“
Next thing you know she'll be on the bus and selling T-shirts in the parking lot, showing off her boobs to get in the stage door."
"At least she has boobs to show," Jess said.
"I have boobs," Chloe said, pointing to her chest. "Just because they're not weighing me down doesn't mean they're not substantial."
"Okay, B cup," Jess said, taking a sip of her drink.
"I have boobs!" Chloe said again, a bit too loudly--she'd already had a couple of minibottles at the Spot. "My boobs are great, goddammit. You know that? They're fantastic! My boobs are amazing.
”
”
Sarah Dessen
“
The young writer should learn to spot them: words that at first glance seem freighted with delicious meaning, but that soon burst in the air, leaving nothing but a memory of bright sound.
”
”
E.B. White
“
Life was a bloody battlefield until I conquered the enemy and won the war. Now, life is a journey, and I am a warrior. Prepared for anything and weakened by nothing. There are hills and dales, mountains and plateaus, blind spots and brilliant vistas, but none of that matters. All that matters is my second chance, and the only thing capable of disrupting my path, is myself.
”
”
B.G. Bowers (Death and Life)
“
Someone has to do it. It's all very well calling for eye of newt, but do you mean Common, Spotted or Great Crested? Which eye, anyway? Will tapioca do just as well? If we substitute egg white will the spell a) work b) fail or c) melt the bottom out of the cauldron? Goodie Whemper's curiosity about such things was huge and insatiable*.
* Nearly insatiable. It was probably satiated in her last flight to test whether a broomstick could survive having its bristles pulled out one by one in mid-air. According to the small black raven she had trained as a flight recorder, the answer was almost certainly no.
”
”
Terry Pratchett (Wyrd Sisters (Discworld, #6; Witches, #2))
“
Mulder gave a crooked smile of welcome. 'Sorry,' he said, 'Nobody down here but the F.B.I.'s most unwanted.
”
”
Les Martin (X Marks the Spot (The X-Files: Middle Grade, #1))
“
All these years, whenever I thought of him, I'd think either of B. or of our last days in Rome, the whole thing leading up to two scenes: the balcony with its attendant agonies and via Santa Maria dell' Anima, where he'd pushed me against the old wall and kissed me and in the end let me put one leg around his. Every time I go back to Rome, I go back to that one spot. It is still alive for me, still resounds with something totally present, as though a heart stolen from a tale by Poe still throbbed under the ancient slate pavement to remind me that, here, I had finally encountered the life that was right for me but had failed to have.
”
”
André Aciman (Call Me by Your Name)
“
Read your paper backward, sentence by sentence, as a final proofreading step. This technique isolates each sentence and makes it easier to spot errors you may have overlooked in previous readings.
”
”
Claire B. May Gordon S. May
“
When Christian pushes into the brick wall of the building catty-corner to the rear of BB&B—first left on the Dark Zone side—and disappears, I melt down in a fit of the giggles. I toss a rock at the spot where he vanished. It bounces off the brick and clatters to the cobblestone. I'm feeling twenty shades of Harry Potter's train station, especially when he pokes his head out of the wall and says impatiently, "Come on, lass. This is hardly my favorite place to be.
”
”
Karen Marie Moning (Iced (Fever, #6))
“
Presently, I was aware that Jeeves was with me. I hadn't heard him come in, but you often don't with Jeeves. He just streams silently from spot A to spot B, like some gas.
”
”
P.G. Wodehouse
“
Tobacco put food on our tables, steeples on our churches, stains on our fingers, spots on our lungs, and contradictions in our hearts.
”
”
Timothy B. Tyson (Blood Done Sign My Name: A True Story)
“
Didn't go in, just hovered outside like homeless person because (a) place was too small and Detta would have spotted me, and (b) once you're through doors of shop like that, if you try to leave without buying anything, they shoot you in the back with sniper's rifle.
”
”
Marian Keyes (Anybody Out There? (Walsh Family, #4))
“
I passed a little further on and heard a peacock say: Who made the grass and made the worms and made my feathers gay, He is a monstrous peacock, and He waveth all the night His languid tail above us, lit with myriad spots of light.
”
”
W.B. Yeats (Collected Poems (Macmillan Collector's Library))
“
Beckett Rush spotted in London Saturday. 'Tinseltown's It Boy reportedly had three dates with three different girls at La Trattoria... all over the course of six hours. Two ladies discovered the duplicity, and catfight broke out. Taylor Risdale broke up the fight before storming out. Beckett's camp could not be reached at the moment.'" Mr. Rush laughed. "You know what this means, right?"
"That once again my name is trashed."
"That your DVD sales will spike at least 5 percent.
”
”
Jenny B. Jones (There You'll Find Me)
“
Retouching is our favourite artistic device. Each of us is a curator in his own museum. [..] Uncover A, cover up B. Remove all spots. Keep your mouth shut. Think of your tongue as a weapon. Think one thing and say another. Use orotund expressions to obfuscate your intentions. Hide what you believe. Believe what you hide.
”
”
Dubravka Ugrešić (The Ministry of Pain)
“
Gentrification had stopped dead several doors west of my spot overlooking Avenue B. You could actually see the line. That side of the line; Biafran cuisine, sparkling plastic secure window units, women called Imogen and Saffron, men called Josh and Morgan. My side of the line; crack whores, burned-out cars, bullets stuck in door frames, and men called Father-Eating Bastard. It’s almost a point of honour to live near a crackhouse, like living in a pre-Rudy Zone, a piece of Old New York.
”
”
Warren Ellis (Crooked Little Vein)
“
For a scientist must indeed be freely imaginative and yet skeptical, creative and yet a critic. There is a sense in which he must be free, but another in which his thought must be very precisely regimented; there is poetry in science, but also a lot of bookkeeping.
”
”
Peter Medawar (The Strange Case Of The Spotted Mice: And Other Classic Essays on Science)
“
The house I got them spotted for looks really great after they’ve first looked at a couple of dumps.
”
”
Robert B. Cialdini (Influence: The Psychology of Persuasion (Collins Business Essentials))
“
To settle down, to Make Good, to sell your soul for a villa and an aspidistra! To turn into the typical little bowler-hatted sneak—Strube’s “little man”—the little docile cit who slips home by the six-fifteen to a supper of cottage pie and stewed tinned pears, half an hour’s listening-in to the B.B.C. Symphony Concert, and then perhaps a spot of licit sexual intercourse if his wife “feels in the mood!” What a fate! No, it isn’t like that that one was meant to live.
”
”
George Orwell (Keep the Aspidistra Flying)
“
See if you can spot the difference between these two statements:
(a) «Those trousers make your backside look fat.»
(b) «You're a repellently obese old hag upon whom I am compelled to heap insults and derision — depressingly far removed from the, 'stupid, squeaky, pocket-sized English women,' who make up my vast catalogue of former lovers and to whom I might as well return right now as I hate everything about you.»
Maybe the acoustics were really bad in the dining room, or something.
”
”
Mil Millington
“
I have to pick up my kids. I have to register them for school. I have to pack their lunches and get their Hep B shots and wash their hands. They must be spotted on the stairs and potty trained and broken of the binkie. And if that relentless work runs right alongside gauging the risks of bladder surgery on a seventy-four-year-old, well, what did you think was gonna happen? What did you think being an adult was?
”
”
Kelly Corrigan (The Middle Place)
“
Early next morning the craft hit the beach again and resumed loading pulpwood. It was an awesome sight, this tentacle of empire reaching out into so remote and quiet a spot; and it was a fearsome sound, the throbbing engines of an old, dead war furnishing the paper for new conquests in the magazine field.
”
”
E.B. White (Writings from The New Yorker 1927-1976)
“
Property of B. King. He had it inked on the spot that he said was for something special.
”
”
Rina Kent (God of Fury (Legacy of Gods, #5))
“
O, let the place of secret prayer become to me the most beloved spot on earth. — Andrew Murray
”
”
Daniel B. Lancaster (Powerful Prayers in the War Room: Learning to Pray like a Powerful Prayer Warrior (Powerful Quite Times in the War Room))
“
Instead of, "Excellent work."
Try, "I see you circled every single picture that begins with the letter B."
Instead of, "Good job following directions."
Try, "You found your spot in the circle as soon as you heard 'circle time.
”
”
Julie King (How to Talk So Little Kids Will Listen: A Survival Guide to Life with Children Ages 2-7 (The How to Talk))
“
And if sorrow clouds your soul, don't fight it; allow the tears to flow. We are not meant to be invincible, we bruise easily, and the heart is soft; prone to bleed at the slightest touch. It is in those moments of sadness that we must be brave enough to allow Christ in, to let him be present in our pain; our sorrow is seen by Christ.
One day He will wipe away every tear, He will hold us tight, but for now we must pray through the pain. Just know that Christ shares our pain, He understands the sorrow that is within you, for He was a man of many sorrows. He wept alone, He was tormented and forsaken. Believe me, a man who has been forsaken such as Christ will never forsake you. Jesus is the only person who knows all that you have been through, He is the only one who knows the deepest, darkest spots of your soul, and still---He remains.
Jesus has the scars to prove that He is trustworthy, He has the only heart that bled for you; and He will never stop loving you.
”
”
T.B. LaBerge
“
The Eridian homeworld is the first planet in the 40 Eridani system. Humans actually spotted it a while ago, obviously not knowing there was a whole civilization there. The catalog name for it is “40 Eridani A b.” That’s a mouthful. The planet’s actual name,
”
”
Andy Weir (Project Hail Mary)
“
A tree.” She spotted one. It was hidden behind a much larger tree, its limbs misshapen in its attempt to fight for even a little sunlight in the shadow. “Dana has this tradition of giving a sad-looking tree the honor of being a Christmas tree.” She walked over to the small, nearly hidden tree. “I like this one. “It’s…”
He laughed. “Ugly?”
“No, it’s beautiful because it’s had a hard life. It’s struggled to survive against all odds and would keep doing that without much hope. But it has a chance to be something special.
”
”
B.J. Daniels (Cardwell Christmas Crime Scene (Cardwell Cousins, 6))
“
You know how it is as a rule, when you want to get Chappie A on Spot B at exactly the same moment when Chappie C is on Spot D. There's always a chance of a hitch. Take the case of a general, I mean to say, who's planning out a big movement. He tells one regiment to capture the hill with the windmill on it at the exact moment when another regiment is taking the bridgehead or something down in the valley; and everything gets all messed up. And then, when they're chatting the thing over in camp that night, the colonel of the first regiment says, "Oh, sorry! Did you say the hill with the windmill? I thought you said the one with the flock of sheep." And there you are!
”
”
P.G. Wodehouse
“
So my options are to take the money and run…” My cheeks flush as I meet his gaze. “Or I take the money, have a place to stay, and have sex with you for six months?”
He pins me to the spot with only a look. If this intensity is a promise of things to come, I’m in. I’m so fucking in.
“Option B, please,” I say.
A flicker of a smile kisses his lips.
”
”
Adriana Locke (The Arrangement (Brewer Family, #2))
“
Elio: What were you doing?
Oliver: Thinking.
Elio: About?
Oliver: Things. Going back to the States. The courses I have to teach this fall. The book. You.
Elio: Me?
Oliver: Me?
Elio: No one else?
Oliver: No one else. I come here every night and just sit here. Sometimes I spend hours.
Elio: All by yourself? I never knew. I thougt...
Oliver: I know what you thought. This spot is probably what I'll miss the most. I've been happy in B. I was looking out towards there and thinking that in two weeks I'll be back at Columbia.
Elio: All this means is that in ten days when I look out to this spot, you won't be here. i don't know what I'll do then. At least you'll be elsewhere, where there are no memories.
”
”
André Aciman (Call Me by Your Name)
“
As delightful as the Just So explanations are of how spots, stripes, humps and horns came to be, biology can now tell us stories about butterflies, zebras and leopards that I contend are every bit as enchanting as Kipling's fairy tales. What's more, they offer some simple, elegant truths that deepen our understanding of all animal forms, including ourselves.
”
”
Sean B. Carroll (Endless Forms Most Beautiful: The New Science of Evo Devo)
“
People had been losing their jobs in large numbers. Home foreclosures were up. Life savings had been decimated. A lot of people felt like they had been hit by a double bird strike in their own lives. But Flight 1549 had shown people that there are always further actions you can take. There are ways out of the tightest spots. We as individuals, and as a society, can find them.
”
”
Chesley B. Sullenberger III (Sully: The Untold Story Behind the Miracle on the Hudson)
“
If A were to go to B, a merchant, and say to him, "Sir, I am a night-watchman, and I insist upon your employing me as such in protecting your property against burglars; and to enable me to do so more effectually, I insist upon your letting me tie your own hands and feet, so that you cannot interfere with me; and also upon your delivering up to me all your keys to your store, your safe, and to all your valuables; and that you authorize me to act solely and fully according to my own will, pleasure, and discretion in the matter; and I demand still further, that you shall give me an absolute guaranty that you will not hold me to any accountability whatever for anything I may do, or for anything that may happen to your goods while they are under my protection; and unless you comply with this proposal, I will now kill you on the spot,"—if A were to say all this to B, B would naturally conclude that A himself was the most impudent and dangerous burglar that he (B) had to fear; and that if he (B) wished to secure his property against burglars, his best way would be to kill A in the first place, and then take his chances against all such other burglars as might come afterwards. Our government constantly acts the part that is here supposed to be acted by A. And it is just as impudent a scoundrel as A is here supposed to be. It insists that every man shall give up all his rights unreservedly into its custody, and then hold it wholly irresponsible for any disposal it may make of them. And it gives him no alternative but death.
”
”
Lysander Spooner (A Letter to Grover Cleveland On His False Inaugural Address, The Usurpations and Crimes of Lawmakers and Judges, and the Consequent Poverty, Ignorance, and Servitude Of The People)
“
As most students of antiquity know, the modern marathon takes its name from the name of a famous battle that the Athenians won over the Persians in 490 B.C. Pheidippides, a Greek soldier and champion runner, volunteered to run the 25 miles from Marathon to Athens to spread the news of the victory. Upon arriving, Pheidippides is reported to have gasped "Rejoice, we conquer!" and then promptly died on the spot.
”
”
Pieter Peereboom (World's Most Extreme Marathons (Part 1))
“
The reason for this is that the universe bends, in a way we can’t adequately imagine, in conformance with Einstein’s theory of relativity (which we will get to in due course). For the moment it is enough to know that we are not adrift in some large, ever-expanding bubble. Rather, space curves, in a way that allows it to be boundless but finite. Space cannot even properly be said to be expanding because, as the physicist and Nobel laureate Steven Weinberg notes, “solar systems and galaxies are not expanding, and space itself is not expanding.” Rather, the galaxies are rushing apart. It is all something of a challenge to intuition. Or as the biologist J. B. S. Haldane once famously observed: “The universe is not only queerer than we suppose; it is queerer than we can suppose.” The analogy that is usually given for explaining the curvature of space is to try to imagine someone from a universe of flat surfaces, who had never seen a sphere, being brought to Earth. No matter how far he roamed across the planet’s surface, he would never find an edge. He might eventually return to the spot where he had started, and would of course be utterly confounded to explain how that had happened. Well, we are in the same position in space as our puzzled flatlander, only we are flummoxed by a higher dimension.
”
”
Bill Bryson (A Short History of Nearly Everything)
“
Most writers cannot afford focus groups or A/B testing, but they can ask a roommate or colleague or family member to read what they wrote and comment on it. Your reviewers needn’t even be a representative sample of your intended audience. Often it’s enough that they are not you. This does not mean you should implement every last suggestion they offer. Each commentator has a curse of knowledge of his own, together with hobbyhorses, blind spots, and axes to grind, and the writer cannot pander to all of them. Many academic articles contain bewildering non sequiturs and digressions that the authors stuck in at the insistence of an anonymous reviewer who had the power to reject it from the journal if they didn’t comply. Good prose is never written by a committee. A writer should revise in response to a comment when it comes from more than one reader or when it makes sense to the writer herself.
”
”
Steven Pinker (The Sense of Style: The Thinking Person's Guide to Writing in the 21st Century)
“
WE met next day as he had arranged, and inspected the rooms at No. 221B, [5] Baker Street, of which he had spoken at our meeting. They consisted of a couple of comfortable bed-rooms and a single large airy sitting-room, cheerfully furnished, and illuminated by two broad windows. So desirable in every way were the apartments, and so moderate did the terms seem when divided between us, that the bargain was concluded upon the spot, and we at once entered into possession.
”
”
Arthur Conan Doyle (The Complete Sherlock Holmes)
“
I resolved to come right to the point. "Hello," I said as coldly as possible, "we've got to talk."
"Yes, Bob," he said quietly, "what's on your mind?" I shut my eyes for a moment, letting the raging frustration well up inside, then stared angrily at the psychiatrist.
"Look, I've been religious about this recovery business. I go to AA meetings daily and to your sessions twice a week. I know it's good that I've stopped drinking. But every other aspect of my life feels the same as it did before. No, it's worse. I hate my life. I hate myself."
Suddenly I felt a slight warmth in my face, blinked my eyes a bit, and then stared at him.
"Bob, I'm afraid our time's up," Smith said in a matter-of-fact style.
"Time's up?" I exclaimed. "I just got here."
"No." He shook his head, glancing at his clock. "It's been fifty minutes. You don't remember anything?"
"I remember everything. I was just telling you that these sessions don't seem to be working for me."
Smith paused to choose his words very carefully. "Do you know a very angry boy named 'Tommy'?"
"No," I said in bewilderment, "except for my cousin Tommy whom I haven't seen in twenty years..."
"No." He stopped me short. "This Tommy's not your cousin. I spent this last fifty minutes talking with another Tommy. He's full of anger. And he's inside of you."
"You're kidding?"
"No, I'm not. Look. I want to take a little time to think over what happened today. And don't worry about this. I'll set up an emergency session with you tomorrow. We'll deal with it then."
Robert
This is Robert speaking. Today I'm the only personality who is strongly visible inside and outside. My own term for such an MPD role is dominant personality. Fifteen years ago, I rarely appeared on the outside, though I had considerable influence on the inside; back then, I was what one might call a "recessive personality." My passage from "recessive" to "dominant" is a key part of our story; be patient, you'll learn lots more about me later on. Indeed, since you will meet all eleven personalities who once roamed about, it gets a bit complex in the first half of this book; but don't worry, you don't have to remember them all, and it gets sorted out in the last half of the book. You may be wondering -- if not "Robert," who, then, was the dominant MPD personality back in the 1980s and earlier? His name was "Bob," and his dominance amounted to a long reign, from the early 1960s to the early 1990s. Since "Robert B. Oxnam" was born in 1942, you can see that "Bob" was in command from early to middle adulthood.
Although he was the dominant MPD personality for thirty years, Bob did not have a clue that he was afflicted by multiple personality disorder until 1990, the very last year of his dominance. That was the fateful moment when Bob first heard that he had an "angry boy named Tommy" inside of him. How, you might ask, can someone have MPD for half a lifetime without knowing it? And even if he didn't know it, didn't others around him spot it?
To outsiders, this is one of the most perplexing aspects of MPD. Multiple personality is an extreme disorder, and yet it can go undetected for decades, by the patient, by family and close friends, even by trained therapists. Part of the explanation is the very nature of the disorder itself: MPD thrives on secrecy because the dissociative individual is repressing a terrible inner secret. The MPD individual becomes so skilled in hiding from himself that he becomes a specialist, often unknowingly, in hiding from others. Part of the explanation is rooted in outside observers: MPD often manifests itself in other behaviors, frequently addiction and emotional outbursts, which are wrongly seen as the "real problem."
The fact of the matter is that Bob did not see himself as the dominant personality inside Robert B. Oxnam. Instead, he saw himself as a whole person. In his mind, Bob was merely a nickname for Bob Oxnam, Robert Oxnam, Dr. Robert B. Oxnam, PhD.
”
”
Robert B. Oxnam (A Fractured Mind: My Life with Multiple Personality Disorder)
“
[Harry Potter]'s in a battle with Satan himself, obviously. [...] And she has an unbelievable profound mythological imagination, and the thing that's so fascinating about all of that is that because her mythological imagination is spot on, she captivated the entire globe, and produced this immense storehouse of wealth and dominated the entertainment landscape for a decade, and you know people don't take that seriously. But it's a great mystery to watch, and absolutely they should. It's [phenomenal] you know, anything that grips people's attention like that is obviously worth paying attention to.
”
”
Jordan B. Peterson
“
Cynnie’s disappeared while I’ve shut up shop. So has Ty, without even giving me a hug. He’s getting a dozen noogies for that the next time I see him. I lock up, checking and double-checking my security. On the way back from checking the manual lock on the fire escape door, I find the dress Cynnie was wearing draped across the foot of the staircase up into the loft like a fallen flower petal.
“Baby?”
Her wild giggle answers me.
Grinning, I scoop up the dress and carry it up the stairs.
I expect her to be n*ked in the bed, but she’s not. There’s no sign of her.
“Baby, where are you?”
Another wild giggle. With the open plan of my apartment, the stairwell, and the screen of trees in the loft, the acoustics can be weird. I was sure the first giggle came from upstairs. Now, it sounds like her giggle is coming from downstairs.
“Come out, come out, wherever you are, bumble baby,” I call.
Insane giggles. I spin around in place on the landing, trying to locate the source of those irresistible giggles.
“When I find you, I’m going to b*te my bumble very hard on her b*ttom,” I growl.
“I sting you!”
That was definitely from my bedroom. I tear through the doorway and look around. No naughty bumble in my bed. I yank open the closet doors. No naughty bumble in my closets. There aren’t many hiding places in my bedroom. There’s no way she could fit between the trees.
Then I spot the black rectangle half-hidden in the rumpled bedding. A phone. She’s put it on speaker and dimmed the screen. That sneaky little bee.
I grab the phone and growl into it. “I’m going to find you.”
“I fly away!”
“You’ll never get away from me, little girl. And when I catch you, I’m going to eat you up.” I grip the phone, so turned on my hand shakes, muscles bunching. I pant into the phone. “I’m going to find you, wherever you are, and rail you into the ground.”
She squees. There’s a very faint echo, and I realize where she is.
Game on.
”
”
E.J. Frost (Max's Bumble (Daddy P.I. Casefiles, #3))
“
Both measurement error and sampling error are unpredictable, but they’re predictably unpredictable. You can always expect data from different samples, measures or groups to have somewhat different characteristics – in terms of the averages, the highest and lowest scores, and practically everything else. So even though they’re normally a nuisance, measurement error and sampling error can be useful as a means of spotting fraudulent data. If a dataset looks too neat, too tidily similar across different groups, something strange might be afoot. As the geneticist J. B. S. Haldane put it, ‘man is an orderly animal’ who ‘finds it very hard to imitate the disorder of nature’, and that goes for fraudsters as much as for the rest of us.
”
”
Stuart Ritchie (Science Fictions)
“
This tragic sequence helps explain the fearful loss of cognition in coronary artery bypass patients.3 But neuroradiologists also report that using magnetic resonance imaging, they can detect little white spots in the brains of Americans starting at about age fifty. These spots represent small, asymptomatic strokes (see Figures 18 and 19 in insert). The brain has so much reserve capacity that at first these tiny strokes cause no trouble. But, if they continue, they begin to cause memory loss and, ultimately, crippling dementia. In fact, one recently reported study found that the presence of these “silent brain infarcts” more than doubles the risk of dementia.4 We now believe, in fact, that at least half of all senile mental impairment is caused by vascular injury to the brain.
”
”
Caldwell B. Esselstyn Jr. (Prevent and Reverse Heart Disease: The Revolutionary, Scientifically Proven, Nutrition-Based Cure)
“
He saw her as he would always see her, a slender girl in a simple beige dress, curled in a large wing chair by the white fireplace. The chair was a gaudy piece patterned in greens and purples, like tropical flowers, with a scrawl of cerise breaking the pattern. Her hair was the color of palest gold, a silvery gold, and she wore it pulled away from her face into a curl at the back of her neck. She had a fine face, nothing pretty-pretty about it, a strong face with high cheek bones and a straight nose. Her eyes were beautiful, sea blue, slanted like wings; and her mouth was a beautiful curve. Yet she wasn’t beautiful; you wouldn’t look at her in a room of pretty women, in a bar or night spot. You wouldn’t notice her; she’d be too quiet; she was a lady and she wouldn’t want to be noticed.
”
”
Dorothy B. Hughes (In a Lonely Place)
“
[Chang Yu relates the following anecdote of Kao Tsu, the first Han Emperor: “Wishing to crush the Hsiung-nu, he sent out spies to report on their condition. But the Hsiung-nu, forewarned, carefully concealed all their able-bodied men and well-fed horses, and only allowed infirm soldiers and emaciated cattle to be seen. The result was that spies one and all recommended the Emperor to deliver his attack. Lou Ching alone opposed them, saying: “When two countries go to war, they are naturally inclined to make an ostentatious display of their strength. Yet our spies have seen nothing but old age and infirmity. This is surely some ruse on the part of the enemy, and it would be unwise for us to attack.” The Emperor, however, disregarding this advice, fell into the trap and found himself surrounded at Po-teng.”] 19. Thus one who is skillful at keeping the enemy on the move maintains deceitful appearances, according to which the enemy will act. [Ts’ao Kung’s note is “Make a display of weakness and want.” Tu Mu says: “If our force happens to be superior to the enemy’s, weakness may be simulated in order to lure him on; but if inferior, he must be led to believe that we are strong, in order that he may keep off. In fact, all the enemy’s movements should be determined by the signs that we choose to give him.” Note the following anecdote of Sun Pin, a descendent of Sun Wu: In 341 B.C., the Ch’i State being at war with Wei, sent T’ien Chi and Sun Pin against the general P’ang Chuan, who happened to be a deadly personal enemy of the later. Sun Pin said: “The Ch’i State has a reputation for cowardice, and therefore our adversary despises us. Let us turn this circumstance to account.” Accordingly, when the army had crossed the border into Wei territory, he gave orders to show 100,000 fires on the first night, 50,000 on the next, and the night after only 20,000. P’ang Chuan pursued them hotly, saying to himself: “I knew these men of Ch’i were cowards: their numbers have already fallen away by more than half.” In his retreat, Sun Pin came to a narrow defile, with he calculated that his pursuers would reach after dark. Here he had a tree stripped of its bark, and inscribed upon it the words: “Under this tree shall P’ang Chuan die.” Then, as night began to fall, he placed a strong body of archers in ambush near by, with orders to shoot directly they saw a light. Later on, P’ang Chuan arrived at the spot, and noticing the tree, struck a light in order to read what was written on it. His body was immediately riddled by a volley of arrows, and his whole army thrown into confusion. [The above is Tu Mu’s version of the story; the SHIH CHI, less dramatically but probably with more historical truth, makes P’ang Chuan cut his own throat with an exclamation of despair, after the rout of his army.] ] He sacrifices something, that the enemy may snatch at it. 20. By holding out baits, he keeps him on the march; then with a body of picked men he lies in wait for him. [With an emendation suggested by Li Ching, this then reads, “He lies in wait with the main body of his troops.”] 21. The clever combatant looks to the effect of combined energy, and does not require too much from individuals.
”
”
Sun Tzu (The Art of War)
“
THE MISER A miser, to make sure of his property, sold all that he had and converted it into a great lump of gold, which he hid in a hole in the ground, and went continually to visit and inspect it. This roused the curiosity of one of his workmen, who, suspecting that there was a treasure, when his master’s back was turned, went to the spot, and stole it away. When the miser returned and found the place empty, he wept and tore his hair. But a neighbor who saw him in this extravagant grief, and learned the cause of it, said: “Fret thyself no longer, but take a stone and put it in the same place, and think that it is your lump of gold; for, as you never meant to use it. the one will do you as much good as the other.” The worth of money is not in its possession, but in its use. FABLES, AESOP, SIXTH CENTURY B.C.
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Robert Greene (The 48 Laws of Power)
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One of the most common mental habits that makes us feel out of control is catastrophizing—otherwise known as making a mountain out of a molehill. A simple way to help kids avoid catastrophizing is to teach them to ask themselves, whenever they’re upset, “Is this a big problem or a little problem?” In cognitive behavioral therapy, kids are taught to distinguish between a disaster (like famine) and something that’s temporarily frustrating or embarrassing, between “I’ll die if this happens” and “I’ll be disappointed but I probably won’t die.” If it’s a little problem, the first line of defense is to use self-soothing mechanisms, like a cool-down spot, deep breathing, or Plan B thinking, to calm themselves down. For most problems, these tools will be enough. When problems feel too big, we want kids to seek help.
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William Stixrud (The Self-Driven Child: The Science and Sense of Giving Your Kids More Control Over Their Lives)
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I wonder how many people in the Washington metropolitan area know just how terrific Senator MacGregor looks in his underwear."
"A select few."
"You must have thought about image projection, Senator." She ran a fingertip down the top of his foot. "You should consider doing some of those ads,you know,like the ball players...I never meet with foreign dignitaries without my B.V.D.'s."
"One can only be grateful you're not the Media Adviser."
"Stuffy,that's the whole problem." She dropped, full-length, on top of him. "Just think of the possibilities."
Alan slipped a hand under her robe. "I am."
"Discreetly placed ads in national magazines, thirty-minute spots in prime time." Shelby propped her elbows on his shoulders. "I'd definitely get my set fixed."
"Think of the trent it might start. Federal officials everywhere stripped down to their respective shorts."
Shelby's brows drew together as she pictured it. "Good God, it could precipitate a national calamity."
"Worldwide," Alan corrected. "Once the ball got rolling, there'd be no stopping it."
"All right, you've convinced me." She gave him a smacking kiss. "It's your patriotic duty to keep your clothes on. Except in here," she added with a gleam in her eye as she toyed with his waistband.
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Nora Roberts (The MacGregors: Alan & Grant (The MacGregors, #3-4))
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The hope is that when it comes to dealing with humans whose behaviors are among our worst and most damaging, words like 'evil' and 'soul' will be as irrelevant as when considering a car with faulty brakes, that they will be as rarely spoken in a courtroom as in an auto repair shop. And crucially, the analogy holds in a key way, extending to instances of dangerous people without anything obviously wrong with their frontal cortex, genes, and so on. When a car is being dysfunctional and dangerous and we take it to a mechanic, this is not a dualistic situation where (a) if the mechanic discovers some broken widget causing the problem, we have a mechanistic explanation, but (b) if the mechanic can’t find anything wrong, we’re dealing with an evil car; sure, the mechanic can speculate on the source of the problem—maybe it’s the blueprint from which the car was built, maybe it was the building process, maybe the environment contains some unknown pollutant that somehow impairs function, maybe someday we’ll have sufficiently powerful techniques in the auto shop to spot some key molecule in the engine that is out of whack—but in the meantime we’ll consider this car to be evil. Car free will also equals 'internal forces we do not understand yet.
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Robert M. Sapolsky
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When Dr. Ramasamy first lectured to their class in the century-old Donovan Auditorium, even the murmuring backbenchers were silenced when the tall, confident woman in a short-sleeved lab coat floated in. She had launched right into inflammation, the body’s first response to any threat, the common denominator of all disease. In minutes she had drawn them into the thick of a battle: the invaders (typhoid bacteria) are spotted by the hilltop sentries (macrophages), who send signals back to the castle (the bone marrow and lymph nodes). The few aging veterans of previous battles with typhoid (memory T-lymphocytes) are roused from their beds, summoned to hastily teach untested conscripts the specific typhoid-grappling skills needed, and then to arm them with custom lances designed solely to latch onto and pierce the typhoid shield—in essence, the veterans clone their younger selves. The same veterans of prior typhoid campaigns also assemble a biological-warfare platoon (B lymphocytes) who hastily manufacture a one-of-a-kind boiling oil (antibodies) to pour over the castle wall; it will melt the typhoid intruders’ shields, while not harming others. Meanwhile, having heard the call to battle, the rogue mercenaries (neutrophils), armed to the teeth,
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Abraham Verghese (The Covenant of Water)
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As a rule, in times of joy and elation, one finds God's footsteps in the majesty and grandeur of the cosmos, in its vastness and its stupendous dynamics. When man is drunk with life, when he feels that living is a dignified affair, then man beholds God in infinity. In moments of ecstasy God addresses Himself to man through the twinkling stars and the roar of the endlessly distant heavens:
ברכי נפשי את ד’, ד’ אלקים, גדלת מאד, הוד והדר לבשת
"O Lord my God Thou are very great, Thou are clothed with glory and majesty."
In such moments, Majestas Dei, which not even the vast universe is large enough to accommodate, addresses itself to happy man.
However, with the arrival of the dark night of the soul, in moments of agony and black despair, when living becomes ugly and absurd; plainly nauseating, when man loses his sense of beauty and majesty, God addresses him, not from infinity but from the infinitesimal, not from the vast stretches of the universe but from a single spot in the darkness which surrounds suffering man, from within the black despair itself...
God, in those moments, appeared not as the exalted, majestic King, but rather as a humble, close friend, brother, father: in such moments of black despair, He was not far from me; He was right there in the dark room; I felt His warm hand, כביכול. on my shoulder, I hugged His knees, כביכול. He was with me in the narrow confines of a small room, taking up no space at all. God's abiding in a fenced-in finite locus manifests His humility and love for man. In such moments Humilitas Dei, which resides in the humblest and tiniest of places, addresses itself to man.
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Joseph B. Soloveitchik
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IN JANUARY 1959 Police Chief Herbert Jenkins found a poem tacked to a bulletin board at his departmental headquarters. Tellingly, the anonymous author had titled it “The Plan of Improvement,” in sarcastic tribute to Mayor Hartsfield’s 1952 program for the city’s expansion and economic progress. The poem looked back over a decade of racial change and spoke volumes about the rising tide of white resentment. It began with a brief review of the origins of residential transition and quickly linked the desegregation of working-class neighborhoods to the desegregation of the public spaces surrounding them: Look my children and you shall see, The Plan of Improvement by William B. On a great civic venture we’re about to embark And we’ll start this one off at old Mozeley Park. White folks won’t mind losing homes they hold dear; (If it doesn’t take place on an election year) Before they have time to get over the shock, We’ll have that whole section—every square block. I’ll try something different for plan number two This time the city’s golf courses will do. They’ll mix in the Club House and then on the green I might get a write up in Life Magazine. And now comes the schools for plan number three To mix them in classrooms just fills me with glee; For I have a Grandson who someday I pray Will thank me for sending this culture his way. And for my finale, to do it up right, The buses, theatres and night spots so bright; Pools and restaurants will be mixed up at last And my Plan of Improvement will be going full blast. The sarcasm in the poem is unmistakable, of course, but so are the ways in which the author—either a policeman himself or a friend of one—clearly linked the city’s pursuit of “progress” with a litany of white losses. In the mind of the author, and countless other white Atlantans like him, the politics of progress was a zero-sum game in which every advance for civil rights meant an equal loss for whites.
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Kevin M. Kruse (White Flight: Atlanta and the Making of Modern Conservatism)
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The mere fact of so large and important an obelisk, inscribed with a Semitic text by an early Babylonian king, being found at Susa was an indication that other monuments of even greater interest might be forthcoming from the same spot; and this impression was intensified when a stele of victory was found bearing an inscription of Naram-Sin, the early Semitic King of Agade, who reigned about 3750 B.C.
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Leonard William King (History of Egypt, Chaldaea, Syria, Babylonia and Assyria in the Light of Recent Discovery)
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baseball players. Football, maybe. Not baseball, not built the way they were: thick
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Reed Farrel Coleman (Robert B. Parker's Blind Spot (Jesse Stone #13))
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Ralph swept back the yellow curtain to look out on the street. The leaves were turning red, the whole block ablaze. Across the street stood a barbershop that shared a storefront with a black bookstore. Next door, the hair salon spewed steam onto the street, the fried chicken spot, a jewelry shop with crucifixes and chains glittering on display, and the beauty supply store that blasted soca and flashed neon lights onto the sidewalk. This particular corner didn't have a view of any of the coffee shops that had opened farther east. Those had plush furniture and abstract art on the walls, stainless-steel espresso pumps. They were always crowded with young people in jeans and plaid, typing away on their laptops. There were the bars, too, with a dozen local beers on tap, and short menus that consisted mostly of nuts, pickles, cheese. Penelope could see the changes, of course, but she still recognized the neighborhood - it wasn't like Fort Greene or Williamsburg, which were no longer themselves. Strangers still said hello to her as they lounged on their stoops at sundown. She still had to ignore the whistles from the young men who stood in front of the bodega for so long each day it was clear they were dealing. Church bells rang on the hour and floors thumped with praise for Jesus in the Baptist churches, the one-room Pentecostal churches, the regal AME tabernacles, worship never ceasing in Bed-Stuy. The horizon on Bedford Avenue was just as long, the sirens of the police cars ars persistent, the wheeze of the B26 loud enough to wake her up at night.
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Naima Coster (Halsey Street)
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It had taken Cyrus a while to come out of his shell. One of those “aw shucks, ma’am” kind of cowboys, he was so darned shy she thought she was going to have to throw herself on the floor at his boots for him to notice her. But once he had opened up a little, they’d started talking, joking around, getting to know each other. Before he left, they’d gone for a horseback ride through the snowy foothills up into the towering pines of the forest. It had been Cyrus’s idea. They’d ridden up into one of the four mountain ranges that surrounded the town of Gilt Edge – and the Cahill Ranch.
It was when they’d stopped to admire the view from the mountaintop that overlooked the small western town that AJ had hoped Cyrus would kiss her. He sure looked as if he’d wanted to as they’d walked their horses to the edge of the overlook.
The sun warming them while the breeze whispered through the boughs of the nearby snow-laden pines, it was one of those priceless Montana January days between snowstorms. That’s why Cyrus had said they should take advantage of the beautiful day before he left for Denver.
Standing on a bared-off spot on the edge of the mountain, he’d reached over and taken her hand in his. “Beautiful,” he’d said. For a moment she thought he was talking about the view, but when she met his gaze she’d seen that he’d meant her.
Her heart had begun to pound. This was it. This was what she’d been hoping for. He drew her closer. His mouth was just a breath away from hers – when his mare nudged him with her nose.
She could laugh about it now. But if she hadn’t grabbed Cyrus he would have fallen down the mountainside.
“She’s just jealous,” Cyrus had said of his horse as he’d rubbed the beast’s neck after getting his footing under himself again.
But the moment had been lost. They’d saddled up and ridden back to Cahill Ranch. AJ still wanted that kiss more than anything.
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B.J. Daniels (Wrangler's Rescue (The Montana Cahills, #7))
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Tuesday and Wednesday flew by. Dylan from 5B came over on Thursday. I didn’t smoke any pot, but I let him hotbox my apartment so I was even more completely stoned than I was the time before, except this time my eyebrows remained intact. We watched three episodes of Whose Line Is It Anyway? and laughed our asses off. Dylan was actually pretty cute. He was tall and skinny and pale with buzzed hair, but he had these really blue eyes. That night he helped me carry my laundry to the basement.
“Hey Kate, you wanna go to the skate park with me tomorrow night?”
“I can’t, I have a date with a lesbian.”
His eyes shot open. “Oh, cool.”
“It’s not what you think.”
He smiled and shrugged. “It’s your business. Aren’t you still dating that douche wad in 9A?”
“Stephen? No, he dumped me last week. He’s dating someone else already.”
“His loss.” He said it so quickly and nonchalantly that I almost believed him.
We got to the basement door. Dylan pushed it open and walked in but paused in front of me. I leaned around his body and saw Stephen making out with a different girl than he had been with earlier that week. At first I didn’t recognize her, and then I saw her token pink scrunchie bobbing above her head. It was the bimbo from the sixth floor. Every time I saw her she was with a different guy.
Stephen turned and spotted me. “Kate, I thought you did your laundry on Mondays?” I contemplated sharing my thoughts on women in their thirties who still wear colorful hair pretties, but I chose to take the high road. Anyway, one or both of them would undoubtedly have a venereal disease by the end of the week, and that was my silver lining.
“Don’t talk to me, Stephen.” I coughed and mumbled, “Pencil dick” at the same time. Dylan stayed near the door. Everyone in the room watched me as I emptied my laundry bag into a washer. I added soap, stuck some quarters in, closed the lid, and turned to walk out. Just as I reached the opening, Dylan pushed me against the doorjamb and kissed me like he had just come back from war. I let him put on a full show until he moved his hand up and cupped my breast. I very discreetly said, “Uh-uh” through our mouths, and he pulled his hand away and slowed the kiss. When we pulled apart, I turned toward Stephen and the bimbo and shot them an ear-splitting smile.
“Hey, Steve”—I’d never called him Steve—“Will you text me when the washer is done? I’ll be busy in my apartment for a while.”
He nodded, still looking stunned.
I grabbed Dylan’s hand and pulled him into the elevator. Once the doors were closed, we both burst into laughter.
“You didn’t have to do that,” I said.
“I wanted to. That asshole had it coming.”
“Well, thank you. You live with your mom, right?”
“Yeah.”
“Please don’t tell her about this. I can’t imagine what she would think of me.”
“I’m not that much younger than you, Kate.” He jabbed me in the arm playfully and smirked. “You need to lighten up. Anyway, my mom would be cool with it.”
“Well, I hope I didn’t give you the wrong idea.”
“Nah. We’re buddies, I get it. I’m kind of in love with that Ashley chick from the fourth floor. I just have to wait until next month when she turns eighteen, you know?” He wiggled his eyebrows.
I laughed. “You two would make a cute couple.” If only it were that simple.
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Renee Carlino (Nowhere but Here)
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So I started circling ads for old cars I could afford. I begged my dad to take me out looking at these cars on Saturdays and Sundays. At first I had no luck getting him interested in doing this. It was fall (1961) when he got tired of my haranguing, and one Saturday we set out to look at some of these advertised vehicles. It was a crisp and breezy autumn Saturday with brilliant yellow, orange, and red leaves blowing from the trees in swirls. The first car we looked at was a 1940 Ford Coupe. I thought at the time, and still do, that it was one of the classiest cars in existence. When we pulled up to the house of the owner, we found both garage doors open with the car inside, the hood open, and several greasy teenaged 'mechanics' bent over the engine compartment. The floor of the garage was strewn with various mechanical parts, and the concrete was stained with oil and grease spots. The front end of the car had been lowered, and the back end had been raised. It had a big V-8 engine block which was painted red. The body needed a little work, but a couple of the fenders had gray primer on them and looked like they were ready for paint. The owner was asking $200 for it. It seemed like the perfect car for me, but when I looked at my dad’s face, it appeared he had more than a little skepticism. He started asking the boys picky questions like: 'Does it run?' and 'Do the brakes work?' I had $200 and I was ready to buy, but after hearing the answers to these questions and few more, my dad said, 'I think we need to go home and think about this.
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David B. Crawley (A Mile of String: A Boy's Recollection of His Midwest Childhood)
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Most personal computers use two types of disk drives as their secondary storage devices-hard drives and optical drives. Hard disks are attached to their disk drives and are coated with a magnetic material. Each data bit is a magnetized spot on the disk, and the spots are arranged in concentric circles called tracks. The disk drive read/write head accesses data by moving across the spinning disk to the correct track and then sensing the spots as they move by.
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Elliot B. Koffman (Problem Solving and Program Design in C)
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The problem with life was that even if you didn't go looking for trouble, trouble sometimes came looking for you.
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Reed Farrel Coleman (Robert B. Parker's Blind Spot (Jesse Stone, #13))
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1. Shoot your loose, half-opened left hand straight along the power line at a chin-high spot on the bag. 2. But, as the relaxed left hand speeds toward the bag, suddenly close the hand with a convulsive, grabbing snap. Close it with such a terrific grab that when the second knuckle of the upright fist smashes into the bag, the fist and the arm and the shoulder will be "frozen" steel-hard by the terrific grabbing tension. That convulsive, freezing grab is the explosion. Try that long left jolt three or four times. Make certain each time that (1) you are completely relaxed before you step; (2) that your relaxed LEFT hand, in normal guarding position, is only half-closed; (3) that you make no preliminary movement with either your feet or your left hand. Do not draw back-or "cock"-the relaxed left hand in a preparatory movement that you hope will give the punch more zing. Don't do that! You'll not only telegraph the blow, but you'll slow up and weaken the punch. Now that you've got the feel of the stepping jolt, let's examine it in slow motion to see exactly what you did.
First, the Falling Step launched your body-weight straight at the target at which your left toe was pointing.
Secondly, your relaxed left hand shot out to relay that moving body-weight along the power line to the target before that moving weight could be relayed to the floor by your descending left foot. Thirdly, the convulsive, desperate grab in your explosion accomplished the following: (a) caused the powerful muscles of your back to give your left shoulder a slight surging whirl toward your own right, (b) psychologically "pulled" the moving body-weight into your arm with P. sudden lurch, (c) gave a lightning boost to the speed of your fist, (d) froze your fist, wrist, arm and shoulder along the power line at the instant your fist smashed into the target, and (e) caused terrific "follow-through" after the explosion. When the long, straight jolt crashes into a fellow's chin, the fist doesn't bounce off harmlessly, as it might in a light, medium-range left jab. No sir! The frozen solidity behind the jolt causes the explosion to shoot forward as the solid breech of a rifle forces a cartridge explosion to shoot the bullet forward. The bullet in a punch is your fist, with the combined power from your fast-moving weight and your convulsing muscles behind it-solidly. Your fist, exploded forward by the solid power behind it, has such terrific "follow-through" that it can snap back an opponent's head like that of a shot duck. It can smash his nose, knock out his teeth, break his jaw, stun him, floor him, knock him out.
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Jack Dempsey (Toledo arts: championship fighting and agressive defence (Martial arts))
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THE STRAIGHT RIGHT JOLT IS THROWN FROM THE SAME POSITION AS THE STRAIGHT LEFT. Stand in your normal punching position. Your relaxed right hand is half-opened, and the upper knuckle of the thumb is about four inches in front of your lips.
Without any preliminary movement of the right hand, shoot it at the chin-high spot on the bag as you do the falling step. Neither pull back nor cock the right before throwing it.
As you step in to explode the second knuckle of your upright fist against the bag, your chin should be partially protected by your left shoulder, left arm and left hand. Remember that your left hand opens to make a "knife blade," with the palm turned slightly toward your opponent. While the right fist is being thrown, the left hand and arm should stiffen for an instant in order to present a rigid barrier before the face in case an opponent attempts to strike with a countering right. The index knuckle of your opened left hand should remain about ten inches in front of your left eye as you step in. But the instant your right fist lands, your left hand should relax into its normal half-opened condition so that it will be ready to punch immediately, if necessary (Figure 13B). Straight punches for the body, with either hand, are begun and executed in the same manner as head punches. (Any change in position before the start would be a telltale.) When in motion, however, your fist turns so that the palm is down when the second knuckle explodes against the bag. Also, as you begin the body punch, you bend forward to slide under guarding arms and to make your own chin a less open target. As you practice those punches, keep your eyes wide open. Don't close your eyes as you step in. Focus your eyes on your target, YOU MUST KEEP YOUR EYES WIDE OPEN AT ALL TIMES WHEN YOU ARE FIGHTING OR BOXING.
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Jack Dempsey (Toledo arts: championship fighting and agressive defence (Martial arts))
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trained to do a position that requires a new base of knowledge and skills. A third option is to learn about a different culture, like the fashion designers who became more innovative when they lived in foreign countries that were very different from their own. You don’t need to go abroad to diversify your experience; you can immerse yourself in the culture and customs of a new environment simply by reading about it. 4. Procrastinate strategically. When you’re generating new ideas, deliberately stop when your progress is incomplete. By taking a break in the middle of your brainstorming or writing process, you’re more likely to engage in divergent thinking and give ideas time to incubate. 5. Seek more feedback from peers. It’s hard to judge your own ideas, because you tend to be too enthusiastic, and you can’t trust your gut if you’re not an expert in the domain. It’s also tough to rely on managers, who are typically too critical when they evaluate ideas. To get the most accurate reviews, run your pitches by peers—they’re poised to spot the potential and the possibilities. B. Voicing and Championing Original Ideas
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Adam M. Grant (Originals: How Non-Conformists Move the World)
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Closure is overrated. Closure doesn't exist.
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Reed Farrel Coleman (Robert B. Parker's Blind Spot (Jesse Stone, #13))
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First, far too many business plans are written in the first burst of enthusiasm without a shred of real evidence to support their assertions. Simply put, most business plans are written too soon. Analogs, antilogs, tested hypotheses? Few or none. A telltale sign makes it easy to spot this problem. Sentences that begin with the phrase “We believe …” are dead giveaways. What the phrase “We believe …” most often means, in actuality, is “We haven’t a shred of real evidence about this, because we’ve been too busy writing this business plan to actually gather any evidence, but we hope that
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John W. Mullins (Getting to Plan B: Breaking Through to a Better Business Model)
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Why is the temple of the New Jerusalem to be built on the exact spot where the Garden of Eden once stood? One of the reasons may be that the Garden of Eden—in both its form and function—was the first temple on the earth, and the construction of the temple on that site would constitute part of the restoration of all things.
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Matthew B. Brown (The Gate of Heaven: Insights on the Doctrines and Symbols of the Temple)
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I bought a narrow blue one with white spots and square ends, took off my long-striped tie and rolled it up in my top jacket pocket, leaving a bit sticking out. After a few attempts at the speckled mirror, I manage to get the bow tie almost right, if a little lopsided. In the world of bow ties, it is important that it should be ever so slightly imperfect; this is to show that: a) you tied it yourself; and b) that you are slightly 'devil may care' and not at all prissy. Perfection is the sign of an amateur, perhaps someone who works with great skill but without connection to his animal nature, to passion and lust. Perfection is not for living things, certainly not for human beings; if you are not capable of loving flaws and faults, then you are not capable of love. I have lived most of my life in poverty, but I can tie a bow tie and to some this will be a mystery, but somebody who knows me would say, 'Of course he can tie a bow tie.' Such imperfections - wrinkles in the world - are where all of life's best stories are.
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Marc Hamer (Spring Rain)
Reed Farrel Coleman (Robert B. Parker's Blind Spot (Jesse Stone #13))
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refuse to accept assertions blindly. Challenge everything and everyone—including your teachers. Don’t be intimidated. You are the best authority on what you don’t understand—trust yourself: don’t be afraid to ask the questions you need to ask, and be brave enough to change your thinking when you uncover a blind spot.
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Edward B. Burger (The 5 Elements of Effective Thinking)
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Whereas secret societies in the past have met in lodges, taverns, and dimly lit alleys, this new generation’s meeting spot was the virtual world of videogames. And also unlike the covert gatherings of yesteryear, where furtive glances and secret handshakes were needed to gain entry, the only password into this world was up-up-down-down-left-right-left-right-B-A-start.
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Blake J. Harris (Console Wars: Sega, Nintendo, and the Battle that Defined a Generation)
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I pray God to save me in future from the dark thoughts that gloomed my mind on turning my back upon that spot; and the reader from experiencing kindred sorrow.
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Royal B. Stratton (Captivity of the Oatman Girls: Being an Interesting Narrative of Life among the Apache and Mohave Indians)
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The Leopard's Spots,
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Nancy Bostick De Saussure (Old Plantation Days Being Recollections of Southern Life Before the Civil War)
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I got up and let Pearl in. She dashed into the room, jumped on the bed, turned around about twelve times, and plumped down hard against Susan, in the spot that until recently had been occupied by me.
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Robert B. Parker (Cold Service (Spenser, #32))
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Scott ejected the disc. The Club Red disc was by far the superior, which left Scott wondering what the missing disc showed. He dug out Melon’s interview with Richard Levin to make sure he had it right, and reread the handwritten note: R. Levin—deliv sec vid—2 discs— EV # H6218B Scott decided to phone Cowly. “Joyce? Hey, it’s Scott James. Hope you don’t mind. I have a question about these discs.” “Sure. What’s up?” “I was wondering why you gave me only one of the Club Red discs and not both.” Cowly was silent for a moment. “I gave you two discs.” “Yeah, you did. One from Tyler’s and one from Club Red, but there are supposed to be two from Club Red. Melon has a note here saying two discs were logged.” Cowly was silent some more. “I don’t know what to tell you. There was only the one disc from Club Red. We have the LAX stuff, the disc from Tyler’s, and the disc from Club Red.” “Melon’s note says there were two.” “I hear you. Those things were screened, you know? All we got was a confirmation of arrival and departure times. Nobody saw anything unusual.” “Why is it missing?” She sounded exasperated. “Shit happens. Things get lost, misplaced, people take stuff and forget they have it. I’ll check, okay? These things happen, Scott. Is there anything else?” “No. Thanks.” Scott felt miserable. He hung up, put away the discs, and stretched out on the couch. Maggie came over, sniffed for a spot, and lay down beside the couch. He rested his hand on her back. “You’re the only good part of this.” Thump thump.
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Robert Crais (Suspect (Scott James & Maggie, #1))
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there are times when we want to avoid having to figure things out and want to be told exactly what to do because it: A) makes life easier and B) we don’t trust that we have the answers within us.
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Derek Doepker (Break Through Your BS: Uncover Your Brain's Blind Spots and Unleash Your Inner Greatness)
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then pulled me away. “Will those two ever figure out they aren’t god’s gift to women?” I sighed. Asher laughed then spotted Mike and Chase walking towards us, well actually once Chase spotted us he took off running for us with Mike right behind him. “Sorry we’re late, how’d the heats go?” He asked. “Well, let’s just say they both have to run the B-feature, but I’m pretty sure they
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Christina Marie (Wreckers or Checkers (In It to Win It #2))
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We had been in the air almost two hours when we got a visual on the ship. It was churning along, on a northerly course, at a good clip in heavy swells. One of the helicopter’s crewmen opened the sliding door on the right side so we could all get a good view of the vessel. We circled it three times, hoping to be able to pick a safe spot to lower me onto. Cables, booms, masts, stacks, and cranes were everywhere—from stem to stern. We cruised along at an altitude of 100 feet...." (Page 266)
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David B. Crawley (Steep Turn: A Physician's Journey from Clinic to Cockpit)
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How do the day’s event(s) compare with the famous quote you’ve picked to write about in So This Just Happened: The Journal for USA Current Events?
Journal your thoughts on current events inside, in light of the 101 famous and thought-provoking quotes about the United States of America, democracy and more.
Abnormal times call for first person accounts: witness current events compared to the United States of America’s values, laws, and principles. So This Just Happened: The Journal for USA Current Events includes 101 thought-provoking and insightful quotes by Founding Fathers’, famous historical figures, past Presidents and more for you to compare and contrast with current events.
With a quote on every other lined journal page; you can write in order or flip to the most relevant quote for the day’s events to write about. Each lined page for you to write on has a spot to write the date at the top.
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Samuel B. Jonathan (So This Just Happened: The Journal for USA Current Events)
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St. Lawrence River
May 1705
Temperature 48 degrees
They stayed in St. Francis for several days.
Mercy was careful not to be around Ebenezer Sheldon again, and careful not to examine the reasons why.
Minutes before the Kahnawake Indians stepped into their canoes to paddle home, Mercy spotted the adopted boy walking alone. She darted between buildings to catch his arm. “Forgive me,” she said in English. The language felt awkward and slippery, as though she might say the wrong thing. “I know you’re not supposed to talk to us. But please. I need to know about your adoption.”
Annisquam’s look was friendly and his smile was pleasant. “You’re one of the Deerfield captives, aren’t you? I’m from Maine. Caught a few years before you.”
She ached to know his English name, but he did not offer it. She must not dishonor whatever he had achieved. If he had become Indian, she must not encroach upon that. “Please, I need to know what happened when you were left alone inside the powwow’s longhouse.”
His freckles and his pale red hair were so unlikely above his Indian clothing. “Nothing happened. I just sat there.”
Mercy was as disappointed as if he had forgotten his English. “I thought you would have been given answers.” Her voice trembled. “Or been sure.”
Annisquam looked at her for a long moment. “Nothing happened. But they did scrub away my past. I was born once more. I was one person when they pushed me under the water and another person when I left the powwow’s. I’m not sure my white blood is gone. I will never forget my family in Maine. But I have set them down.”
Mercy’s head rocked with the size of that decision. He set them down. How had he done that? Every captive carried both: both worlds, both languages, both Gods, both families.
Listen, listen, listen, the powwows and the chieftains cried.
But so many voices spoke. How had Annisquam known which voice told the truth? How had he been sure what to set down and what to keep?
“But your parents,” she said. “What would they think? Would they forgive you?”
His smile was lopsided and did not last long. “My parents,” he said gently, “are waiting for me.”
They stared at each other.
“Go with God,” he whispered, and he walked away from her to join the man who had put the wampum belt around his neck and the woman who had washed him in the river.
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Caroline B. Cooney (The Ransom of Mercy Carter)
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Deerfield, Massachusetts
February 29, 1704
Temperature 0 degrees
Mercy could not keep up the pace. Gradually the line passed her by, until she was walking with Eben Nims, and she must not fall farther behind than that, because the Indians behind Eben were the end of the line. Daniel held tight and sucked his thumb. But not only did Marah refuse to walk, she kept yelling that her feet were cold, and she wanted Stepmama, and she needed her mittens, and she was hungry.
Mercy could walk, though not fast enough, and she could carry, though not easily. But she could not supply food, warmth or Stepmama.
Mercy tried to believe that Stepmama was up ahead of her with the baby; that it was so crowded and chaotic Mercy could not spot her. But in her heart, she did not think Stepmama had left the stockade.
“The savage put food in my pack, Mercy,” said Eben quietly. “If you slip your hand into the opening near my left shoulder, there’s a loaf of bread on top.”
They walked on, considering whether the Indians would tomahawk her for stealing Eben’s own bread. Well, they’d shortly tomahawk Marah for whining, so Mercy might as well get on with it. She set the two children down, and Eben bent his knees so she could reach and Mercy fished around in the pack. She slid the loaf out. It was long and fat and crusty.
Her Indian was watching. Mercy looked straight at him while she ripped off a chunk for Marah. He did nothing. Mercy decided to give some to Jemima too, which would give her something to do besides whine. She would give bread to Eliza and hope food would break Eliza’s grieving stupor.
Marah didn’t take a single bite. She threw the bread across the snow. “I want Mama!” she said fiercely. She glared at Mercy, as if all this hiking and shivering were Mercy’s fault.
Mercy could not abandon the bread out there in the snow. She was going to need that bread. It was all they had, and somehow Mercy had become responsible for Marah and Daniel and Ruth and Eliza and Jemima, and probably even for Eben. Mercy stepped off the trodden path to retrieve the crust, but her Indian stopped her, shaking his head.
On his face was no expression but the one painted in black. His arms were tattooed with snakes that curled their fangs when he tightened his muscles. How could he go half bare in this weather? she thought, and then remembered that she wore his rabbit-lined cloak.
Daniel, sitting happily on her hip, reached out from under the rabbit fur and patted the snake. The Indian tensed his upper arm to make the snake slither. Daniel giggled, so the Indian did it again, and it seemed to Mercy that he actually smiled at Daniel.
Then, blessedly, he took Marah for her.
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Caroline B. Cooney (The Ransom of Mercy Carter)
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Sean Platt is the bestselling co-author of over 60 books, including breakout post-apocalyptic horror serial Yesterday’s Gone, literary mind-bender Axis of Aaron, and the blockbuster sci-fi series, Invasion. Never one for staying inside a single box for long, he also writes smart stories for children under the pen name Guy Incognito, and laugh out loud comedies which are absolutely not for children. He is also the founder of the Sterling & Stone Story Studio and along with partners Johnny B. Truant and David W. Wright hosts the weekly Self-Publishing Podcast, openly sharing his journey as an author-entrepreneur and publisher. Sean is often spotted taking long walks,
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Sean Platt (Extinction (Alien Invasion #6))
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Once we assembled the entire package, Mike named it Netscape SuiteSpot, as it would be the “suite” that displaced Microsoft’s BackOffice. We lined everything up for a major launch on March 5, 1996, in New York. Then, just two weeks before the launch, Marc, without telling Mike or me, revealed the entire strategy to the publication Computer Reseller News. I was livid. I immediately sent him a short email: To: Marc Andreessen Cc: Mike Homer From: Ben Horowitz Subject : Launch I guess we’re not going to wait until the 5th to launch the strategy. — Ben Within fifteen minutes, I received the following reply. To: Ben Horowitz Cc: Mike Homer, Jim Barksdale (CEO), Jim Clark (Chairman) From: Marc Andreessen Subject: Re: Launch Apparently you do not understand how serious the situation is. We are getting killed killed killed out there. Our current product is radically worse than the competition. We’ve had nothing to say for months. As a result, we’ve lost over $3B in market capitalization. We are now in danger of losing the entire company and it’s all server product management’s fault. Next time do the fucking interview yourself. Fuck you, Marc I received this email the same day that Marc appeared barefoot and sitting on a throne on the cover of Time magazine. When I first saw the cover, I felt thrilled. I had never met anyone in my life who had been on the cover of Time. Then I felt sick. I brought both the magazine and the email home to Felicia to get a second opinion. I was very worried. I was twenty-nine years old, had a wife and three children, and needed my job. She looked at the email and the magazine cover and said, “You need to start looking for a job right away.” In the end, I didn’t get fired and over the next two years, SuiteSpot grew from nothing to a $400 million a year business. More shocking, Marc and I eventually became friends; we’ve been friends and business partners ever since. People often ask me how we’ve managed to work effectively across three companies over eighteen years. Most business relationships either become too tense to tolerate or not tense enough to be productive after a while. Either people challenge each other to the point where they don’t like each other or they become complacent about each other’s feedback and no longer benefit from the relationship. With Marc and me, even after eighteen years, he upsets me almost every day by finding something wrong in my thinking, and I do the same for him. It works.
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Ben Horowitz (The Hard Thing About Hard Things: Building a Business When There Are No Easy Answers)
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You’re a smart girl. You’re going to replay everything we’ve done, and you’re going to reach the same conclusion I have.” He moved in close, leaning down to kiss my jawline and lower.
“And wh- what conclusion is that?” When had he discovered how sensitive my neck was? With one spot in particular. . .
He pressed his lips directly to my pulse point, making my knees weak. “Eto ne izbezhno dlya nas.” You and I are inevitable.
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Kresley Cole (The Professional: Part 2 (The Game Maker, #1b))
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Remember when I said I was a bit scattered? It wasn’t just when it came to jobs. I had a slew of strange ex-boyfriends, too. There was George, who liked to wear my underwear . . . everyday. Not just to prance around in—he wore them under his Levi’s at work. As a construction worker. That didn’t go over well with his co-workers once they found out. He works at Jamba Juice now. I don’t think anyone cares about what kind of underwear he wears at Jamba Juice.
Then there was Curtis. He had an irrational fear of El Caminos. Yes, the car. He just hated them so much that he became really fearful of seeing one. He’d say, “I don’t understand, is it a car or a truck?” The confusion would bring him to tears. When we were walking on the street together, I had to lead him like a blind person because he didn’t want to open his eyes and spot an El Camino. If he did, it would completely ruin his day. He would cry out, “There’s another one. Why, God?” And then he would have to blink seven times and say four Hail Marys facing in a southerly direction. I don’t know what happened to Curtis. He’s probably in his house playing video games and collecting disability.
After Curtis came Randall, who will never be forgotten. He was an expert sign spinner. You know those people who stand on the corner spinning signs? Randall had made a career of it. He was proud and protective of his title as best spinner in LA. I met him when he was spinning signs for Jesus Christ Bail Bonds on Fifth Street. He was skillfully flipping a giant arrow that said, “Let God Free You!” and his enthusiasm struck me. I smiled at him from the turn lane. He set the sign down, waved me over, and asked for my phone number. We started dating immediately. He called himself an Arrow Advertising executive when people would ask what he did for a living. He could spin, kick, and toss that sign like it weighed nothing. But when he’d put his bright-red Beats by Dre headphones on, he could break, krump, jerk, turf, float, pop, lock, crip-walk, and b-boy around that six-foot arrow like nobody’s business. He was the best around and I really liked him, but he dumped me for Alicia, who worked at Liberty Tax in the same strip mall. She would stand on the opposite corner, wearing a Statue of Liberty outfit, and dance to the National Anthem. They were destined for each other.
After Randall was Paul. Ugh, Paul. That, I will admit, was completely my fault.
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Renee Carlino (Wish You Were Here)
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She had spotted three of them, at the very least. Probably more. She had also spotted the B&T Paint van. She’d dialed the number on the van’s sign, but it was out of service. She checked with directory assistance. There was no B&T Paint. They
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Harlan Coben (Tell No One)
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or dispatch them on the spot.
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Paul Anthony Rahe (Sparta's Second Attic War: The Grand Strategy of Classical Sparta, 446-418 B.C. (Yale Library of Military History))
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Word of advice, young fellow, don’t ever stand still or life will fossilize you on the spot.
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B.V. Lawson (Scott Drayco Box Set: Books 1-3 (Scott Drayco Mystery #1-3))
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There are only three kinds of relationships in the animal kingdom. The first is commensalism. One example: Fish finding hiding spots in coral reefs. Fish profit, but life for the coral doesn’t change. Then there’s mutualism, a relationship where both animals benefit from each other. The tricky thing about animals is you don’t always know what kind of relationship you’re in. Which brings me to relationship number three. The parasitic.
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John B. Routledge
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Among those watching the Larry King interview was Diane Disney Miller and her husband, Ron. In response to a caller asking whether Walt Disney had really been frozen, Eisner said that no, Walt had been buried in an unmarked grave in a secret location. “His wishes were that it was unmarked, and not available to anybody to ever find out,” he said. “But I went up there and talked my way into them showing me where he’s buried.”
Why would the grave be unmarked? King asked.
Walt “wanted his privacy forever,” Eisner replied. “It’s a beautiful little spot and nobody could ever find it, and I’m very proud that I talked myself into it.”
Diane didn’t know whether to laugh or cry. How could Eisner say this on national television? He knew perfectly well that Walt was not buried in an unmarked grave. Diane herself had told him that Walt had been cremated, after they had dinner all those years ago.
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James B. Stewart (Disney War)
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Leopards don’t change their spots. They change camouflage for their next victim.
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B.J. Harvey (Second Chance (Chances, #2))
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But would they respect me here, if all I do is stick underneath the only Black professor in the program?” On the other end, Dr. Oludara heaved a sigh. “Ailey, why are you making things harder than they have to be?” “I’m not. It’s just—” “Ailey. Let me ask you something. Do any of your classmates invite you to their study sessions?” “No, ma’am.” “Are they even friendly to you?” “I mean . . . no. Not really.” “Then why do you give a good goddamn about what they think? You could have nothing but white folks on your dissertation committee, and your classmates still would have something to say. I’m sure they’ve passed around that you’re there on a quota. They love to accuse Black folks of taking their place. Even when it ain’t but one of us, and fifty of them, they don’t even want us to have that one spot.
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Honorée Fanonne Jeffers (The Love Songs of W.E.B. Du Bois)
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I keep a begonia plant in my office, on my desk by the window. It’s thriving in that spot, right beside the bright light that filters in through the blue curtain in the afternoon. I have learned to care for begonias because I have killed a few in my time, and every time it is painful to admit that I could not keep them alive and well. When this begonia plant flourishes, I am full of hope. But still, sometimes I notice that they are thirsty. I pour water from my own drinking glass into the plastic container beneath the pot, so their roots can drink first. Within seconds, the water disappears, and I say to myself, “Oh, you were so thirsty.” They keep drinking and blooming and asking for more care in that most gentle way plants do, and I say that I am sorry when they are too thirsty or too drenched in sunlight. And I wonder how thirsty we are, or if we notice, if that mindfulness and way of keeping watch happens in our own souls. I wonder if we let others know when we need a drink or a break from the heat, or that we might need a little deadheading here or there. And when we get closer to the water, we drink it up within seconds, begging for more, while nearby someone says, “Oh, Love, you were so thirsty.” I wonder if we even notice that we’re thirsty.
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Kaitlin B. Curtice (Living Resistance: An Indigenous Vision for Seeking Wholeness Every Day)
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I smile, but it falters when I reach his pectoral muscle and find a new tattoo in the spot he left blank on purpose. My hands freeze as I study the artistic patterns of the lotus flower and make out the elegant font beneath it that reads Property of B. King. He had it inked on the spot that he said was for something special.
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Rina Kent (God of Fury (Legacy of Gods, #5))
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dopamine is released when the reward is experienced for the first time. The next time around (B), dopamine rises before taking action, immediately after a cue is recognized. This spike leads to a feeling of desire and a craving to take action whenever the cue is spotted. Once a habit is learned, dopamine will not rise when a reward is experienced because you already expect the reward. However, if you see a cue and expect a reward, but do not get one, then dopamine will drop in disappointment (C). The sensitivity of the dopamine response can clearly be seen when a reward is provided late (D). First, the cue is identified and dopamine rises as a craving builds. Next, a response is taken but the reward does not come as quickly as expected and dopamine begins to drop. Finally, when the reward comes a little later than you had hoped, dopamine
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James Clear (Atomic Habits: An Easy & Proven Way to Build Good Habits & Break Bad Ones)
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A frame is a psychological model you build for yourself to organize and carry out a strategy to attain a goal; to move from spot A to spot B while guarding against detours and resistance.
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Josh King Madrid
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All Good Bad Poetry is formal poetry because the reader is allowed to see exactly how the poem is failing to be good. Strained or unimaginative rhymes and awkward or inappropriately jaunty meters are easy to spot within an open grid of predictability. A formal poem risks bring indisputably bad, for any reader can recognize the ways in which it is bad, whereas free verse may offer a verbal camouflage where one's ineptitude has a fighting chance to remain undetected.
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D.B. Wyndham-Lewis (The Stuffed Owl: An Anthology of Bad Verse)
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The wrong things draw you in like the Sunday-sun the eyes. You would stare straight into it and wonder if there is something somewhere out there, other than depressing sunny days and lonely Sundays: something more. When you would take your eyes out of the sun again, you would only see red spots as if the light had forgotten them on your retina and then you would stand around and ponder why your eyes would always wander towards the sun, although you don't want them to and actually know that it does harm.
~ As the moon began to rust
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Sima B. Moussavian
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Fall is the best season in New Mexico. It’s warm and colorful, and it stretches itself like a cat, lingering in the sunny spots as long as it can.
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B.B. Griffith (The Vanished Series #1-3)
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Our judgments are influenced by the judgments of people who we see as: (a) more expert or credible than we are; (b) well-liked; or (c) part of our own in-group. 9 We tend to change our accounts or opinions of things or events after we have heard of others’ own accounts or opinions, typically for two reasons. First, we could be unsure of our own versions, so we change our statements to conform to those of others’ to appear more credible.
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Thinknetic (Cognitive Biases In A Nutshell: How To Spot And Stop The Hiccups In Our Thinking Process (Decision Making Mastery))
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The wrong things draw you in like the Sunday sun the eyes. You would stare straight at it and wonder if there is something somewhere out there, other than depressing sunny days and lonely Sundays: something more and when you would take your eyes out of the sun again, you'd only see red spots as if the light forgot them on your retina and then you would stand around and ponder why your eyes would always wander towards the it, although you don't want them to and actually know that it does harm.
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Sima B. Moussavian (As the moon began to rust)
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You will then find yourself turning across time, incrementally and gracefully, to aim ever more accurately at that tiny pinpoint, the X that marks the spot, the bull’s-eye, and the center of the cross; to aim at the highest value of which you can conceive. You will pursue a target that is both moving and receding: moving, because you do not have the wisdom to aim in the proper direction when you first take aim; receding, because no matter how close you come to perfecting what you are currently practicing, new vistas of possible perfection will open up in front of you. Discipline and transformation will nonetheless lead you inexorably forward. With will and luck, you will find a story that is meaningful and productive, improves itself with time, and perhaps even provides you with more than a few moments of satisfaction and joy. With will and luck, you will be the hero of that story, the disciplined sojourner, the creative transformer, and the benefactor of your family and broader society.
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Jordan B. Peterson (Beyond Order: 12 More Rules For Life)