Sudden Demise Quotes

Stress and nervous tension are now serious social problems in all parts of the Galaxy, and it is in order that this situation should not be in any way exacerbated that the following facts will now be revealed in advance. The planet in question is in fact the legendary Magrathea. The deadly missile attack shortly to be launched by an ancient automatic defense system will result merely in the breakage of three coffee cups and a mouse cage, the bruising of somebody’s upper arm, and the untimely creation and sudden demise of a bowl of petunias and an innocent sperm whale.

Don't you ever wonder if this life has just gotten old and stale? When suddenly faced with my possible demise, I can't think of one thing I would miss, except you." - Vampire, Michel Baptiste

Her hand tightened around the handle of the serving spoon. "Don't do it," he warned. "Do what?" "Throw the spoon." "I wouldn't dream of it," she said tightly. He laughed aloud. "Oh,yes you would. You're dreaming of it right now. You just wouldn't do it." Sophie's hand was gripping the spoon so hard it shook. Benedict was chuckling so hard his bed shook. Sophie stood,still holding the spoon. Benedict smiled. "Are you planning to take that with you?" Remember your place, Sophie was screaming at herself. Remember your place. "Whatever could you be thinking." Benedict mused, "to look so adorably ferocious? No,don't tell me," he added. "I'm sure it involves my untimely and painful demise." Slowly and carefully, Sophie turned her back to him and put the spoon down on the table. She didn't want to risk any sudden movements. One false move and she knew she'd be hurling it at his head. Benedict raised his brows approvingly. "That was very mature of you." Sophie turned around slowly. "Are you this charming with everyone or only me?" "Oh,only you." He grinned. "I shall have to make sure you take me up on my offer to find you employment with my mother.You do bring out the best in me, Miss Sophie Beckett." "This is the best?" she asked with obvious disbelief. "I'm afraid so.

If things do not exist as fixed, independent entities, then how can they die? Our notion of death as the sudden expiration of that which was once so real starts to unwind. If things do not exist in their own right and are flickering rather than static, then we can no longer fear their ultimate demise. We may fear their instability, or their emptiness, but the looming threat of death starts to seem absurd. Things are constantly dying, we find. Or rather, they are constantly in flux, arising and passing away with each moment of consciousness.

Stress and nervous tension are now serious social problems in all parts of the Galaxy, and it is in order that this situation should not be in any way exacerbated that the following facts will now be revealed in advance. The planet in question is in fact the legendary Magrathea. The deadly missile attack shortly to be launched by an ancient automatic defense system will result merely in the breakage of three coffee cups and a mouse cage, the bruising of somebody’s upper arm, and the untimely creation and sudden demise of a bowl of petunias and an innocent sperm whale. In order that some sense of mystery should still be preserved, no revelation will yet be made concerning whose upper arm sustains the bruise. This fact may safely be made the subject of suspense since it is of no significance whatsoever.

When World War II erupted, colonialism was at its apogee. The courde of the war, however, its symbolic undertones, would sow the seeds of the system's defeat and demise. [...] The central subject, the essence, the core relations between Europeans and Africans during the colonial era, was the difference of race, of skin color. Everything-each eaxchange, connection, conflict-was translated into the language of black and white. [...] Into the African was inculcated the notion that the white man was untouchable, unconquerable, that whites constitute a homogenous, cohesive force. [...] Then, suddenly, Africans recruited into the British and French armies in Europe observed that the white men were fighting one another, shooting one another, destroying one another's cities. It was revelation, a surprise, a shock.

In 1997, the NCI director, Richard Klausner, responding to reports that cancer mortality had remained disappointingly static through the nineties, argued that the medical realities of one decade had little bearing on the realities of the next. “There are far more good historians than there are good prophets,” Klausner wrote. “It is extraordinarily difficult to predict scientific discovery, which is often propelled by seminal insights coming from unexpected directions. The classic example—Fleming’s discovery of penicillin on moldy bread and the monumental impact of that accidental finding—could not easily have been predicted, nor could the sudden demise of iron-lung technology when evolving techniques in virology allowed the growth of poliovirus and the preparation of vaccine. Any extrapolation of history into the future presupposes an environment of static discovery—an oxymoron.

It was such a tangled web and he suddenly realized why they called the dope game “the trap” … because once you stepped in, there was only one true exit: the grave.

I was suddenly overwhelmed with the knowledge that this was a moment to pay attention to: this day, this air, these two people. I felt the perfection of the moment and, inside of it, I felt its demise.

There is a dark side to religious devotion that is too often ignored or denied. As a means of motivating people to be cruel or inhumane -- as a means of inciting evil, to borrow the vocabulary of the devout -- there may be no more potent force than religion. When the subject of religiously inspired bloodshed comes up, many Americans immediately think of Islamic fundamentalism, which is to be expected in the wake of the September 11 attacks on New York and Washington. But men have been committing heinous acts in the name of God ever since mankind began believing in deities, and extremists exist within all religions. Muhammad is not the only prophet whose words have been used to sanction barbarism; history has not lacked for Christians, Jews, Hindus, Sikhs, and even Buddhists who have been motivated by scripture to butcher innocents. Plenty of these religious extremists have been homegrown, corn-fed Americans. Faith-based violence was present long before Osama bin Laden, and it ill be with us long after his demise. Religious zealots like bin Laden, David Koresh, Jim Jones, Shoko Asahara, and Dan Lafferty are common to every age, just as zealots of other stripes are. In any human endeavor, some fraction of its practitioners will be motivated to pursue that activity with such concentrated focus and unalloyed passion that it will consume them utterly. One has to look no further than individuals who feel compelled to devote their lives to becoming concert pianists, say, or climbing Mount Everest. For some, the province of the extreme holds an allure that's irresistible. And a certain percentage of such fanatics will inevitably fixate on the matters of the spirit. The zealot may be outwardly motivated by the anticipation of a great reward at the other end -- wealth, fame, eternal salvation -- but the real recompense is probably the obsession itself. This is no less true for the religious fanatic than for the fanatical pianist or fanatical mountain climber. As a result of his (or her) infatuation, existence overflows with purpose. Ambiguity vanishes from the fanatic's worldview; a narcissistic sense of self-assurance displaces all doubt. A delicious rage quickens his pulse, fueled by the sins and shortcomings of lesser mortals, who are soiling the world wherever he looks. His perspective narrows until the last remnants of proportion are shed from his life. Through immoderation, he experiences something akin to rapture. Although the far territory of the extreme can exert an intoxicating pull on susceptible individuals of all bents, extremism seems to be especially prevalent among those inclined by temperament or upbringing toward religious pursuits. Faith is the very antithesis of reason, injudiciousness a crucial component of spiritual devotion. And when religious fanaticism supplants ratiocination, all bets are suddenly off. Anything can happen. Absolutely anything. Common sense is no match for the voice of God...

People have always expected the end of the world to be a dramatic, thematic event: war, disease, a sudden explosion. But what if the end of the world has already occurred? What if our final demise happened slowly, secretly … and we’ve been oblivious to it all?

The deadly missile attack shortly to be launched by an ancient automatic defense system will result merely in the breakage of three coffee cups and a mouse cage, the bruising of somebody’s upper arm, and the untimely creation and sudden demise of a bowl of petunias and an innocent sperm whale. In order that some sense of mystery should still be preserved, no revelation will yet be made concerning whose upper arm sustains the bruise. This fact may safely be made the subject of suspense since it is of no significance whatsoever.

Modern dating is like hosting for a dinner that has been pushed back from 7pm to 9pm. You do not want to put the duck in the oven too early and you don't want to eat a full meal while you're waiting for your late dinner. But you also get hungry in the meantime. You decide to snack. You start out pretty healthy with some baby carrots, then decide those carrots need some ranch, shift to something more substantial like a hotpocket, and next thing you know you're eating nutella out of the jar. The demise in the quality of the food does not sit well with you and suddenly you're wondering why you decided to snack in the first place. Such is the life of the modern single who hopes to find love but not too soon.

My head was spinning at the rapid change in direction our conversation had taken. From the cheerful topic of my impending demise, we were suddenly declaring ourselves. He waited, and even though I looked down to study our hands between us, I knew his golden eyes were on me. "You already know how I feel, of course," I finally said. "I'm here… which, roughly translated, means I would rather die than stay away from you." I frowned. "I'm an idiot.

They mock Him by denying His very existence, but instead of feeling free, they just feel angry because suddenly life doesn’t make sense anymore. They want to be rid of God, and they want life to have meaning anyway, and it just doesn’t work and it makes them angry. And anger kills. I’ve lived long enough to know, and I can see it coming. Anger is going to be right at the heart of the demise of this country. America is going to fall, and when we do, we’re not getting back up again.

The sympathy for parents who have lost children is also so natural and automatic that the deaths are often not thoroughly investigated. In many cases the children are killed in infancy and their demise ascribed to Sudden Infant Death Syndrome (SIDS). In fact, the research paper originally used to claim that SIDS has a genetic origin was based primarily on the case of a mother who had supposedly lost five successive children to SIDS. It turned out that the mother had MBPS and had smothered the children to death. She was ultimately convicted of the murders.

I barely escaped Sarajevo in one piece Chetniks looked directly at my mother They were eager to kill us like mice She saw their evil eyes, as cold as ice They wanted to ensure our extinction They wanted to plan our demise But despite their ammunition We were strategic, clever, and wise Imagine being in a situation like that What would you do? What would you think? How would you deal with the intensity Of being afraid to even blink? Think about people that matter to you most What if they became like a distant ghost? What if all your friends, family, and favorite things Suddenly became birds with clipped wings?

Some of his authors were so mulishly stubborn about altering their own work, one would think he had suggested changing text in the Bible. Amanda was easy to work with, and she did not harbor great pretensions about herself or her writing. In fact, she was relatively modest about her talents, to the extent of appearing surprised and uncomfortable when he praised her. The plot of 'Unfinished Lady' centered on a young woman who tried to live strictly according to society's rules, yet couldn't make herself accept the rigid confinement of what was considered proper. She made fatal errors in her private life- gambling, taking a lover outside of marriage, having a child out of wedlock- all due to her desire to obtain the elusive happiness she secretly longed for. Eventually she came to a sordid end, dying of venereal disease, although it was clear that society's harsh judgements had caused her demise fully as much as disease. What fascinated Jack was that Amanda, as the author, had refused to take a position on the heroine's behavior, neither applauding nor condemning it. Clearly she had sympathy for the character, and Jack suspected that the heroine's inner rebelliousness reflected some of Amanda's own feelings.

Old Hubert must have had a premonition of his squalid demise. In October he said to me, ‘Forty-two years I’ve had this place. I’d really like to go back home, but I ain’t got the energy since my old girl died. And I can’t sell it the way it is now. But anyway before I hang my hat up I’d be curious to know what’s in that third cellar of mine.’ The third cellar has been walled up by order of the civil defence authorities after the floods of 1910. A double barrier of cemented bricks prevents the rising waters from invading the upper floors when flooding occurs. In the event of storms or blocked drains, the cellar acts as a regulatory overflow. The weather was fine: no risk of drowning or any sudden emergency. There were five of us: Hubert, Gerard the painter, two regulars and myself. Old Marteau, the local builder, was upstairs with his gear, ready to repair the damage. We made a hole. Our exploration took us sixty metres down a laboriously-faced vaulted corridor (it must have been an old thoroughfare). We were wading through a disgusting sludge. At the far end, an impassable barrier of iron bars. The corridor continued beyond it, plunging downwards. In short, it was a kind of drain-trap. That’s all. Nothing else. Disappointed, we retraced our steps. Old Hubert scanned the walls with his electric torch. Look! An opening. No, an alcove, with some wooden object that looks like a black statuette. I pick the thing up: it’s easily removable. I stick it under my arm. I told Hubert, ‘It’s of no interest. . .’ and kept this treasure for myself. I gazed at it for hours on end, in private. So my deductions, my hunches were not mistaken: the Bièvre-Seine confluence was once the site where sorcerers and satanists must surely have gathered. And this kind of primitive magic, which the blacks of Central Africa practise today, was known here several centuries ago. The statuette had miraculously survived the onslaught of time: the well-known virtues of the waters of the Bièvre, so rich in tannin, had protected the wood from rotting, actually hardened, almost fossilized it. The object answered a purpose that was anything but aesthetic. Crudely carved, probably from heart of oak. The legs were slightly set apart, the arms detached from the body. No indication of gender. Four nails set in a triangle were planted in its chest. Two of them, corroded with rust, broke off at the wood’s surface all on their own. There was a spike sunk in each eye. The skull, like a salt cellar, had twenty-four holes in which little tufts of brown hair had been planted, fixed in place with wax, of which there were still some vestiges. I’ve kept quiet about my find. I’m biding my time.

It is especially humbling that the simplest Trotskyist, council communist or anarcho-syndicalist militant saw much more clearly than famous and brilliant theorists that, however deserved the terminal defeat of the Soviet bloc and of Soviet-style state capitalism had been, however understandable and salutary the sudden East European infatuation with freedom and rights, however promising the fall of the market Stalinist parties, it was at the same time a historical disaster, heralding the demise of working-class power, of adversary culture, the end of two centuries of beneficent fear for the ruling classes. What was a philosophical construction and idealization in Marx’s Capital—capitalism as a total system, with capital as the only Subject—became a palpable, quotidian reality.

The most insidious of the destructive forces behind Africatown’s demise involves the paper mills, which were at the heart of a billion-dollar lawsuit filed by residents. After seventy years as the main employers of Africatown’s residents, both mills shut down in 2000. Suddenly, nearly two thousand jobs disappeared, along with the perpetual and noxious stench associated with paper making. But the job losses were just a scratch on the surface compared to the real, almost invisible damage the mills had inflicted. To fully understand the story, we must step back in time to the 1980s, to a time when environmental laws in Alabama were essentially meaningless. Today, Alabama ranks last in the nation for what it spends to protect the environment, and is widely regarded by industry trade groups as the most permissive state in the country when it comes to setting or enforcing pollution limits. Back in the eighties and nineties, things were much worse. James Warr, who was the head of the Alabama Department of Environmental Management from its inception in the 1980s until the early 2000s, was opposed to vigorous application of environmental regulations for businesses. He was an odd fit for the head of an environmental agency tasked with regulating polluters, but I believe that is precisely why he was chosen—to ensure that the Clean Air Act and Clean Water Act didn’t slow industrial production in Alabama. I was an environment reporter for the Mobile newspaper for eighteen years, beginning in 2000, and had numerous interactions with Warr and his agency. During an interview in 2003, Warr told me that the federal Superfund law was illegal and he had no intention of enforcing it or adding new sites in Alabama to the list.

You shouldn’t think of me as your responsibility,” she finally said. He gave her a rather superior glance. “I told you I would find you a new position.” “But—” “What could there possibly be to discuss?” “Nothing,” she grumbled. “Nothing at all.” Clearly, it was no use arguing with him just then. “Good.” He leaned back contentedly against his pillows. “I’m glad you see it my way.” Sophie stood. “I should be going.” “To do what?” She felt rather stupid as she said, “I don’t know.” He grinned. “Have fun with it, then.” Her hand tightened around the handle of the serving spoon. “Don’t do it,” he warned. “Do what?” “Throw the spoon.” “I wouldn’t dream of it,” she said tightly. He laughed aloud. “Oh, yes you would. You’re dreaming of it right now. You just wouldn’t do it.” Sophie’s hand was gripping the spoon so hard it shook. Benedict was chuckling so hard his bed shook. Sophie stood, still holding the spoon. Benedict smiled. “Are you planning to take that with you?” Remember your place, Sophie was screaming at herself. Remember your place. “Whatever could you be thinking,” Benedict mused, “to look so adorably ferocious? No, don’t tell me,” he added. “I’m sure it involves my untimely and painful demise.” Slowly and carefully, Sophie turned her back to him and put the spoon down on the table. She didn’t want to risk any sudden movements. One false move and she knew she’d be hurling it at his head. Benedict raised his brows approvingly. “That was very mature of you.” Sophie turned around slowly. “Are you this charming with everyone or only me?” “Oh, only you.” He grinned. “I shall have to make sure you take me up on my offer to find you employment with my mother. You do bring out the best in me, Miss Sophie Beckett.” “This is the best?” she asked with obvious disbelief. “I’m afraid so.” Sophie just shook her head as she walked to the door. Conversations with Benedict Bridgerton could be exhausting. “Oh, Sophie!” he called out. She turned around. He smiled slyly. “I knew you wouldn’t throw the spoon.” What happened next was surely not Sophie’s fault. She was, she was convinced, temporarily and fleetingly possessed by a demon. Because she absolutely did not recognize the hand that shot out to the small table next to her and picked up a stump of a candle. True, the hand appeared to be connected quite firmly to her arm, but it didn’t look the least bit familiar as it drew back and hurled the stump across the room. Straight at Benedict Bridgerton’s head. Sophie didn’t even wait to see if her aim had been true. But as she stalked out the door, she heard Benedict explode with laughter. Then she heard him shout out, “Well done, Miss Beckett!” And she realized that for the first time in years, her smile was one of pure, unadulterated joy. -Sophie & Benedict

You sure? I’ll even let you personalize the way he dies. Let’s see here, he can choke on a turnip, suddenly fall down an outhouse, or get strangled by his own undergarments. Heck, I bet I can even combine those into quite the headline-making demise …

The demise of Pan Am was a remarkable story, but not a unique one. Nearly every company led by a master P-type innovator like Trippe gets shocked. Some sudden change, whether from a regulatory agency or a new competitor, stops the music. The loonshot-franchise cycle stops working. The wheel turns one too many times, and suddenly there’s a fleet of 747s that no one wants to fly.

I want to make this point, though, and might also come back to it a few times. It’s an evolutionary response to shut down and go numb like this. When we can’t fight or flee from a horrible threat, we lie down and play dead – we freeze. A deer will do it as a last-ditch survival trick when being chased by a tiger. Playing dead might fool their predator into being a bit casual in their final lunge, giving the deer an opportunity to suddenly jerk back to life and escape. Abuse victims do it as a form of self-protection; anxiety sufferers do it in the face of too many decisions and existential overwhelm. And I reckon it’s what we do to survive when we find ourselves living a life that is so removed from the miraculous. Which is useful to reflect on; it certainly makes me more compassionate about things when I do. Of course, freezing or numbing out can work as a survival trick for a while, but if we remain asleep, particularly as a society, we face our collective demise.

Across the Americas and Asia, people told stories of hurricanes that destroyed homes and hospitals and took out government services, schools, and businesses. In the past, I had seen images of stranded polar bears and the disappearance of ancient glaciers, but these anecdotal stories from the front lines of climate change suddenly began to match the scientific findings I was reading with increasing concern. It seemed that Mother Earth was trying to tell us something—that depleting the earth’s resources at an ever-accelerating rate would ultimately lead to our own demise.

I was very upset at how his skin was peeling off so badly anywhere, but nobody gave it a second thought. They told me it was ‘normal’. Of course this was far from normal. There was no way they could have known about EB (Epidermolysis Bullosa) back then considering the rarity of the disorder. The only way to diagnose EB it is through a skin biopsy, and they would need to suspect EB to send it to the correct lab. It would not be until Nicky was born 21 months later that every Doctor imaginable was all of a sudden extremely interested in seeing photos of Alex. “Oh yeah” the dermatologist that diagnosed Nicky and Doctor McGuire at Stanford said to me unequivocally, “Alex for sure had EB.” How EB could have caused his demise though is still a mystery. Doctor Marinkovich at Stanford told me that many babies with EB are indeed stillborn, but could not tell me why. At this point however, in the delivery room, we were completely oblivious about EB and would remain so for nearly two years

Having experienced multiple deaths in her family, she offered a formula for eulogizing departed loved ones, pointing out that tears were the easier to elicit the more unexpected and violent the demise. “It will be best if he went away suddenly, being killed, drowned, or froze to death.” The address in such a case ought to include a litany of melancholy expressions such as “dreadful, deadly, cruel cold death, unhappy fate, weeping eyes.” An experienced speaker would wring the maximal lachrymation from an audience, but in a pinch anyone could deliver the doleful sentiments. “Put them into the empty skull of some young Harvard (but in case you have ne’er a one at hand, you may use your own).” Rhymes were nice: “power, flower; quiver, shiver; grieve us, leave us.” A concluding flourish was the mark of a really distinguished graveside encomium. “If you can procure a scrap of Latin to put at the end, it will garnish it mightily.” Had they come from the pen of a mature writer, the Dogood letters would deserve to be considered a delightful example of social satire. Coming as they did from the pen of a mere youth, they reveal emerging genius. Some of what Franklin wrote he might have experienced indirectly; some he extrapolated from his reading; much he must simply have imagined. But the tone is uniformly confident and true to the character he created. Silence is irreverent and full of herself, yet she brings most readers—the proud and powerful excepted—into the realm of her sympathy. They laugh when she laughs, and laugh at whom she laughs at. She is one of the more memorable minor characters of American literature, and all the more memorable for being the creation of a sixteen-year-old boy.

Someone once said, probably, that exploring an alien planet was terribly intrepid, bold and glamorous, and that someone can sod off, frankly. Because, once you have a full-on space industry and alien planets you can physically go to, you find it’s actually quite inconvenient to do so. The business of physically exploring them becomes devolved to your society’s equivalent of the unpaid office intern. Someone who won’t be missed, and whose sudden demise won’t much impede the mission.