had been living in the world of romantic comedy and this was the final scene. But it was real. The entire University Club dining room had been watching. I decided to complete the story according to tradition and kissed Rosie.

I watched as Humphrey Bogart’s character used beans as a metaphor for the relative unimportance in the wider world of his relationship with Ingrid Bergman’s character, and chose logic and decency ahead of his selfish emotional desires. The quandary and resulting decision made for an engrossing film. But this was not what people cried about. They were in love and could not be together. I repeated this statement to myself, trying to force an emotional reaction. I couldn’t. I didn’t care. I had enough problems of my own.

You are the world’s most perfect woman. All other women are irrelevant. Permanently. No Botox or implants will be required.

Difficulties are inevitable,” I said. “Major projects require persistence.

If you shut yourself down, you’re wasting two days of your life that someone is trying to make exciting and productive and fun for you.

Amazing. She retains a professor of genetics, an alien of extraordinary abilities, to help find her father, she travels for a week, spending almost every minute of the waking day with him, yet when she wants the answer to a question on genetics, she goes to the Internet.

If she's a psychology student, she'll love talking about herself.

Time has been redefined. Previous rules no longer apply. Alcohol is hereby declared mandatory in the Rosie Time Zone.

My schedule and social skills had now been brought into line with conventional practice, to the best of my ability within the time I had allocated. The Don Project was complete. It was time to commence the Rosie Project.

I took her in the standard jive hold that I had practised on the skeleton, and immediately felt the awkwardness, approaching revulsion, that I feel when forced into intimate contact with another human.

You considered me as a partner?’ ‘Sure,’ she said. ‘Except for the fact that you have no idea of social behaviour, your life’s ruled by a whiteboard and you’re incapable of feeling love – you’re perfect.

It may have been due to the effect of the gordo blanco on my cognitive functions, but I was suddenly overwhelmed by an extraordinary feeling—not of satisfaction but of absolute joy. It was the feeling I had in the Museum of Natural History and when I was making cocktails. We started dancing again, and this time I allowed myself to focus on the sensations of my body moving to the beat of the song from my childhood and of Rosie moving to the same rhythm.

Nothing would change the fault in my brain that made me unacceptable.

I began the second half of my life by making coffee.

Since I had never been so sexually attracted to a woman before, I was suddenly compelled to examine her ears.

Contrary to popular belief, alcohol does not destroy brain cells.

How are you going to kiss a girl if you won’t share her ice-cream?

Habitual earliness is cumulatively a major waste of time.

There was also a dark-haired man of about thirty (BMI approximately twenty) who appeared not to have shaved for several days, and, beside him, the most beautiful woman I had ever seen. In contrast to the complexity of Bianca’s costume, she was wearing a green dress with zero decoration, so minimal that it did not even have straps to hold it in place. It took me a moment to realise that its wearer was Rosie.

I never drink coffee after 3.48 p.m. It interferes with sleep. Caffeine has a half-life of three to four hours, so it’s irresponsible serving coffee at 7.00 p.m. unless people are planning to stay awake until after midnight. Which doesn’t allow adequate sleep if they have a conventional job.

I've sequenced the questions for maximum speed of elimination,’ I explained. ‘I believe I can eliminate most women in less than forty seconds. Then you can choose the topic of discussion for the remaining time.’ ‘But then it won’t matter,’ said Frances. ‘I’ll have been eliminated.’ ‘Only as a potential partner. We may still be able to have an interesting discussion.’ ‘But I’ll have been eliminated.’ I nodded. ‘Do you smoke?’ ‘Occasionally,’ she said. I put the questionnaire away. ‘Excellent.’ I was pleased that my question sequencing was working so well. We could have wasted time talking about ice-cream flavours and make-up only to find that she smoked. Needless to say, smoking was not negotiable. ‘No more questions. What would you like to discuss?

How many positions in that book can you do?” “The sex book? All of them.” “Bullshit.” “It was considerably less complex than the cocktail book.

we need to be vigilant that emotions do not cripple us.

You’d better not let me down,” said Rosie. “I’m expecting constant craziness.

I sat beside Rosie, pretending to be her friend.

I need a minute to think,” she said. I automatically started the timer on my watch. Suddenly Rosie started laughing. I looked at her, understandably puzzled at this outburst in the middle of a critical life decision. “The watch,” she said. “I say ‘I need a minute’ and you start timing. Don is not dead.

In the last eight weeks I had experienced two of the three best times of my adult life, assuming all visits to the Museum of Natural History were treated as one event. They had both been with Rosie. Was there a correlation? It was critical to find out.

Restaurants are minefields for the socially inept, and I was nervous as always in these situations. But we got off to an excellent start when we both arrived at exactly 7:00 PM as arranged. Poor synchronization is a huge waste of time.

Oh my God,’ she said. ‘I need a drink.’ I was not sure why she was sharing this information with someone she had known for only forty-six minutes. I planned to consume some alcohol myself when I arrived home but saw no reason to inform Julie.

So why the stress?" said Gene. “You have had sex before?” “Of course,” I said. “My doctor is strongly in favor.” “Frontiers of medical science,” said Gene. He was probably making a joke. I think the value of regular sex has been known for some time. I explained further. “It’s just adding a second person makes it complicated.

There was only one bar of that name, in a back street of an inner suburb. I had already modified the day’s schedule, cancelling my market trip to catch up on the lost sleep. I would purchase a ready-made dinner instead. I am sometimes accused of being inflexible, but I think this demonstrates an ability to adapt to even the strangest of circumstances.

The answer came to me as I was boning a quail...

I would normally have scheduled my driving time according to published studies on fatigue and booked accommodation accordingly. But I had been too busy to plan. Nevertheless, I stopped for rest breaks every two hours and found myself able to maintain concentration. At 11.43 p.m., I detected tiredness, but rather than sleep I stopped at a service station, refuelled, and ordered four double espressos. I opened the sunroof and turned up the CD player volume to combat fatigue, and at 7.19 a.m. on Saturday, with the caffeine still running all around my brain, Jackson Browne and I pulled into Moree.

When I returned, wearing an uncomfortably large white shirt, with a decorative frill in the front, I tried to introduce the Wife Project, but Claudia was engaged in child-related activities. This was becoming frustrating. I booked dinner for Saturday night and asked them not to schedule any other conversation topics.

Why do we focus on certain things at the expense of others? We will risk our lives to save a person from drowning, yet not make a donation that could save dozens of children from starvation. We install solar panels when their impact on CO2 emissions is minimal - and indeed may have a net negative effect if manufacturing and installation are taken into account - rather than contributing to more efficient infrastructure projects.

Logically, I should be attractive to a wide range of women. In the animal kingdom, I would succeed in reproducing. However, there is something about me that women find unappealing. I have never found it easy to make friends, and it seems that the deficiencies that caused this problem have also affected my attempts at romantic relationships.

In evaluating Elizabeth’s suitability as a potential partner — someone to provide intellectual stimulation, to share activities with, perhaps even to breed with — Claudia’s first concern was my reaction to her choice of glasses frames, which was probably not even her own but the result of advice from an optometrist. This is the world I have to live in.

I was feeling overwhelmed. Meeting Bianca, dancing, rejection by Bianca, social overload, discussion of personal matters—now, just when I thought the ordeal was over, Rosie seemed to be proposing more conversation. I was not sure I could cope. ‘It’s extremely late,’ I said. I was sure this was a socially acceptable way of saying that I wanted to go home. ‘The taxi fares go down again in the morning.’ If I understood correctly, I was now definitely far out of my depth. I needed to be sure that I wasn’t misinterpreting her.

I decided that ten positions would be sufficient initially. More could be learned if the initial encounter was successful. It did not take long—less time than learning the cha-cha. In terms of reward for effort, it seemed strongly preferable to dancing and I was greatly looking forward to it.

It seems right now that all I’ve ever done in my life is making my way here to you.’ I could see that Rosie could not place the line from The Bridges of Madison County that had produced such a powerful emotional reaction on the plane. She looked confused. ‘Don, what are you…what have you done to yourself?’ ‘I’ve made some changes.’ ‘Big changes.’ ‘Whatever behavioural modifications you require from me are a trivial price to pay for having you as my partner.’ Rosie made a downwards movement with her hand, which I could not interpret. Then she looked around the room and I followed her eyes. Everyone was watching. Nick had stopped partway to our table. I realised that in my intensity I had raised my voice. I didn’t care. ‘You are the world’s most perfect woman. All other women are irrelevant. Permanently. No Botox or implants will be required. ‘I need a minute to think,’ she said. I automatically started the timer on my watch. Suddenly Rosie started laughing. I looked at her, understandably puzzled at this outburst in the middle of a critical life decision. ‘The watch,’ she said. ‘I say “I need a minute” and you start timing. Don is not dead. 'Don, you don’t feel love, do you?’ said Rosie. ‘You can’t really love me.’ ‘Gene diagnosed love.’ I knew now that he had been wrong. I had watched thirteen romantic movies and felt nothing. That was not strictly true. I had felt suspense, curiosity and amusement. But I had not for one moment felt engaged in the love between the protagonists. I had cried no tears for Meg Ryan or Meryl Streep or Deborah Kerr or Vivien Leigh or Julia Roberts. I could not lie about so important a matter. ‘According to your definition, no.’ Rosie looked extremely unhappy. The evening had turned into a disaster. 'I thought my behaviour would make you happy, and instead it’s made you sad.’ ‘I’m upset because you can’t love me. Okay?’ This was worse! She wanted me to love her. And I was incapable. Gene and Claudia offered me a lift home, but I did not want to continue the conversation. I started walking, then accelerated to a jog. It made sense to get home before it rained. It also made sense to exercise hard and put the restaurant behind me as quickly as possible. The new shoes were workable, but the coat and tie were uncomfortable even on a cold night. I pulled off the jacket, the item that had made me temporarily acceptable in a world to which I did not belong, and threw it in a rubbish bin. The tie followed. On an impulse I retrieved the Daphne from the jacket and carried it in my hand for the remainder of the journey. There was rain in the air and my face was wet as I reached the safety of my apartment.

The crisis of Humanism means that the structural others of the modern humanistic subject re-emerge with a vengeance in postmodernity (Braidotti, 2002). It is a historical fact that the great emancipatory movements of postmodernity are driven and fuelled by the resurgent ‘others’: the women’s rights movement; the anti-racism and de-colonization movements; the anti-nuclear and pro-environment movements are the voices of the structural Others of modernity. They inevitably mark the crisis of the former humanist ‘centre’ or dominant subject-position and are not merely anti-humanist, but move beyond it to an altogether novel, posthuman project.

I now believe that virtually all my problems could be attributed to my brain’s being configured differently from those of the majority of humans. All the psychiatric symptoms were a result of this difference, not of any underlying disease. Of course I was depressed: I lacked friends, sex, and a social life, because I was incompatible with other people. My intensity and focus were misinterpreted as mania. And my concern with organization was labeled as obsessive-compulsive disorder.

There were approximately twenty-five people milling around the door and the front of the classroom, but I immediately recognised Julie, the convenor, from Gene’s description: ‘blonde with big tits’. In fact, her breasts were probably no more than one and a half standard deviations from the mean size for her body weight, and hardly a remarkable identifying feature. It was more a question of elevation and exposure, as a result of her choice of costume, which seemed perfectly practical for a hot January evening.

She was wearing a black dress without decoration, thick-soled black boots and vast amounts of silver jewellery on her arms. Her red hair was spiky like some new species of cactus. I have heard the word ‘stunning’ used to describe women, but this was the first time I had actually been stunned by one. It was not just the costume or the jewellery or any individual characteristic of Rosie herself: it was their combined effect. I was not sure if her appearance would be regarded as conventionally beautiful or even acceptable to the restaurant that had rejected my jacket. ‘Stunning’ was the perfect word for it.

You’re saying your mother engaged in unprotected sex outside her primary relationship?’ ‘With some other student,’ replied Rosie. ‘While she was dating my’ – at this point Rosie raised her hands and made a downwards movement, twice, with the index and middle fingers of both hands – ‘father. My real dad’s a doctor. I just don’t know which one. Really, really pisses me off.’ I was fascinated by the hand movements and silent for a while as I tried to work them out. Were they a sign of distress at not knowing who her father was? If so, it was not one I was familiar with. And why had she chosen to punctuate her speech at that point … of course! Punctuation! ‘Quotation marks,’ I said aloud as the idea hit me. ‘What?’ ‘You made quotation marks around “father” to draw attention to the fact that the word should not be interpreted in the usual way. Very clever.’ ‘Well, there you go,’ she said. ‘And there I was thinking you were reflecting on my minor problem with my whole fucking life. And might have something intelligent to say.’ I corrected her. ‘It’s not a minor problem at all!’ I pointed my finger in the air to indicate an exclamation mark. ‘You should insist on being informed.’ I stabbed the same finger to indicate a full stop. This was quite fun.