Stiff Necked Fools Quotes

hand. I’m real sorry she left you, Celie. I remember how I felt when she left me. Then the old devil put his arms around me and just stood there on the porch with me real quiet. Way after while I bent my stiff neck onto his shoulder. Here us is, I thought, two old fools left over from love, keeping each other company under the stars. Other times he want to know bout my children. I told him you say they both wear long robes, sort of like dresses. That was the day he come to visit me while I was sewing and ast me what was so special bout my pants. Anybody can wear them, I said. Men and women not suppose to wear the same thing, he said. Men spose to wear the pants. So I said, You ought to tell that to the mens in Africa. Say what? he ast. First time he ever thought bout what

Hey," she whispered to Malachi. "When are Irin considered adults?" He was following what looked to be a quiet argument between Sari and Mala. "Full adults? Around sixty to seventy-five years. When we're finished with our training. Why?" She flushed. Wow. "So, you're quite the cradle robber, aren't you?" Malachi turned to her abruptly. "What? No, I'm not." "I'm not even thirty. That's like... a teenager to you guys." She could see the flush crawl up his neck, even behind the beard. "You're human. You mature differently." "But I'm not really human." His shoulders were stiff and his posture screamed his discomfort. It was really a shame Ava found teasing him to be so amusing. "I mean, what would your mom say if she found out you were mated-and I mean well and thoroughly mated- to what she would basically consider a kid?" He wiped a hand over his forehead. "Heaven above, please stop talking." "So are we going to stop fooling around now?" He groaned. "Ava." "I'm just yanking your chain." "You're going to have to speak up, because the mental lecture my mother's memory is giving me right now is rather loud.

There was a boy at our school. He was the most extraordinary lad I ever came across. I believe he really liked study. He used to get into awful rows for sitting up in bed and reading Greek; and as for French irregular verbs, there was simply no keeping him away from them. He was full of weird and unnatural notions about being a credit to his parents and an honour to the school; and he yearned to win prizes, and grow up and be a clever man, and had all those sort of weak-minded ideas. I never knew such a strange creature, yet harmless, mind you, as the babe unborn. Well, that boy used to get ill about twice a week, so that he couldn’t go to school. There never was such a boy to get ill. If there was any known disease going within ten miles of him, he had it, and had it badly. He would “take bronchitis in the dog-days, and have hayfever at Christmas. After a six weeks’ period of drought, he would be stricken down with rheumatic fever; and he would go out in a November fog and come home with a sunstroke. They put him under laughing-gas one year, poor lad, and drew all his teeth, and gave him a false set, because he suffered so terribly with toothache; and then it turned to neuralgia and ear-ache. He was never without a cold, except once for nine weeks while he had scarlet fever; and he always had chilblains. He had to stop in bed when he was ill, and eat chicken and custards and hot-house grapes; and he would lie there and sob, because they wouldn’t let him do Latin exercises, and took his German grammar away from him. And we other boys, who would have sacrificed ten terms of our school life for the sake of being ill for a day, and had no desire whatever to give our parents any excuse for being stuck-up about us, couldn’t catch so much as a stiff neck. We fooled about in draughts, and it did us good, and freshened us up; and we took things to make us sick, and they made us fat, and gave us an appetite. Nothing we could think of seemed to make us ill until the holidays began. Then, on the breaking-up day, we caught colds, and whooping cough, and all kinds of disorders, which lasted till the term recommenced; when, in spite of everything we could manoeuvre to the contrary, we would get suddenly well again, and be better than ever.

You are American,” he says, as if I’m a mythical creature. I nod. “Yes. And, uh, we have different dances where I come from.” “Can you show us one?” The second boy, a dark-haired kid, steps forward, looking intrigued. I stifle a laugh. “Oh, uh, no. I’m a horrible dancer.” “Please?” the redheaded boy asks. “I have never seen an American dance.” I just laughed at them thirty seconds ago. Wouldn’t that make me mean if I just blow them off now? “I doubt you’d want to see these dances,” I say, stalling. I feel kind of bad. But I really can’t dance. I’ll make a fool of myself. “Oh, but I do. Most certainly.” “Oh.” Well, then. I could try, right? Just some tiny little thing? But what do I share? MC Hammer? The Running Man? The Electric Slide? A little Macarena? “Uh,” I say, stepping forward. “How about, um, the Robot?” “The Robot?” the two boys ask in unison. Did the word robot even exist in 1815? “Yeah. You, uh, hold your arms out like this,” I say, demonstrating the proper way to stand like a scarecrow. I can’t believe I’m doing this. “And then relax your elbows and let your hands swing. Like this.” I’m really not doing it well, but by the way their eyes widen, you’d think I just did a full-on pop-and-lock routine with Justin Timberlake. They mimic my maneuver, making it look effortless. The drummer guy stands up and gets in on the action, swinging his arms freely. The guy’s better than me after a two-second demo. Figures. “Okay, then, uh, you sort of walk and you try to make everything look stiff and, uh, unnatural. Like this.” I show him my best robotic walk, my arms mechanical in their movements. The two boys and the drummer immediately copy me, and by the time they’ve taken four or five steps, they seriously look like robots. In no time they’re improvising, and their laughter trickles up toward the rafters of the barn. Yeah. That’s my cue to leave before inspiration strikes and I try to show them how to break-dance but only succeed in breaking my neck. I slip out of the barn unnoticed, grinning to myself as I walk the gravel path back toward the house, my skirts brushing the dirt. At least somewhere, I’m not Callie the Klutz. Even if it’s just some smelly old barn. There’s hope for me after all.

You stiff-necked fool,” he muttered, “too proud to listen. Can you eat pride, Stark? Will honor shield your children?

Chris let go two stiff punches, connecting with Roy’s face. Roy unsuccessfully tried to cover with his arms locked in front of his face, then rolled to his stomach in an effort to hide from the onslaught. Big mistake. Chris punched him a couple more times in the back of the head. He slipped his right arm around Roy’s thick neck then quickly locked him in a half-nelson sleeper hold. After a moment of squirming, Roy went limp. Chris rolled him on his side in the recovery position. He checked his pulse and breathing to make sure he hadn’t killed the poor bastard. He was okay. Just asleep. Chris didn’t have a choice. This was serious. He couldn’t have a fool down here with him. They were potentially facing an enemy no one had ever faced. ***

Before I could say anything the other gagged my mouth with a stone ball. I wanted to say what fools they were, but not the first fool in Dolingo. How could I confess anything with my mouth gagged? And the boy’s smell came to my nose again, so strong, almost as if he was right outside this cell, but now moving away. The one-eyed scientist pulled a knot at his neck and removed his hood. Bad Ibeji. I heard of one found at the foot of the Hills of Enchantment, which the Sangoma burned, even though it was already dead. Even in death it shook the unshakable woman, for it was the one mingi she would kill on sight. Bad Ibeji was never to be born but is not the unborn Douada, who roams the spirit world, wiggling on air like a tadpole and sometimes slipping into this world through a newborn. Bad Ibeji was the twin that the womb squeezed and crushed, tried to melt, but could not melt away. Bad Ibeji grows on its malcontent like that devil of the body’s own flesh, that bursts through the breasts of woman, killing her by poisoning her blood and bone. Bad Ibeji knows it will never be the favored one, so it attacks the other twin in the womb. Bad Ibeji sometimes dies at birth when the mind did not grow. When the mind did grow, all it knows to do is survive. It burrows into the twin’s skin, sucking food and water from his flesh. It leaves the womb with the twin, and sticks so tight to his skin that the mother thinks this too is the baby’s flesh, unformed, ugly like a burn and not handsome, and sometimes throws away them both to the open lands to die. It is wrinkled and puffy flesh, and skin and hair, and one eye big and a mouth that drools without stop, and one hand with claws and another stuck on the belly as if sewn, and useless legs that flap like fins, a thin penis, stiff like a finger, and hole that bursts shit like lava. It hates the twin for it will never be the twin, but it needs the twin for it cannot eat food, or drink water as it has no throat, and teeth grow anywhere, even above the eye. Parasite. Fat, and lumpy, like cow entrails tied together, and leaving slime where it crawls.

Before I could say anything the other gagged my mouth with a stone ball. I wanted to say what fools they were, but not the first fool in Dolingo. How could I confess anything with my mouth gagged? And the boy’s smell came to my nose again, so strong, almost as if he was right outside this cell, but now moving away. The one-eyed scientist pulled a knot at his neck and removed his hood. Bad Ibeji. I heard of one found at the foot of the Hills of Enchantment, which the Sangoma burned, even though it was already dead. Even in death it shook the unshakable woman, for it was the one mingi she would kill on sight. Bad Ibeji was never to be born but is not the unborn Douada, who roams the spirit world, wiggling on air like a tadpole and sometimes slipping into this world through a newborn. Bad Ibeji was the twin that the womb squeezed and crushed, tried to melt, but could not melt away. Bad Ibeji grows on its malcontent like that devil of the body’s own flesh, that bursts through the breasts of woman, killing her by poisoning her blood and bone. Bad Ibeji knows it will never be the favored one, so it attacks the other twin in the womb. Bad Ibeji sometimes dies at birth when the mind did not grow. When the mind did grow, all it knows to do is survive. It burrows into the twin’s skin, sucking food and water from his flesh. It leaves the womb with the twin, and sticks so tight to his skin that the mother thinks this too is the baby’s flesh, unformed, ugly like a burn and not handsome, and sometimes throws away them both to the open lands to die. It is wrinkled and puffy flesh, and skin and hair, and one eye big and a mouth that drools without stop, and one hand with claws and another stuck on the belly as if sewn, and useless legs that flap like fins, a thin penis, stiff like a finger, and hole that bursts shit like lava. It hates the twin for it will never be the twin, but it needs the twin for it cannot eat food, or drink water as it has no throat, and teeth grow anywhere, even above the eye. Parasite. Fat, and lumpy, like cow entrails tied together, and leaving slime where it crawls. The Bad Ibeji’s one hand splayed itself on the one-eyed scientist’s neck and chest. He unhooked each claw and a little blood ran out of each hole. The second hand unwrapped itself from the scientist’s waist, leaving a welt. I shook and screamed into the gag and kicked against the shackles but the only thing free was my nose to huff. The Bad Ibeji pulled his head off the twin’s shoulder and one eye popped open. The head, a lump upon a lump, upon a lump, with warts, and veins, and huge swellings on the right cheek with a little thing flapping like a finger. His mouth, squeezed at the corners, flopped open, and his body jerked and sagged like kneaded flour being slapped. From the mouth came a gurgle like from a baby. The Bad Ibeji left the scientist’s shoulder and slithered on my belly and up to my chest, smelling of arm funk and shit of the sick. The other scientist grabbed my head with both sides and held it stiff. I struggled and struggled, shaking, trying to nod, trying to kick, trying to scream, but all I could do was blink and breathe.

His eyes were holes I fell in. I dodged his shadow lest it cover me, and felt a fool. He’s not so old, sixty perhaps; but his eyes run, his ears ring, his teeth rot. His nose clogs. His lips pale and bleed. His knees, his hips, his neck and arms, are stiff. His feet are sore, the ankles swollen. His back, head and legs ache. His throat is raw, his chest constricted, and all his inner organs—heart, liver, kidneys, lungs, and bowels—are weak. Hands shake. His hair is falling. His flesh lies slack. His cock I vision shriveled to a string, and each breath of life he draws dies as it enters his nose and crosses his tongue.

The king heard him. “You stiff-necked fool,” he muttered, “too proud to listen. Can you eat pride, Stark? Will honor shield your children?