Volvo Quotes

Stupid, shiny Volvo owner.

We’re so self-important. Everybody’s going to save something now. “Save the trees, save the bees, save the whales, save those snails.” And the greatest arrogance of all: save the planet. Save the planet, we don’t even know how to take care of ourselves yet. I’m tired of this shit. I’m tired of f-ing Earth Day. I’m tired of these self-righteous environmentalists, these white, bourgeois liberals who think the only thing wrong with this country is that there aren’t enough bicycle paths. People trying to make the world safe for Volvos. Besides, environmentalists don’t give a shit about the planet. Not in the abstract they don’t. You know what they’re interested in? A clean place to live. Their own habitat. They’re worried that some day in the future they might be personally inconvenienced. Narrow, unenlightened self-interest doesn’t impress me. The planet has been through a lot worse than us. Been through earthquakes, volcanoes, plate tectonics, continental drift, solar flares, sun spots, magnetic storms, the magnetic reversal of the poles … hundreds of thousands of years of bombardment by comets and asteroids and meteors, worldwide floods, tidal waves, worldwide fires, erosion, cosmic rays, recurring ice ages … And we think some plastic bags and some aluminum cans are going to make a difference? The planet isn’t going anywhere. WE are! We’re going away. Pack your shit, folks. We’re going away. And we won’t leave much of a trace, either. Maybe a little Styrofoam … The planet’ll be here and we’ll be long gone. Just another failed mutation. Just another closed-end biological mistake. An evolutionary cul-de-sac. The planet’ll shake us off like a bad case of fleas. The planet will be here for a long, long, LONG time after we’re gone, and it will heal itself, it will cleanse itself, ’cause that’s what it does. It’s a self-correcting system. The air and the water will recover, the earth will be renewed. And if it’s true that plastic is not degradable, well, the planet will simply incorporate plastic into a new paradigm: the earth plus plastic. The earth doesn’t share our prejudice toward plastic. Plastic came out of the earth. The earth probably sees plastic as just another one of its children. Could be the only reason the earth allowed us to be spawned from it in the first place. It wanted plastic for itself. Didn’t know how to make it. Needed us. Could be the answer to our age-old egocentric philosophical question, “Why are we here?” Plastic… asshole.

Tampaknya hanya buku yang paling pantas diceritakan dengan bangga oleh manusia beradab, bukan BMW, Mercedes, ataupun Volvo. Apabila ada manusia di zaman sekarang yang menyebut dirinya modern tetapi tidak mengindahkan buku, memilikinya, dan membacanya, maka dengan demikian manusia tersebut telah mengambil inisiatif menjadikan dirinya sebagai hewan.

If you watched a movie about a guy who wanted a Volvo and worked for years to get it, you wouldn’t cry at the end when he drove off the lot, testing the windshield wipers. You wouldn’t tell your friends you saw a beautiful movie or go home and put a record on to think about the story you’d seen. The truth is, you wouldn't remember that movie a week later, except you’d feel robbed and want your money back. Nobody cries at the end of a movie about a guy who wants a Volvo. But we spend years actually living those stories, and expect our lives to be meaningful. The truth is, if what we choose to do with our lives won't make a story meaningful, it won’t make a life meaningful either

I don't see how that is any of your business." Stupid, shiny Volvo owner.

Gamache enjoyed going to churches for their music and the beauty of the language and the stillness. But he felt closer to God in his Volvo.

When we did eventually get to the party - me walking next to Dad's Volvo driving at five miles an hour - I had a horrible time. Everyone laughed at first but then more or less ignored me. In a mood of defiant stuffed oliveness I did have a dance by myself but things kept crashing to the floor around me. The host asked if I would sit down. I had a go at that but it was useless. In the end I was at the gate for about an hour before Dad arrived.

that time Rune drove a Volvo, but later he bought a BMW. You just couldn’t reason with a person who behaved like that.

I knew the men were probably terrible people who whistled at pretty girls, treated their wives like servants, and voted for Nixon every chance they got, but as far as I was concerned, they beat the hell out of a Volvo-load of liberals for hard work and good times.

I looked around me to make sure it was clear. That's when I noticed the still, white figure. Edward Cullen was leaning against the front door of the Volvo, three cars down from me, and staring intently in my direction. I swiftly looked away and threw the truck into reverse, almost hitting a rusty Toyota Corolla in my haste. Lucky for the Toyota, I stomped on the brake in time. It was just the sort of car that my truck would make scrap metal of. I took a deep breath, still looking out the other side of my car, and cautiously pulled out again, with greater success. I stared straight ahead as I passed the Volvo, but from a peripheral peek, I would swear I saw him laughing.

Dogs are wonderful, and in many ways unique. But they are remarkably unremarkable in their intellectual and experiential capacities. Pigs are every bit as intelligent and feeling, by any sensible definition of the words. They can't hop into the back of a Volvo, but they can fetch, run and play, be mischievous, and reciprocate affection. So why don't they get to curl up by the fire? Why can't they at least be spared being tossed on the fire?

It’s a cliché. I swear to God, every surviving Volvo produced between 1970 and 1985 is being driven by quirky fictional girls.

Let go!” I insisted. He ignored me. I staggered along sideways across the wet sidewalk until we reached the Volvo. Then he finally freed me – I stumbled against the passenger door. “You are so pushy!” I grumbled “It’s open,” was all he responded. He got in the driver’s side. “I am perfectly capable of driving myself home!” I stood by the car, fuming. It was raining harder now, and I’d never put my hood up, so my hair was dripping down my back. He lowered the automatic window and leaned toward me across the seat. “Get in, Bella.” I didn’t answer. I was mentally calculating my chances of reaching the truck before he could catch me. I had to admit it, they weren’t good. “I’ll just drag you back,” he threatened, guessing my plan.

You have to distinguish between two things - the Swedish economy and the Swedish stock market. The Swedish economy is the sum of all the goods and services that are produced in this country every day. There are telephones from Ericsson, cars from Volvo, chickens from Scan, and shipments from Kiruna to Skovde. That's the Swedish economy, and it's just as strong or weak today as it was a week ago... The Stock Exchange is something very different. There is no economy and no production of goods and services. There are only fantasies in which people from one hour to the next decide that this or that company is worth so many billions, more or less. It doesn't have a thing to do with the Swedish economy.

Ronan,” said Declan. The word was loaded with additional meaning: I see you’ve only just come out of school and already your uniform looks like hell; nothing is shocking here. He gestured to the Volvo. “Join me in my office.” Ronan did not want to join him in his office. Ronan wanted to stop feeling like he had drunk battery acid. “What do you need with Ronan?” Gansey asked. His “Ronan” was loaded with additional meaning, too: Was this prearranged and tell me what is happening and do you need me to intervene? “Just a little family chat,” Declan said. Ronan looked at Gansey entreatingly. “Is it a family chat that could happen on the way to Fox Way?” Gansey asked, all polite power. “Because he and I were just headed over there.” Ordinarily, Declan would have stepped off at the slightest pressure from Gansey, but he said, “Oh, I can drop him off there after we’re done. Just a few minutes.” “Ronan!” Matthew reached his hand out the window towards Ronan. His ebullient “Ronan” was another version of please. Trapped. “Miseria fortes viros, Ronan,” Adam said. When he said “Ronan,” it meant: Ronan.

I stared straight ahead as I passed the Volvo, but from a peripheral peek, I would swear I saw him laughing.

Volvos are fundamentally invisible.

Let’s drive our Volvo into a brick wall to make Rosie Perez feel better.

But Max's Volvo is double-parked in front of my house when Jerry and I return, and Max is waiting on the stoop, holding four coffees. "I didn't know what kind you like. So I just got like...all of them.

In the earliest years, when you could still drive a Volvo 240 without feeling self-conscious, the collective task in Ramsey Hill was to relearn certain life skills that your own parents had fled to the suburbs specifically to unlearn, like how to interest the local cops in actually doing their job, and how to protect a bike from a highly motivated thief, and when to bother rousting a drunk from your lawn furniture, and how to encourage feral cats to shit in somebody else’s children’s sandbox, and how to determine whether a public school sucked too much to bother trying to fix it.

If that logic made any sense - which it doesn't, by the way - you, with your Volvo, would have been way more into Swedish House Maffia.

stupid shinny Volvo owner" - Bella - Twilight

Estúpido propietario de un flamante Volvo.

I swear to God, every surviving Volvo produced between 1970 and 1985 is being driven by quirky fictional girls.

Vermont is Volvos and antique shops and country inns with cutely contrived names like Quail Hollow Lodge and Fiddlehead Farm Inn. New Hampshire is guys in hunting caps and pickup trucks with license plates bearing the feisty slogan “Live Free or Die.

Hipster (n.): Yes, you ride a fixed-gear bike and drink single-origin chai from a local specially abled artist’s hand-thrown ceramic mug. Your bi-friend only listens to cassettes, and you just love vintage flats, and your rescue dog is named Cobain. Please just wear your hat and glasses and turned-up pants and defy categorizing. Remember: you will one day be driving a Volvo with toys thrown willy-nilly and Burger King wrappers on the floor, listening to Sade and digging it unironically. Even the freshest kale can go brown and wilt. Cave futurum.

Some time later, after Noah had discreetly disappeared, Declan’s Volvo glided up, as quiet as the Pig was loud. Ronan said, “Move up, move up” to Blue until she scooted the passenger seat far enough for him to clamber behind it into the backseat. He hurriedly sprawled back in the seat, throwing one jean-covered leg over the top of Adam’s and laying his head in a posture of thoughtless abandon. By the time Declan arrived at the driver’s side window, Ronan looked as if he had been asleep for days. “Lucky I was able to get away,” Declan said. He peered into the car, eyes passing over Blue and snagging on Ronan in the backseat. His gaze followed his brother’s leg to where it rested on top of Adam’s, and his expression tightened. “Thanks, D,” Gansey said easily. With no effort, he pushed open the door, forcing Declan back without seeming to. He moved the conversation to the region of the front fender. It became a battle of genial smiles and deliberate hand gestures.

These days, as we all know, Volvos are cool.

If I had a vulva, I’d let you drive it like a Volvo. It’s all about safety. You could probably park on the street, but you might get a ticket.

I looked at her in disbelief. “If I see a damn mouse come out of your dashboard, I am hurling myself out of the Volvo.

In retrospect, Anita will tell the other neighbors that she had not seen Ove so angry since 1977, when there was talk of a merger between Saab and Volvo.

At that time Rune drove a Volvo, but later he bought a BMW. You just couldn’t reason with a person who behaved like that.

Stay strong," said the detective. "They respect strength." What the hell was she supposed to do? Break a chair? Bench-press a Volvo?

Now that we know that Spring Roll is a girl, we should probably think about setting up her room. Gabriel kept his eyes on the road as he drove the Volvo one Saturday morning in May. We should also talk about names. That sounds good. Maybe you should think about what you want and we can go shopping. Julia turned to look at him. Now? I said I'd take you to lunch, and we can do that. But afterward, we need to start thinking about Spring Roll's room. We want it to be attractive, but functional. Something comfortable for you and for her, but not juvenile. She's a baby, Gabriel. Her stuff is going to be juvenile. You know what I mean. I want it to be elegant and not look like a preschool. Good grief. Julia fought a grin as she began imagining what the Professor would design. (Argyle patterns, dark wood, and chocolate brown leather immediately came to mind.) He cleared his throat. I might have done some searching on the Internet. Oh, really? From where? Restoration Hardware? Of course not. He bristled. Their things wouldn't be appropriate for a baby's room. So where then? He gazed at her triumphantly. Pottery Barn Kids. Julia groaned. We've become yuppies. Gabriel stared at her in mock horror. Why do you say that? We're driving a Volvo and talking about shopping at Pottery Barn. First of all, Volvos have an excellent safety rating and they're more attractive than a minivan. Secondly, Pottery Barn's furniture happens to be both functional and aesthetically pleasing. I'd like to take you to one their stores so you can see for yourself. As long as we get Thai food first. Now it was Gabriel's turn to roll his eyes. Fine. But we're ordering takeout and taking it to the park for a picnic. And I'm having Indian food, instead. If I see another plate of pad Thai, I'm going to lose it. Julia burst into peals of laughter.

And there were likely people who thought one could not interpret men's feelings by the cars they drove. But when they moved onto the street, Ove drove a Saab 96 and Rune a Volvo 244. After the accident Ove bought a Saab 95 so he'd have space for Sonja's wheelchair. That same year Rune bought a Volvo 245 to have space for a stroller. Three years later Sonja got a more modern wheelchair and Ove bought a hatchback, a Saab 900. Rune bought a Volvo 265 because Anita had started talking about another child. Then Ove bought two more Saab 900s and after that his Saab 9000. Rune bought a Volvo 265 and eventually a Volvo 745 station wagon. But no more children came. One evening Sonja came home and told Ove that Anita had been to the doctor. And a week later a Volvo 740 stood parked in Rune's garage. The sedan model. Ove saw it when he washed his Saab. In the evening Rune found a half bottle of whiskey outside his door. They never spoke about it.

In the mid-1980s, on a spring Sunday morning, a Volvo stationwagon parked in Brunswick Street. A young couple got out. She was trim, blonded, tanned. He was already broadening in the midsection, sockless, short and hairy legs ending in boatshoes. From a restraining chair in the back seat, he unloaded a child, complaining, flailing. They took it into a cafe. They were going to have brunch. The old Brunswick Street was dead, Brunchwick Street born. There was no turning back.

You have to distinguish between two things – the Swedish economy and the Swedish stock market. The Swedish economy is the sum of all the goods and services that are produced in this country every day. There are telephones from Ericsson, cars from Volvo, chickens from Scan, and shipments from Kiruna to Skövde. That’s the Swedish economy, and it’s just as strong or weak today as it was a week ago.” He paused for effect and took a sip of water. “The Stock Exchange is something very different. There is no economy and no production of goods and services. There are only fantasies in which people from one hour to the next decide that this or that company is worth so many billions, more or less. It doesn’t have a thing to do with reality or with the Swedish economy.

Never before have the American people had their noses so deeply in one another's business. If I announce that I and eleven other diners shared a thirty-seven-course lunch that likely cost as much as a new Volvo station wagon, Those of a critical nature will let their minds run in tiny, aghast circles of condemnation. My response to them is that none of us twelve disciples of gourmandise wanted a new Volvo. We wanted only lunch and since lunch lasted approximately eleven hours we saved money by not having to buy diner. The defense rests.

Längtan efter vad? Vet inte. Vet bara allt som jag inte vill. Inte det normala. Inte mamma-pappa-barn-villa-vovve (ta det inte personligt Sniff)-Volvo-tv-studielån-lån-bingolotto-9-5-jobb-meningslöshet-tick-tack-livet-går-vad vill universum -med-mig-vad-vill-jag-med-mig?

I leave the number and a short message on every green Volvo in town Is anything wrong? I miss you. 574-7423 The phone rings constantly. One says, Are you bald? Another, How tall are you in your stocking feet? Most just reply, Nothing's wrong. I miss you, too. Come quick.

Growing up, my mom made dinner every night. Usually this would be a large salad with kale, carrots, tomatoes, cucumbers, all organic of course, and sometimes she’d sprinkle nuts on top for texture. Kale has a metallic taste, like chewing on the hood of a Mercedes. No, something safer, like a Volvo.

Sitting in the shadows next to the Volvo was Mr. FBI’s pickup. Inside of the cab, his lit cigarette burned red then faded to a pale orange. She paused next to his open window, slipping on the jean jacket she’d borrowed from Claire. Old Hank Williams Sr.’s singing Your Cheatin’ Heart came from his speakers.

we don’t sit enough with our grief and let our bodies process it.

When I realized that by “no one” this man was referring to approximately 750,000 children, I knew that I had found my passion and my cause.

I turned the steering wheel as far as I could. The old blue Volvo didn't believe in power steering. "More," my father said. I thought I was going to die. I thought I might have a heart attack. I thought if I ever had to drive that car, I'd end up looking like Arnold Schwarzenegger. "I think I'm having a heart attack," I said. "What?" "Never mind.

Osim toga, svet je mali. Ponekad se stvari sklope na najslađi način. Drugi put se sklope na manje slatke načine, ili se ne sklope uopšte.

I don’t care if your first name’s “Carnegie” and your last name’s “Mellon,” you’d probably be waitlisted now.

All at once I was standing at our front window one day, looking down at the driveway, and Natalie was buckling the baby into the car. This was a Volvo wagon her parents had given us when Opal was born. And I watched her shut the passenger door and walk around to the driver’s side, and I said to myself, ‘Why, great God in heaven! I seem to have married one of those station wagon mommies!’ So we got divorced.

In the house on the other side of Jimmy live Rune and his wife. Ove wouldn’t exactly call Rune his “enemy” . . . or rather, he would. Everything that went to pot in the Residents’ Association began with Rune. He and his wife, Anita, moved into the area on the same day that Ove and Sonja moved in. At that time Rune drove a Volvo, but later he bought a BMW. You just couldn’t reason with a person who behaved like that

If I followed my better instincts right now, I would put this typewriter in the Volvo and drive to the home of the nearest politician -- any politician -- and hurl the goddamn machine through his front window ... flush the bugger out with an act of lunatic violence then soak him down with mace and run him naked down Main Street in Aspen with a bell around his neck and black lumps all over his body from the jolts of a high powered "Ball Buster" cattle prod.

Sweetheart, you got to understand something. Mad Dog Twenty-Twenty, that’s my favorite wine. And Mad Dog and opera, they don’t go together. Opera make you want to drink some white wine in a Volvo. Some Chardonnay or something like that. But listen to this.” He turned up the eight-track and James Brown hollered. “Now, James make you want to drink some Mad Dog in a Cadillac, don’t he? This is an Eldorado, to be more specific, but James don’t sing Chardonnay music, and this ain’t no Chardonnay car.

Ronan!” Gansey shouted, too late. Declan went down, but before Gansey even had time to form a plan of action, he was back up again, fist smacking into his brother. Ronan released a string of profanity so varied and pointed that Gansey was amazed that the words alone didn’t slay Declan. Arms windmilled. Knees met chests. Elbows rammed into faces. Then Ronan grabbed Declan’s suit coat and used it to throw him onto the mirrorlike hood of Declan’s Volvo. “Not the fucking car!” snarled Declan, his lip bloody.

Edward was walking past the front of my truck, looking straight forward, his lips pressed together. I yanked the door open and jumped inside, slamming it loudly behind me. I revved the engine deafeningly and reversed out into the aisle. Edward was in his car already, two spaces down, sliding out smoothly in front of me, cutting me off. He stopped there—to wait for his family; I could see the four of them walking this way, but still by the cafeteria. I considered taking out the rear of his shiny Volvo, but there were too many witnesses.

Cea mai minunată femeie din lume este cea care te iubeşte cu adevărat şi pe care-o iubeşti cu adevărat. Nimic altceva nu contează. Odată, pe vremea liceului, umblam pe bulevard cu un prieten, doi puşti zăluzi şi frustraţi care dădeau note «gagicilor» şi vorbeau cu atât mai scabros cu cât erau, de fapt, mai inocenţi erotic. Ce fund are una, ce balcoane are alta... Femeile nu erau nimic altceva pentru noi decât nişte obiecte de lux, ca automobilele lustruite din vitrinele magazinelor «Volvo» sau «Maserati»: nu ne imaginam cu adevărat că vom avea şi noi una vreodată. Prin dreptul cinematografului Patria am zărit o tipă trăznitoare. Am rămas înlemniţi: ce pulpe în ciorapi de plasă neagră, ce fund rotund şi ce mijloc subţire, ce ţoale pe ea, ce plete de sârmă roşie, răsucită în mii de feluri... Ne-am învârtit în jurul ei ca s-o vedem şi din faţă: cum putea avea aşa pereche de ţâţe, aşa de perfecte cum numai în albumele de artă — care pe-atunci ne ţineau loc de Penthouse—mai văzuserăm? Pentru cine era o astfel de fiinţă, cum putea fi o noapte de sex cu ea? Până la urmă ne-am aşezat la coadă la bilete, fără s-o scăpăm din ochi şi fără să-ncetăm comentariile. Când, îl auzim pe unul, un tip destul de jegos care stătea şi el la coadă, mâncând seminţe, înaintea noastră: «E bună paraşuta asta, nu? V-ar place şi vouă, ciutanilor... Da' ascultaţi-mă pe mine, c-am fumat destule ca ea: cât o vedeţi de futeşă, să ştiţi că e pe undeva un bărbat sătul de ea până peste cap! Poa'să fie cea mai mişto din lume, poa'să fie şi Brijibardo, că tot i-e drag vreunuia de ea ca mie de nevastă-mea...» Am fost mult mai şocat de remarcile astea decât mi-aş fi imaginat. Cum să te plictiseşti de frumuseţea însăşi, de neatins şi de neconceput? De cea pentru care ţi-ai da şi pielea de pe tine? Ce ar putea dori un bărbat mai mult decât să-şi poată trece braţul în jurul mijlocului ei, să poată privi minute-n şir în ochii ei, să o întindă încetişor pe pat... Să o scoată din învelişul ei de dantelă mătăsoasă... De-aici încolo imaginaţia mea se bloca, nu-mi puteam închipui cum e să faci dragoste. De câte ori mă gândeam cum ar fi, vedeam doar un ocean roz care se răsuceşte asupra ta şi te sufocă... Am cunoscut apoi femei reale, femei imaginare, femei din vis, femei din cărţi, femei din reclame, femei din filme, femei din videoclipuri. Femei din revistele porno. Fiecare altfel şi fiecare cu altceva de oferit. M-am îndrăgostit de câteva şi de fiecare dată a fost la fel: primul semn că aş putea-o iubi a fost mereu că nu m-am putut gândi, văzând-o, «cât de futeşă e». Chiar dacă era. Bărbaţii au creierul impregnat de hormoni. Nici cel mai distins intelectual nu e altfel, până şi el, la orice vârstă, îşi imaginează cum ar face-o cu fata plictisită, necunoscută, de lângă el. Dar când cunoşti cea mai minunată femeie din lume, care e cea pe care o poţi iubi, semnul este, trebuie să fie, că nici pulpele, nici «balcoanele» nu se mai văd, de parcă hormonii sexului şi-ai agresivităţii s-ar retrage din creierul tău tumefiat şi l-ar lăsa inocent ca un creier de copil şi translucid ca o corniţă de melc. Facem sex cu un creier de bărbat, dar iubim cu unul de copil, încrezător, dependent, dornic de a da şi a primi afecţiune. Femeile minunate din viaţa mea, toate cele pe care le-am iubit cu adevărat şi care-au răspuns cu dragoste dragostei mele, au fost într-un fel necorporale, au fost bucurie pură, nevroză pură, experienţă pură. Senzualitatea, uneori dusă până foarte departe, nu a fost decât un ingredient într-o aventură complexă şi epuizantă a minţii. Pentru mine nu există, deci, «cea mai minunată» în sensul de 90-60-90, nici în cel de blondă, brună sau roşcată, înaltă sau minionă, vânzătoare sau poetă. Cea mai minunată este cea cu care am putut avea un copil virtual numit «cuplul nostru», «dragostea noastră».

* ad fakt, že Doppler běží jako blázen Bystrý čtenář možná podotkne, že si Doppler před celkem nedávnou dobou vymkl kotník, von Borring ho musel při vstupu do domu podpírat atd., tak jak najednou může běžet jako blázen? Bohužel nemám (já, autor tohoto textu) na tuto otázku vhodnou odpověď. Popravdě řečeno jsem na to nejspíš zapomněl, ale když jsem si kvůli tomu text nyní znovu pročetl, uvědomil jsem si, že bych zde mohl být nařčen z nekonsekventnosti a z toho, že okamžitě zapomínám na své nápady, jakmile se objeví nové. O takové kritice budu přemýšlet.

A vážně hrozné je, že celkem zakrátko přijde Maj Britt na obláček k von Borringově matce na permanentní návštěvu, protože Maj Brittiny dny se už krátí, a přestože její vztah k Bohu je poněkud vlažný, bohatě stačí na to, aby byla Maj Britt vpuštěna do nebe, pochyby jí budou přičteny k dobru a bude umístěna na stejný obláček jako ostatní lidé z její obce, protože tak to v nebi chodí, respektují se tam hranice obcí, a jestliže von Borringově matce už teď připadá vyčerpávající tam sedět, dokážete si sami představit, v jaké peklo se jí pobyt promění po Maj Brittině příchodu. A ostatně: v rozporu s tím, v co, jak se zdá, věří mnoho křesťanů, to není tak, že by si s sebou člověk do nebe nesměl nic vzít. Jednu věci si totiž každý vzít může. Proto je třeba volit obezřetně. Von Borringova matka si vybrala truhlu s morfiem a Maj Britt si zvolí kamion marihuany. Diskuse mezi nimi budou duchaplné i iritující a budou probíhat opravdu dlouho předlouho.)

Dogs are wonderful, and in many ways unique. But they are remarkably unremarkable in their intellectual and experiential capacities. Pigs are every bit as intelligent and feeling, by any sensible definition of the words. They can't hop into the back of a Volvo, but they can fetch, run and play, be mischievous, and reciprocate affection. So why don't they get to curl up by the fire? Why can't they at least be spared being tossed on the fire? Our taboo against dog eating says something about dogs and a great deal about us. The French, who love their dogs, sometimes eat their horses. The Spanish, who love their horses, sometimes eat their cows. The Indians, who love their cows, sometimes eat their dogs. While written in a much different context, George Orwell's words (from Animal Farm) apply here: "All animals are equal, but some animals are more equal than others." The protective emphasis is not a law of nature; it comes from the stories we tell about nature.

To the degree that advertising reaches us, occupying our time and thought, it keeps us vibrating within strict limits. If forty million people see a commercial for a car, then forty million people have a car commercial in their heads, all at the same time. This is bound to have more beneficial effect on the commodity system than if, at that moment, all those people were thinking separate thoughts which, in some cases, might not be about commodities at all. Of course, advertising people will argue against the notion that the purpose and result of their activities is to unify and homogenize people and culture. They are forever speaking of the dazzling array of choices our market system provides and how advertising provides the information we need to make choices. It is an ominous sign that so many people can accept this argument, which confuses diversity of product choice with diversity of life-style or thoughts. It ought to be self-evident that if I choose a Ford and you choose a Volvo, we are not expressing diversity, we are expressing unity. Moreover, if you and I at any one moment are both occupied with mental images and feelings related to products—any products— rather than some experience which is not connected to purchasing, then in terms of the commodity system, the gross national product, and the world of advertising, we are indistinguishable; we have merged as “market.” While it might matter to Upjohn or Cutter Laboratories which drug a consumer buys, both are in agreement that they benefit whenever people seek any drug rather than a nondrug solution to a problem. Advertising, then, serves to further the movement of humans into artificial environments by narrowing the conception of diversity to fit the framework of commodities while unifying people within this conception. The result is a singularly channeled mentality, nicely open to receiving commercial messages, ready to confuse brand diversity with diversity itself, and to confuse human need with the advertiser’s need to sell commodities.

We need to be humble enough to recognize that unforeseen things can and do happen that are nobody’s fault. A good example of this occurred during the making of Toy Story 2. Earlier, when I described the evolution of that movie, I explained that our decision to overhaul the film so late in the game led to a meltdown of our workforce. This meltdown was the big unexpected event, and our response to it became part of our mythology. But about ten months before the reboot was ordered, in the winter of 1998, we’d been hit with a series of three smaller, random events—the first of which would threaten the future of Pixar. To understand this first event, you need to know that we rely on Unix and Linux machines to store the thousands of computer files that comprise all the shots of any given film. And on those machines, there is a command—/bin/rm -r -f *—that removes everything on the file system as fast as it can. Hearing that, you can probably anticipate what’s coming: Somehow, by accident, someone used this command on the drives where the Toy Story 2 files were kept. Not just some of the files, either. All of the data that made up the pictures, from objects to backgrounds, from lighting to shading, was dumped out of the system. First, Woody’s hat disappeared. Then his boots. Then he disappeared entirely. One by one, the other characters began to vanish, too: Buzz, Mr. Potato Head, Hamm, Rex. Whole sequences—poof!—were deleted from the drive. Oren Jacobs, one of the lead technical directors on the movie, remembers watching this occur in real time. At first, he couldn’t believe what he was seeing. Then, he was frantically dialing the phone to reach systems. “Pull out the plug on the Toy Story 2 master machine!” he screamed. When the guy on the other end asked, sensibly, why, Oren screamed louder: “Please, God, just pull it out as fast as you can!” The systems guy moved quickly, but still, two years of work—90 percent of the film—had been erased in a matter of seconds. An hour later, Oren and his boss, Galyn Susman, were in my office, trying to figure out what we would do next. “Don’t worry,” we all reassured each other. “We’ll restore the data from the backup system tonight. We’ll only lose half a day of work.” But then came random event number two: The backup system, we discovered, hadn’t been working correctly. The mechanism we had in place specifically to help us recover from data failures had itself failed. Toy Story 2 was gone and, at this point, the urge to panic was quite real. To reassemble the film would have taken thirty people a solid year. I remember the meeting when, as this devastating reality began to sink in, the company’s leaders gathered in a conference room to discuss our options—of which there seemed to be none. Then, about an hour into our discussion, Galyn Susman, the movie’s supervising technical director, remembered something: “Wait,” she said. “I might have a backup on my home computer.” About six months before, Galyn had had her second baby, which required that she spend more of her time working from home. To make that process more convenient, she’d set up a system that copied the entire film database to her home computer, automatically, once a week. This—our third random event—would be our salvation. Within a minute of her epiphany, Galyn and Oren were in her Volvo, speeding to her home in San Anselmo. They got her computer, wrapped it in blankets, and placed it carefully in the backseat. Then they drove in the slow lane all the way back to the office, where the machine was, as Oren describes it, “carried into Pixar like an Egyptian pharaoh.” Thanks to Galyn’s files, Woody was back—along with the rest of the movie.

The yuppie was an adult version of the privileged campus longhair who had outgrown the juvenile provocations and naive politics of his youth and now had a "pragmatic" approach to changing the world. This mostly consisted of buying things that were sensible, bourgeois, and decorous, such as Volvo station wagons and imported Italian olive oil.

What was I thinking? The guy was night to my day, truck to my Volvo, grease to my silk, bedroll to my eggroll.

You have to distinguish between two things - the Swedish economy and the Swedish stock market. The Swedish economy is the sum of all the goods and services that are produced in this country every day. There are telephones from Ericsson, cars from Volvo, chickens from Scan, and shipments from Kiruna to Skövde. That's the Swedish economy, and it's just as strong or weak today as it was a week ago... The Stock Exchange is something very different. There is no economy and no production of goods and services. There are only fantasies in which people from one hour to the next decide that this or that company is worth so many billions, more or less. It doesn't have a thing to do with the Swedish economy.

Her dusty Volvo bounced up and down the rugged path leading to the ranch house.

Cissy had proven to be a major asset during the journey home. Fueled by journalistic pride and booze, she drove ahead of Cormac, honking at oncoming traffic to make sure that they allowed the Volvo ample clearance. At one point in time, she tried to lead them on a shortcut through a city park. Cormac didn't think the couch could handle an off-road journey, so he stuck to the road. Cissy later confirmed that she'd actually nodded off at the wheel. She said that she'd hit a goose, and would prefer not to discuss it.

Tę głęboką emocjonalną różnicę dostrzegał nie tylko Gal, ale i bracia z Zatoki Psów Niewiernych. Zarówno ich, jak i wszystkich im podobnych bojowników można było poznać na drogach świata po nadgryzionym białym jabłuszku naklejonym na tyle starego volkswagena albo volvo serii 240.

The next morning, Steve and John were sitting on the porch of the house, taking in the nice view—which was marred only by the sight of John’s 1984 Honda Civic, with 210,000 miles on it. “The paint was just sunburned off,” says Lasseter. “The seats were shot—I put T-shirts over them. Steve had driven up in their Jeep Cherokee. Now he knew the roads I had to drive on every day.” “Don’t tell me that’s your car,” Steve said. “Yeah, it is,” John told him. “You drive to and from Pixar on these roads in that car?” Steve said. Lasseter sheepishly nodded. “Okay. No, no, no, no. No, that just won’t do.” “Steve,” said Lasseter, “I’ve got to be honest, I can’t afford a new car right now. We just bought this house and it’s far more than we can afford. I just can’t do it now.” “I think what he was thinking,” Lasseter told me, “was, ‘Oh my God, I bet the farm on this guy, and he’s driving that crap car … if a truck hits him—dink!—he’ll be dead.’ ” “Okay,” Steve said, “we’ll figure something out.” When Lasseter got his next paycheck, it contained a small bonus. “You have to use this to buy a new car,” Steve told him. “It has to be safe, and I have to approve it.” John and Nancy picked out a Volvo, and Steve approved.

When Lasseter got his next paycheck, it contained a small bonus. “You have to use this to buy a new car,” Steve told him. “It has to be safe, and I have to approve it.” John and Nancy picked out a Volvo, and Steve approved.

Hide your quirks and you’re a Volvo.

Milton pointed his key at his Volvo and thumbed the lock. It seemed a pointless affectation, and the car looked vulnerable as they walked away from it.

Having more airbags than a Volvo doesn't make you attractive. Nothing is sexier than a polished soul. ‪‎Skyeism‬ 115

Parts of the works were being demolished prior to privatisation. For as far as I could see, cutting torches fizzed and flared and sent up showers of sparks from among the buckled girders. Heaps of waste smouldered in the mud between the huge corrugated sheds, giving off an acrid, low-lying smoke through which I could make out gantries crawling with oxygen pipes; muddy yards where the Mercedes, Volvo and Magirus Deutz trucks were parked in rows; the venous curves of a disused railway line – a bright, almost luminous green moss grew between its dull rails. As we walked past the shed now directly below us, I had seen what I thought were huge steel wheels piled on top of one another. They were already beginning to rust. This reminded me of how, at the turn of the eighteenth century, stone from France became cheaper than Hathersage grit. The grindstone industry collapsed, and work stopped in a day. Half-finished millstones are still scattered around at the base of the Peak District edges, for tourists to eat their lunch off.

Jamie got back to her apartment in nineteen minutes and forty-nine seconds.  It wasn’t a personal best for a five-kilometre run, but it was still fast.  She showered and dressed, pulled on her boots, and was out the door in seventeen minutes flat. Which probably was close to a personal best.  She was wearing jeans she picked up from a supermarket. She liked them because they had a three percent lycra content woven into the denim, which stretched a little and meant that she could more easily crouch, walk, and kick someone in the side of the head if the situation called for it. It hadn’t yet, but she had a long career ahead of herself, she hoped.  She jumped into her car — a small and economical hybrid hatchback which squeezed around the city easily — and headed north towards the Lea.  It took nearly forty minutes to get there in rush hour traffic, and by the time she pulled up, Roper was leaning against the bonnet of his ten-year-old Volvo saloon, smoking a cigarette. He was tall with thinning, short hair, and a face that looked like he was always squinting into a stiff wind.  His long black coat was pinned to his right leg in the breeze and his shirt looked like it’d been pulled out of the laundry hamper rather than a clean drawer. He was perpetually single, and it showed. There was no one to hold him accountable when he decided it was okay to skip a morning shower for an extra ten minutes sleeping off his hangover. What she hated most about him, beyond the cigarette stink and the pissed-at-life attitude, was that she always had to look twice to make sure he wasn’t her father.  Her mother had dragged her away from him in Sweden, and now, she’d been thrown together with a guy who seemingly had inherited all his bad habits. Her mum said it was because all detectives were like it if they did the job long enough. They saw too much and didn’t talk about it enough. Which led inevitably to drink, and drugs, and other women. She’d spoken from experience of course. And Jamie knew she hadn’t exaggerated.  Though moving them both to Britain seemed like a bit of a dramatic reaction. But then again, her father had given her mother gonorrhoea and couldn’t say which woman he’d gotten it from. So Jamie figured it was reasonable.  He would have turned sixty-one this year. Roper pushed off the Volvo and ground out his cigarette under the heel of his battered Chelsea boot. Jamie looked at it, stopping short of his odour-radius. ‘You gonna just leave that there?’ He looked between his feet, rolling onto the outsides of them as he inspected the flattened butt. ‘It’ll wash away in the rain.’ ‘Into the ocean, yeah, where some poor fish is going to eat it,’ Jamie growled, coming to a stop in front of him.

North-Korea still has not paid Sweden for the 600 Volvos they bought in 1971.

[...] én, aki ezt írom, a felkiáltójel használatát a gyengeség jelének tartom. Még ha az ember napi rendszerességgel ír is, összesen talán ha két alkalommal engedheti meg magának a felkiáltójel használatát az egész élete során. Ha valaki ennél ritkábban ír, legfeljebb egyszer alkalmazhat felkiáltójelet, de akkor is csak a megfelelő feltételek fennállása esetén. A felkiáltójel használatával visszaélőket pedig száműzetésbe kellene küldeni - legalábbis egy időre.

Downstairs they exited the building into a small employee parking lot and headed straight for a sports car that looked like it belonged in a James Bond movie. It was sleek, with tinted windows and a matte black paint job. As she walked toward it, Sara wondered if it came fully loaded with secret weapons and an ejector seat. She was just about to run her fingers along the body when Mother called her. “Sorry, but that’s not ours,” he said. She turned to see that he and Sydney had stopped at an oldish Volvo station wagon that looked more mom than Bond.

Driving into Huddersfield, Mary followed the signs for the city center and Kingsgate Shopping Centre. She managed to shoehorn the Volvo into the multistory car park without scraping too much paint off on the concrete pillars, then led the fractious and irritated children out in search of a toilet facility, fast food, and some sort of bribe. “There’s a GameStop in here,” she told Robert, “and something called The Entertainer Toy Shop. Wouldn’t you like to go there after lunch, children?

Sell. Move out of London. Bigger garden, better schools, a dog, a Volvo estate. He wants us to be middle-class, middle-aged, welly-wearing bores, listening to Radio Four and moaning about the commute. He says it’s all for Sofia. But we both know it’s what he wants.

Volvo director shows the Dutch wallet to the King.

Have no shame ... as another woman friend of mine counseled with perfect sincerity and cheer: 'Just gain the 25 pounds. I really think I would not have survived menopause--AND the death of my mother--without having gained these 25 pounds.' [quoting Sandra Tsing Loh's 'The Madwoman in the Volvo']

Let’s go, ladies,” said Dolores, her long face grim as she turned from the scene. “Let’s see what Obiryn can tell us about trapping this devil.” We had no need to stay here. We’d be much more productive back at Davenport House with glasses of wine between our hands. We did our best thinking and planning that way. Red wine is a superfood. I fell into step with Marcus as we all followed Dolores down the alleyway toward the Volvo station wagon parked at the curb. Beverly and Ruth walked in silence behind us. I felt a vibration chime through me just as the light faded as though storm clouds had suddenly covered the sky—just a little too fast. Curious, I halted and looked up into the sky. “What the hell is that?” I asked no one in particular. We’d come to the crime scene under a blue sky, a speckling of clouds, and a warm morning. But now a cold wind rose with a green horizon

Nous pas lire Pour le Proust, à la librairie, te donnent pas de télécommande, pas moyen de zapper pour un match de football ou un jeu où on gagne des Volvo. Nous vivons plus longtemps, mais moins scrupuleusement, et en phrases beaucoup plus courtes. Nous voyageons plus vite, plus souvent et plus loin, et rentrons sans souvenirs, mais avec cartes mémoire.. C’est moi avec mon mec. Là c’est mon ex je crois. Et là tout le monde à poil, donc à la plage, mais où. Sept volumes, pitié. Y a pas ça en plus court ? Ou alors, encore mieux, en images ? Y avait à la télé un truc, Marius, Fanny... Mais ma belle-sœur me dit que c’est un autre Marcel P. Et d’ailleurs, entre nous, c’est qui, votre Marcel. Il a passé sa vie au lit, à gribouiller. Une feuille après l’autre, à pied, clopin-clopant. Et nous , en cinquième vitesse, touchons du bois, bien portants.

It's a cliche. I swear to God, every surviving Volvo produced between 1970 and 1985 is being driven by quirky fictional girls.

made reservations at a famous fishing lodge on the Au Sable River in Michigan. When I got there and found a place to park among the Saabs and Volvos the proprietor said I was just a few days early for the Hendrikson hatch. There is, I see, one constant in all types of fishing, which is when the fish are biting, which is almost-but-not-quite-now. I looked pretty good making false casts in the lodge parking lot. I mean no one doubled over with mirth. But most of the other two thousand young professionals fishing this no-kill stretch of the Au Sable were pretty busy checking to make sure that their trout shirts were color coordinated with their Reebok wading sneakers. When I stepped in the river, however, my act came to pieces. My line hit the water like an Olympic belly flop medalist. I hooked four “tree trout” in three minutes. My back casts had people ducking for cover in Traverse City and Grosse Pointe Farms. Somebody ought to tie a dry fly that looks like a Big Mac. Then there’d be an excuse for the hook winding up in my mouth instead of the fish’s. The only thing I could manage to get a drag-free float on was me after I stepped in a hole. And the trout? The trout laughed.

Moorkop en Negerzoen in het Walhalla schrijverschap.

Volvo en Peugeot, combinatie van krachtig en geruisloos.

Peugeot en Volvo Holland, combinatie van geruisloze penetratie.

The headmaster's sleek silver Volvo was in its usual reserved spot, right by the door. It was the perfect choice for Dr Grover. Outwardly discreet and reliable, it was also eye-wateringly expensive and luxurious - like his ties - and it cunningly referenced those wonderful Scandiwegian detective drama series that Dulwich parents tended to get addicted to. All too appropriate at the moment

The red-state/blue-state divide also helped conservatives perform one of their dearest rhetorical maneuvers, which we will call the latte libel: the suggestion that liberals are identifiable by their tastes and consumer preferences and that these tastes and preferences reveal the essential arrogance and foreignness of liberalism. While a more straightforward discussion of politics might begin by considering the economic interests that each party serves, the latte libel insists that such interests are irrelevant. Instead it’s the places that people live and the things that they drink, eat, and drive that are the critical factors, the clues that bring us to the truth. In particular, the things that liberals are said to drink, eat, and drive: the Volvos, the imported cheese, and above all, the lattes.*

In 1982, his biggest investment was Treasury bonds; right after that, he made Chrysler his top holding, even though most experts expected the automaker to go bankrupt; then, in 1986, Lynch put almost 20% of Fidelity Magellan in foreign stocks like Honda, Norsk Hydro, and Volvo. So, before you buy a U.S. stock fund, compare the holdings listed in its latest report against the roster of the S & P 500 index; if they look like Tweedledee and Tweedledum, shop for another fund.7

I started back in high school in Orange County.  We used to crash cars to set off the air bags.  It sort of grew.  We figured if you packed enough kids into a Volvo with front and side air bags nobody could get seriously hurt.  We were wrong about that, but still, we had fun.

along with a Sentra whose trunk is being held closed by a length of frayed clothesline. A light-blue Volvo sedan

We could use geofencing to limit car speeds within cities, or certain parts of cities, or even by time of day or day of week such as when schools or bars let out. Doing so would save lives. We choose not to. Europe isn’t exactly limiting speeds, yet. But as of 2022, Europe requires that all new cars sold use GPS and street sign detection to determine if a driver is speeding and if so, warn the driver. Starting in 2021, Volvo limits top speeds on new cars to 112 mph. It’s not revolutionary—nor that helpful to pedestrians and bicyclists

No one thought it odd that Pierre always delivered a kick to the car upon entering or leaving, as Volvo-bashing was a general practice in southwestern France, and could even be encountered as far away as Paris. Indeed, carried to cosmopolitan centers around the world by tourists, Volvo-bashing was slowly becoming a cult activity throughout the world, and this pleased Nicholai Hel, since he had begun it all.

Why’d she move all the way to Montana from New York?” And why had she taken that drive alone? That wasn’t a safe trip, especially with an infant. She should have had help. How did an educated, gorgeous woman end up traveling across the country alone with a baby and what seemed like every one of her possessions stuffed into a Volvo?

The Suzuki hit a trace of diesel on the second one and shied sideways, damned near high-siding me into the back end of a lumbering Volvo saloon. It would have made an ironic change for a biker to have wiped out a Swedish tank,

The thing is, it was hard to imagine our parents as being anything other than, well, parents. It was as if both Yana and my dad had strolled out of the uterus with a 401(k), a mortgage, and the keys to a 1998 Volvo. They

The success stories of the Chinese car industry have all been small, upstart companies, often sponsored by local governments—most notably the private firm Geely, which in 2010 acquired the Volvo passenger-car company.

My ex—who was an academic—and I used to argue about the best way to broil a salmon. Neither of us was grateful for the gift that someone else might cook it, albeit slightly incorrectly. It was a horrible way to live.

because in point of fact we would have come flying if we had known remotely how much he was suffering.

By changing my thinking patterns, I have somehow become able to excrete a hormone that douses anxiety instead of fuels it.