“
My mind was quickly consumed with thoughts of my girlfriend and all the good times we had had, like one of those cheesy montages ni eighties movies, when the angsty protagonist envisions himself and his ex holding hands on the beach, feeding a small puppy, getting into some kind of zany wrestling match with whipped cream. I interrupted my cliché memories by saying aloud: "Ugh, I'm feeling pretty low about this whole thing."
"You just gotta try to put it out of your head," he said, folding the paper halfway down to look at me.
"I know, it's just hard. I mean, I still have stuff at her place. What am I going to do about that? I still have a TV...," I said.
"Fuck the TV. Leave the TV. Cut your ties."
"It's a fifteen-hundred-dollar TV," I insisted.
"Go get that fucking TV.
”
”
Justin Halpern (Sh*t My Dad Says)
“
We were just a hair's breadth from electing America's first female president to succeed America's first black president. We weren't done, but we were doing it. And then, true to form-like the Balrog's whip catching Gandalf by his little gray bootie, like the husband in a Lifetime movie hissing, 'If I can't have you, no one can'-white American voters shoved an incompetent, racist con man into the White House.
”
”
Lindy West (The Witches Are Coming)
“
Draft-dodging is what chicken-hawks do best. Dick Cheney, Glenn Beck, Karl Rove, Rush Limbaugh (this capon claimed he had a cyst on his fat ass), Newt Gingrich, former Attorney General John Ashcroft—he received seven deferments to teach business education at Southwest Missouri State—pompous Bill O’Reilly, Jeb Bush, hey, throw in John Wayne—they were all draft-dodgers. Not a single one of these mouth-breathing, cowardly, and meretricious buffoons fought for his country. All plumped for deferments. Former New York Mayor Rudy Giuliani? Did not serve. Former Massachusetts Governor Mitt Romney? Did not serve in the military. (He served the Mormon Church on a thirty-month mission to France.) Former Senator Fred Thompson? Did not serve. Former President Ronald Reagan? Due to poor eyesight, he served in a noncombat role making movies for the Army in southern California during WWII. He later seems to have confused his role as an actor playing a tail gunner with the real thing. Did Rahm Emanuel serve? Yes, he did during the Gulf War 1991—in the Israeli Army. John Boehner did not serve, not a fucking second. Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell, R-KY? Not a minute! Former Senate Majority Leader Trent Lott, R-MS? Avoided the draft. Senate Minority Whip Jon Kyl, R-AZ—did not serve. National Republican Senatorial Committee Chair John Cornyn, R-TX—did not serve. Former Senate Republican Policy Committee Chair John Ensign, R-NV? Did not serve. Jack Kemp? Dan Quayle? Never served a day. Not an hour. Not an afternoon. These are the jackasses that cherish memorial services and love to salute and adore hearing “Taps.
”
”
Alexander Theroux
“
Comic books, movies, radio programmes centered their entertainment around the fact of torture. With the clearest of consciences, with a patriotic intensity, children dreamed, talked, acted orgies of physical abuse. Imaginations were released to wander on a reconnaissance mission from Cavalry to Dachau.
European children starved and watched their parents scheme and die. Here we grew up with toy whips. Early warning against our future leaders, the war babies.
”
”
Leonard Cohen (The Favorite Game)
“
A car whipped past, the driver eating and a passenger clicking a camera. Moving without going anywhere, taking a trip instead of making one. I laughed at the absurdity of the photographs and then realized I, too, was rolling effortlessly along, turning the windshield into a movie screen in which I, the viewer, did the moving while the subject held still. That was the temptation of the American highway, of the American vacation (from the Latin vacare, "to be empty").
”
”
William Least Heat-Moon (Blue Highways)
“
It was Valentine's Day and I had spent the day in bed with my life partner, Ketel One. The two of us watched a romance movie marathon on TBS Superstation that made me wonder how people who write romantic comedies can sleep at night.
At some point during almost every romantic comedy, the female lead suddenly trips and falls, stumbling helplessly over something ridiculous like a leaf, and then some Matthew McConaughey type either whips around the corner just in the nick of time to save her or is clumsily pulled down along with her. That event predictably leads to the magical moment of their first kiss. Please. I fall all-the-time. You know who comes and gets me? The bouncer.
Then, within the two hour time frame of the movie, the couple meet, fall in love, fall out of love, break up, and then just before the end of the movie, they happen to bump into each other by "coincidence" somewhere absolutely absurd, like by the river. This never happens in real life. The last time I bumped into an ex-boyfriend was at three o'clock in the morning at Rite Aid. I was ringing up Gas-X and corn removers.
”
”
Chelsea Handler (My Horizontal Life: A Collection of One-Night Stands)
“
I scooted out of the laundry room and skipped down the hallway, arms flaying around my head like one of the hot pink puppets from the movie Labyrinth. “A scent and a sound, I’m lost and I’m found. And I’m hungry like the wolf. Something on a line, it’s discord and rhyme—whatever, whatever, la la la—Mouth is alive, all running inside, and I’m hungry like the—” Warmth spread down my neck.
“It’s actually, ‘I howl and I whine. I’m after you,’ and not blah or whatever.”
Startled by the deep voice, I shrieked and whipped around. My foot slipped on a section of well-cleaned wood and my butt smacked on the floor.
“Holy crap,” I gasped, clutching my chest. “I think I’m having a heart attack.”
“And I think you broke your butt.” Laughter filled Daemon’s voice.
I remained sprawled across the narrow hallway, trying to catch my breath. “What the hell? Do you just walk into people’s houses?”
“And listen to girls absolutely destroy a song in a matter of seconds? Well, yes, I make a habit out of it. Actually, I knocked several times, but I heard your…singing, and your door was unlocked.” He shrugged.
“So I just let myself in.”
“I can see that.” I stood, wincing. “Oh, man, maybe I did break my butt.”
“I hope not. I’m kind of partial to your butt.” He flashed a smile. “Your face is pretty red. You sure you didn’t smack that on the way down?”
I groaned. “I hate you.
”
”
Jennifer L. Armentrout
“
Ash has a huge customized Barbie collection. Aside from Horror Movie Barbie (head lopped halfway off, torn and bloody clothes), Commando Barbie (camouflage bandana, pistol-whipping Ken with toy guns stolen from Josh), there is my personal favorite, Fat Barbie (dressed in a muumuu, sporting extra body girth and a double chin, thanks to the discreet placement of Silly Putty), I think Fat Barbie is genius but Nancy flipped out when she saw her. Our mother, whose statuesque blond Minnesouda beauty makes her look like a Barbie, is a size four on her bloated days.
”
”
Rachel Cohn (Shrimp (Cyd Charisse, #2))
“
She’s everything that should be loathed,” he went on, staring in front of him. “Sometimes I think I hate everything in the world. No decency, no conscience. She’s what people mean when they say America never grows up, America rewards the corrupt. She’s the type who goes to the bad movies, acts in them, reads the love-story magazines, lives in a bungalow, and whips her husband into earning more money this year so they can buy on the installment plan next year, breaks up her neighbor’s marriage—
”
”
Patricia Highsmith (Strangers on a Train)
“
Of course, it is true that plastic surgeries and sex reassignments are “artificial,” but then again so are the exercise bikes we work out on, the antiwrinkle moisturizers we smear on our faces, the dyes we use to color our hair, the clothes we buy to complement our figures, and the TV shows, movies, magazines, and billboards that bombard us with “ideal” images of gender, size, and beauty that set the standards that we try to live up to in the first place. The class systems based on attractiveness and gender are extraordinarily “artificial”— yet only those practices that seem to subvert those classes (rather than reaffirm them) are ever characterized as such.
”
”
Julia Serano (Whipping Girl: A Transsexual Woman on Sexism and the Scapegoating of Femininity)
“
Unbelievable,” Audrey’s voice squeaked as I pushed past her. “Here we are, talking to you about your freaky little-boy encounter back in Breaux Bridge and how your caramel macchiato tasted like cardboard, and boom! You just zone out like one of the kids from Children of the Corn.”
“Um, Aud, babe … I don’t think those kids zone out. They’re just freaky twenty-four-seven. It’s a year-round thing.” Gabe’s response drew a half-hearted laugh from me, but it was quickly reined in when I reached the Book of the Ancients.
“Whatever, Gabriel,” Audrey said to him. “My point is, it’s freaky, okay? She gets this glazed-over look in her eyes, like she’s gonna whip out a butcher knife and go all Michael Myers on us or something.”
I glanced over my shoulder to cock an eyebrow at her.
“Oh, now you pay attention.” She cocked an eyebrow back.
“What is it with you and the cheesy horror-movie references?” Gabe muttered.
“Hey, now. Halloween is a classic,” Gavin scolded him. “Don’t go hating on the classics.
”
”
Rachael Wade (The Tragedy of Knowledge (Resistance, #3))
“
On Saturday Ben and I drove to Johns Island to see Skyfall.”
“You did?” Hi asked sharply. “Thanks for the invite, jerks.”
Shelton raised his palms. “You were at temple. We’re supposed to just wait around? Plus, you’ve seen that move like five times.”
“You still could’ve asked,” Hi grumbled.
“I don’t—”
“Guys!” I clapped my hands once. “The story, please.”
“An hour in, I go for a popcorn refill.” Shelton shuddered. “When I get back, Ben’s sitting in the dark, flaring away, and he’s not even wearing his sunglasses! I almost wet myself. He said he wanted to watch the movie in HD. Man, I don’t remember a single minute from the rest of the film.”
“In a theater!?” My temper exploded. “That stupid mother—”
“Hiram!”
Our heads whipped. Ruth Stolowitski was standing on her front stoop.
“Get back in here this instant! You’re not dressed.”
Ruth wore a fuzzy pink bathrobe, her free hand vising the garment closed. Her eyes darted, as if worried that cagey perverts were surveilling our remote island, waiting for just this opportunity to get an eyeful.
”
”
Kathy Reichs (Exposure (Virals, #4))
“
He looks like the rich-boy villain in an '80s teen movie - the one who bullies the sensitive misfit, the one who will end up with a pie in the puss, the whipped cream wilting his upturned collar as everyone in the cafeteria cheers.
”
”
Gillian Flynn (Gone Girl)
“
Dear . . . God,” she blurted as she recoiled. The hallway beyond was filled with the males of the house, the Brothers and other fighters and Manny sitting on the floor with their backs to the bare walls, their legs stretched out, propped up, crossed at the knees or crossed at the ankles. Apparently there had been quite a bit of drinking going on, empty bottles of vodka and whiskey littered around them, glasses in hands or on thighs. “This is not as pathetic as it looks,” her Butch pointed out. “Liar,” V muttered. “It so fucking is. I think I’m going to start knitting for reals.” As the females emerged with her, each one of them registered shock, disbelief, and then a wry amusement. “Is it me,” one of the males groused, “or did we just perform our own mass castration out here?” “I think that just about sums this shit up,” somebody agreed. “I’m wearing panties under my leathers from now on. Anyone joining me?” “Lassiter already does,” V said as he got to his feet and went to Jane. “Hey.” And then it was group-reunion time. While the other pairs found one another, Butch smiled as Marissa came over to him and put out her hand to help him off the floor. As they embraced, he kissed her on the side of the neck. “Are you out of love with me now?” he murmured. “’ Cuz I’m pussy-whipped?” She leaned back in his arms. “Why? Because you pined after me while I was watching a dirty movie with my girls that wasn’t all that dirty? I think it’s actually— and brace yourself— really pretty cute.” “I’m still all man.” As she rolled her body against him, she let out a mmmm as she felt his erection. “Yes, I can tell.
”
”
J.R. Ward (Blood Kiss (Black Dagger Legacy, #1))
“
He sighs and wiggles around in his chair to get comfortable-it's going to be a long night. Watching humans play pretend for two hours doesn't exactly flip his fin. But he can tell Emma's getting restless. And so is he.
Just as he nods off, a loud noise pops from the screen. Emma latches onto his arm as if he's dangling her over a cliff. She presses her face into his biceps and moans. "Is it over yet?" she whispers.
"The movie?"
"No. The thing that jumped out at her. Is it gone?"
Galen chuckles and pries his arm from her grasp, then wraps it around her. "No. You should definitely stay there until I tell you it's clear."
She whips her head up, but there's an almost-smile in her eyes. "I might take you up on that, pretend date or no. I hate scary movies."
"Why didn't you tell me that? Everyone at school was practically salivating over this movie."
The lady next to her leans over. "Shhh!" she whisper-yells.
Emma nestles into the crook of his arm and buries her face in his chest, where she returns frequently as the movie goes on. Galen admits to himself that humans can make everything look pretty real. Still, he can't understand how Emma can be afraid when she knows they're only actors on the screen getting paid to scream like boiling lobsters. But who is he to complain? Their convincing performance keeps Emma in his arms for almost two solid hours.
When the movie is over, he pulls the car to the curb and opens the door for her just as Rachel instructed. Emma accepts his hand as he helps her in.
"What should we call our new little game?" he says on the way home.
"Game?"
"You know, 'Have some Lemonheads, sweet lips!'"
"Oh, right." She laughs. "How about...Upchuck?"
"Sounds appropriate. You realize it's your turn, right? I was thinking of making you eat a live crab."
She leans over him. He almost swerves off the road when her lips brush his ear. "Where will you get a live crab? All I have to do is poke my head in the water and tell them to scatter."
He grins. She's been getting more comfortable with her Gift. Yesterday, she sent some dolphins chasing after him.
”
”
Anna Banks (Of Poseidon (The Syrena Legacy, #1))
“
Tate practically raised you from what I hear. You love him, don’t you?”
Her face closed up. “For all the good it will ever do me, yes,” she said softly.
“He won’t have the excuse of pure Lakota blood much longer,” he advised.
“I’m not holding out for miracles anymore,” she vowed. “I’m going to stop wanting what I can never have. From now on, I’ll take what I can get from life and be satisfied with it. Tate will have to find his own way.”
“That’s sour grapes,” he observed.
“You bet it is. What do you want me to do to help?”
“It’s dangerous,” he pointed out, hesitating as he considered her youth. “I don’t know…”
“I’m a card-carrying archeologist,” she reminded him. “Haven’t you ever watched an Indiana Jones movies? We’re all like that,” she told him with a wicked grin. “Mild-mannered on the outside and veritable world-tamers inside. I can get a whip and a fedora, too, if you like,” she added.
”
”
Diana Palmer (Paper Rose (Hutton & Co. #2))
“
When I come home from school, I take my Doc Martens off and put on fake satin mules with the marabou trim, slip into my dressing gown and my movie, and I feel serene. I hold a glass of Coke to my cheek and pretend it is a glass of bourbon and I am in New Orleans. My bedroom door is the doorway onto the street and at night I can't sleep because of the heat and the commotion in this town. So I go down to the river and dance as a man with scars on his face plays an accordion. People clap along and wolf-whistle and I whip my skirt around my thighs, which are long and lean because I barely get a chance to eat, what with all my bourbon and afternoon baths. I dance until my mules get muddy, then I tiptoe home, followed by sailors and men who have hundreds and thousands of dollars playing stud poker. Steve McQueen might be there. I can't remember. I get confused at this point. Too much drink. I'm sure Karl Malden is lurking in the background, gazing at me longingly. I am kind to him because his mother is dying.
”
”
Emma Forrest (Namedropper)
“
Growing up, I was a big fan of the Indiana Jones movies. I watched them again recently and found them to be misleading. Aspiring archeologists across the world probably show up to their first day of work with their weather-worn fedoras and their whips and they’re like, “Where’s the cavern of jewels?” And their boss is like, “Actually, today we’re gonna start off by dusting thousands of miles of nothing.
”
”
Mike Birbiglia (Sleepwalk with Me: and Other Painfully True Stories)
“
Moments after the waitress left us, Tommy whipped out both copies of our chosen play and handed me mine. “All right,” he said. “Now we do scene.” “Wait,” I said. “Now?” Tommy was unperturbed. “So what? Yes. We do it now.” I looked around. All the tables around us were full. “Shouldn’t we eat first?” “What? Are you not dedicated actor? Rehearsal is very important.” Tommy was already demonstrating a lot of promise in knowing how to embarrass the shit out of me.
”
”
Greg Sestero (The Disaster Artist: My Life Inside The Room, the Greatest Bad Movie Ever Made (A Gift for Film Buffs))
“
In the comedy department, I have the latest Vince Vaughn and Will Ferrell movies. For action, I have a James Bond flick and another where a bunch of shit blows up. And I have The Notebook.”
I whipped around, almost dropping the silverware. “The Notebook? You own The Notebook?”
Cam stared at me blankly. “What’s wrong with that?”
“Oh, nothing is wrong with that. Its just such a… uh, chick flick.”
“I’m confident enough in my masculinity and sexuality that I can say that Ryan Gosling is just dreamy in this movie.”
My jaw hit the floor.
”
”
J. Lynn (Wait for You (Wait for You, #1))
“
So the more manly you are, the less you say?” “Right.” Simon nodded. Past him she could see the humid fog lowering over the East River, shrouding the waterfront in feathery gray mist. The water itself was the color of lead, churned to a whipped cream consistency by the steady wind. “That’s why when major badasses greet each other in movies, they don’t say anything, they just nod. The nod means, ‘I am a badass, and I recognize that you, too, are a badass,’ but they don’t say anything because they’re Wolverine and Magneto and it would mess up their vibe to explain.” “I have no idea what you’re talking about,” said Jace, from the backseat. “Good,” Clary said, and was rewarded by the smallest of smiles from Simon as he turned the van onto the Manhattan Bridge, heading toward Brooklyn and home.
”
”
Cassandra Clare (City of Bones (The Mortal Instruments, #1))
“
Deep blue like the hour between the dog and the wolf. An attractively scooped neckline. Sleeves and hemline a length and cut you would call kind. Buttons in back like discreetly sealed lips. Good give in the fabric. Double lined. The sort of dress that looks like nothing but a sad dark sack on the hanger, but on the body it’s a different story. Takes extremely well to accessories. My mother loved this sort of dress. At whatever weight she was—thin, fat, middling—she owned an iteration. I saw her wear it to work, lunch with friends, on dates, to movies, parties, funerals. I saw her wear it alone in her apartment for days on end. Scratch at a stain on the boob. Shit. The hemline begin to unravel. Fuck fuck fuck. Do you have a safety pin? Holes begin to appear in the armpits. Jesus. The sleeves fray. Well. That’s that, isn’t it? She wore it so much she’d wear it out and then she’d have to hunt for another, whip through the plus-size racks for something that fit just as impossibly well, that was just as dignified, just as forgiving in its plain dark elegance.
”
”
Mona Awad (13 Ways of Looking at a Fat Girl)
“
Trash first. Then supplies.
Stepping forward, I kicked a pile of takeout containers to one side, wanting to clear a path to the cabinets so I could look for latex gloves. But then I stopped, stiffening, an odd scratching sound coming from the pile I’d just nudged with my foot.
Turning back to it, I crouched on the ground and lifted a greasy paper at the top of the mess. And that’s when I saw it.
A cockroach.
In Ireland.
A giant behemoth of a bug, the likes I’d only ever seen on nature programs about prehistoric insects.
Okay, perhaps I was overexaggerating its size. Perhaps not. Honestly, I didn’t get a chance to dwell on the matter, because the roach-shaped locust of Satan hopped onto my hand.
I screamed.
Obviously.
Jumping back and swatting at my hand, I screamed again. But evil incarnate had somehow crawled up and into the sleeve of my shirt. The sensation of its tiny, hairy legs skittering along my arm had me screaming a third time and I whipped off my shirt, tossing it to the other side of the room as though it was on fire.
“What the hell is going on?”
I spun toward the door, finding Ronan Fitzpatrick and Bryan Leech hovering at the entrance, their eyes darting around the room as though they were searching for a perpetrator. Meanwhile, I was frantically brushing my hands over my arms and torso. I felt the echo of that spawn of the devil’s touch all over my body.
“Cockroach!” I screeched. “Do you see it? Is it still on me?” I twisted back and forth, searching.
Bryan and Ronan were joined in the doorway by more team members, but I barely saw them in my panic.
God, I could still feel it.
I. Could. Still. Feel. It.
Now I knew what those hapless women felt like in horror movies when they realized the serial killer was still inside the house.
”
”
L.H. Cosway (The Cad and the Co-Ed (Rugby, #3))
“
Where’s Sam?” Brianna asked.
“He’s out. So is Edilio,” Dekka said. “You going to tell us what’s in the bag or do we have to guess?”
Brianna stopped. She was disappointed. In her imagination the big revelation would have been to an admiring Sam Temple. He was the one she wanted to impress. Failing that, Edilio, who was generally warm and sweet to her.
But she was tired and wanted to put the bag down. Also, she couldn’t keep the secret any longer.
She climbed nimbly up to the top deck of the boat, grinned, and said, “Is it anyone’s birthday? Because I have a present.”
“Breeze,” Dekka warned.
So Brianna opened the bag. Dekka looked inside. “What is it?”
So Brianna upended the bag. Dead lizards, broken eggs, and Drake’s head landed on the antiskid flooring.
“Ahhhh!” Astrid screamed.
“Ah, Jesus!” Dekka yelled.
“I know,” Brianna said proudly.
What lay there was something to strike envy into the heart of a horror movie special-effects expert. The two halves of Drake’s head had started to rejoin. But because the halves had been tossed wildly together, the process was very incomplete. Very.
In fact at the moment the halves were backward, so that the left half was looking one direction and the right half another. Sections of neck and spine stuck both up and down. The part that held most of Drake’s mouth was stuffed with hair from the back of his head.
And, somehow, bits of dead lizard were squeezed in between. But the dead lizards thus incorporated were no longer dead. And there was egg white smeared across one eye.
The mouth was trying to speak and not managing it.
A lizard tail whipped one eye—hard to tell if it was left or right—a parody of Drake’s whip arm.
The three of them stared: Astrid with blue eyes wide, hand over mouth; Dekka with mouth wide open and brow furrowed; Brianna like a proud school kid showing off her art project.
“Ta-da!” Brianna said.
”
”
Michael Grant (Light (Gone, #6))
“
A splash of light snuck beneath the a dressing room door. He heard a groan. A shuffle. A bump. A heavy sigh.
"Uh, too tight."
He walked toward the back, stopping outside the dressing room. The door was cracked a fraction. He rested a shoulder against the wall, and glanced inside. Grace as Catwoman blew his mind. A feline fantasy.
The three-way mirror tripled his pleasure. He viewed her from every angle. Hot, sleek, fierce. The lady could fight Batman in her skintight black leather catsuit and come out the winner.
After a moment she scrunched her nose, slapped her palms against her thighs. Stuck out her tongue at her reflection in the mirrors. He saw what had her so frustrated. Sympathized with her disappointment. Her costume didn't fit. The front zipper hadn't fully cleared her cleavage, which was deep and visible. She wore no bra. She gave a little hop, and her breasts bounced. Full and plump. He felt a tug at his groin. Superhero lust.
He cleared his throat and made his presence known. She caught his image in the corner of the glass, and reached for the fitting room chair, positioning it between them.
Like that would keep him from her. He should've looked away, but couldn't. He sensed her embarrassment. Her panic. Flight? She had nowhere to go. He blocked the door. He wasn't leaving until they'd talked.
"Archibald's going to love your costume," he initiated.
She didn't find him funny. Her gaze narrowed behind the molded cat-eye mask with attached ears. Her fingers clenched in her elbow-length gloves. Inspired by the movie The Dark Knight, she'd added a whip and a gun holster. Her thigh-high stiletto boots were killer, adding five inches to her height. Her image would stick with him forever.
She backed against the center mirror, and nervously fingered the open flaps over her breasts. A yank on the zipper broke the tab. The metal teeth parted, and the gap widened, revealing the round inner curves of her breasts. A hint of her nipples. Dusky pink. All the way down to the dent of her navel.
”
”
Kate Angell (The Cottage on Pumpkin and Vine)
“
You need to be careful to stay out of Charlie’s line of sight,” Steve said to me. “I want Charlie focusing only on me. If he changes focus and starts attacking you, it’s going to be too difficult for me to control the situation.”
Right. Steve got no argument from me. Getting anywhere near those bone-crushing jaws was the furthest thing from my mind. I wasn’t keen on being down on the water with a huge saltwater crocodile trying to get me. I would have to totally rely on Steve to keep me safe.
We stepped into the dinghy, which was moored in Charlie’s enclosure, secured front and back with ropes. Charlie came over immediately to investigate. It didn’t take much to encourage him to have a go at Steve. Steve grabbed a top-jaw rope. He worked on roping Charlie while the cameras rolled.
Time and time again, Charlie hurled himself straight at Steve, a half ton of reptile flesh exploding up out of the water a few feet away from me. I tried to hang on precariously and keep the boat counterbalanced. I didn’t want Steve to lose his footing and topple in. Charlie was one angry crocodile. He would have loved nothing more than to get his teeth into Steve.
As Charlie used his powerful tail to propel himself out of the water, he arched his neck and opened his jaws wide, whipping his head back and forth, snapping and gnashing. Steve carefully threw the top-jaw rope, but he didn’t actually want to snag Charlie. Then he would have had to get the rope off without stressing the croc, and that would have been tricky.
The cameras rolled. Charlie lunged. I cowered. Steve continued to deftly toss the rope. Then, all of a sudden, Charlie swung at the rope instead of Steve, and the rope went right over Charlie’s top jaw. A perfect toss, provided that had been what Steve was trying to do. But it wasn’t. We had a roped croc on our hands that we really didn’t want.
Steve immediately let the rope go slack. Charlie had it snagged in his teeth. Because of Steve’s quick thinking and prompt maneuvering, the rope came clear. We breathed a collective sigh of relief.
Steve looked up at the cameras. “I think you’ve got it.”
John agreed. “I think we do, mate.”
The crew cheered. The shoot lasted several minutes, but in the boat, I wasn’t sure if it had been seconds or hours. Watching Steve work Charlie up close had been amazing--a huge, unpredictable animal with a complicated thought process, able to outwit its prey, an animal that had been on the planet for millions of years, yet Steve knew how to manipulate him and got some fantastic footage.
To the applause of the crew, Steve got us both out of the boat. He gave me a big hug. He was happy. This was what he loved best, being able to interact and work with wildlife. Never before had anything like it been filmed in any format, much less on thirty-five-millimeter film for a movie theater. We accomplished the shot with the insurance underwriters none the wiser.
Steve wanted to portray crocs as the powerful apex predators that they were, keeping everyone safe while he did it. Never once did he want it to appear as though he were dominating the crocodile, or showing off by being in close proximity to it. He wished for the crocodile to be the star of the show, not himself.
I was proud of him that day. The shoot represented Steve Irwin at his best, his true colors, and his desire to make people understand how amazing these animals are, to be witnessed by audiences in movie theaters all over the world. We filmed many more sequences with crocs, and each time Steve performed professionally and perfected the shots. He was definitely in his element.
With the live-croc footage behind us, the insurance people came on board, and we were finally able to sign a contract with MGM. We were to start filming in earnest. First stop: the Simpson Desert, with perentie lizards and fierce snakes.
”
”
Terri Irwin (Steve & Me)
“
Larry's dog's named Earl P. Jessup Bowers, if you can get ready for that. And I should mention straightaway that I do not like dogs one bit, which is why I was glad when Larry said somebody had to go. Cats are bad enough. Horses are a total drag. By the age of nine I was fed up with all that noble horse this and noble horse that. They got good PR, horses. But I really can't use em. Was a fire once when I was little and some dumb horse almost burnt my daddy up messin around, twisting, snorting, broncing, rearing up, doing everything but comin on out the barn like even the chickens had sense enough to do. I told my daddy to let that horse's ass burn. Horses be as dumb as cows. Cows just don't have good press agents is all.
I used to like cows when I was real little and needed to hug me something bigger than a goldfish. But don't let it rain, the dumbbells'll fall right in a ditch and you break a plow and shout yourself hoarse trying to get them fools to come up out the ditch. Chipmunks I don't mind when I'm at the breakfast counter with my tea and they're on their side of the glass doing Disney things in the yard. Blue jays are law-and-order birds, thoroughly despicable. And there's one prize fool in my Aunt Merriam's yard I will one day surely kill. He tries to "whip whip whippoorwill" like the Indians do in the Fort This or That movies when they're signaling to each other closing in on George Montgomery but don't never get around to wiping that sucker out. But dogs are one of my favorite hatreds. All the time woofing, bolting down their food, slopping water on the newly waxed linoleum, messin with you when you trying to read, chewin on the slippers.
”
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Toni Cade Bambara
“
You got a name?” the ring announcer asked me. I’m sure I had thought of a million ideas, but I was drawing a blank. This was all happening fast, and I had nothing. I totally froze. A wrestler who went by the name Tack turned to Cody, “He’s like the F’n guy from the movie, Varsity Blues, Jonathan Moxley!” In the movie the guy’s name is Jonathan Moxon. So thankfully, he had actually messed it up. Cody gave the OK sign to the ring announcer. I was busy pissing my pants, so I didn’t offer anything. Just like that, I had a name, a name I like to think I’ve defined as my own. The fact that women wearing whipped-cream bikinis are often lurking around every corner ready to accost me is purely a coincidence.
”
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Jon Moxley (MOX)
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I didn’t turn around until “Cullen!” rang out around me in Houston’s voice. My body whipped around, and there Houston was…running through the airport like we were in a movie or something. He pushed his way through crowds of people, his face pink with a mixture of embarrassment and exhaustion. How far had he run?
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Riley Hart (False Start (Playing for Keeps #2))
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This is the secret adults don’t want us to know: They are just children with sex. It is not at all like the movies where they move slowly in the shadows between satin sheets. When we are not around, they gorge on candy and comics and dirty jokes, just as we do, only more so. There is nothing mature about their desires. Their mouths are rimmed in chocolate. They writhe in whipped cream. They fuck like Willy Wonka.
”
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Piper Weiss (You All Grow Up and Leave Me: A Memoir of Teenage Obsession)
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In the way people like my father (businessmen, lawyers) dream of being gangsters, of meeting each setback, each humiliation, with a sneer and a shove, a threat of violence; gangsters like Reles dreamed of being businessmen, lawyers, whipping every enemy with words, and not caring a stitch about the getaway. It is a kind of transitive property, a formula that connects the lower and higher orders: George Raft dreaming he is a real gangster as Ben Siegel dreams he is a real movie star.
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Rich Cohen (Tough Jews: Fathers, Sons, and Ganster Dreams)
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Me: I don’t do relationships. I grimace at my own words. I sound like a knock-off Christian Grey, without the whips and red room of sexual pain. Plus, I’m not a billionaire. I shake my head. Olivia made me watch all three movies back-to-back one night when we were teens, and I hated it, but I loved watching her watch someone get fucked.
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Leigh Rivers (Little Stranger (The Web of Silence Duet, #1))
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Not with my hair like this.” I touched its short red-gold strands. He snorted. “Oh, yeah, like that’s a master disguise no one could see through.” “But if you and Kara were covering me, then—” “Do you even know what ‘covering’ someone means?” Alex asked coldly. “This isn’t a movie. Do you really want us to have to start shooting at a screaming mob to get you out of there if something goes wrong?” Where had this argument come from? “No, of course I don’t want that,” I said. Everyone had gone quiet, watching us. Trish’s eyes were wide; her coffee mug paused in mid-air. “But Alex, you know I can usually sense if a place is going to be a danger to me. I mean, okay, it’s not foolproof, but—” “Willow.” He lashed my name at me like a whip. “I said no, all right? Drop it.” It felt like he had slapped me. In the sudden roaring silence, Alex tossed the sheet down and shoved his chair back. He left the room without a word. My
”
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L.A. Weatherly (Angel Fire (Angel, #2))
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But Matt’s unease returned the moment he entered the Sprint store and started hearing about the two-year commitment. The salesman’s smile looked somehow satanic, like the devil in one of those movies where a naïve guy sells his soul. When the salesman whipped out a map of the United States—the “nonroaming” areas, he informed them, were in bright red—Matt started to back away. As
”
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Harlan Coben (The Innocent)
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jock and his blonde girlfriend were fooling around naked, whipping at each other’s butts with twisted towels, wrestling, but Sitterson knew that she was teasing, putting everything on view but not making anything available. Not yet, at least. The jock didn’t seem aware of this, and when
”
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Tim Lebbon (The Cabin in the Woods: The Official Movie Novelization)
“
Mom.’
‘Hmm?’ She replies from miles away in her planter’s paradise.
Deepest of breaths. ‘When Luke comes over later, would it be okay if we watched a movie in my bedroom?’
The paper goes down and she eyeballs me from over the top of her wire reading glasses.
‘Should I be worried?’
‘No.’ I shake my head, whip my hair into a frenzy.
‘Have you gotten comfortable with him touching you yet?’
‘Sort of . . .’ In retrospect, I could have probably said no.
‘What does that mean? Exactly?’ She folds You and Your Garden Monthly in half, sets it down beside her empty bowl.
‘It means we take all our clothes off, and he turns into a koala, clings to me like a tree while we watch TV.’
Mom chokes on the sip of tea she’s just taken. ‘Norah Jane Dean.’
‘It was a joke.’
‘Obviously,’ she says. ‘I’m just a little shocked you made it.’
Her shock would be less, I’m sure, if she knew how hard I was working to keep a mental image of the aforementioned out of my mind. I take half a second to wonder if Luke would find my quip amusing. It’s a joke at his expense, after all, having an abnormal girlfriend, one he can’t touch.
‘So what is “sort of” comfortable?’ Mom prods.
‘I touched his hand last week, you know, before the fear kicked in.
”
”
Louise Gornall (Under Rose-Tainted Skies)
“
I’m just saying, whipped cream wars are not as fun as they portray them in books or movies. They’re usually all sexy and whatnot. Ours? Not so much. I got whipped cream up my nose, I was running away from him and fell over Trip and hit the hardwood really hard. Like, I think my hip and elbow are going to bruise from it because Kash was on top of me when I went down. When I knocked the can out of his hand it somehow hurt me more than anything, my hand is throbbing. Then when I’m about to get one good hit in, nothing comes out of the can! I’m all sticky and gross, it was just one massive fail.” Candice was laughing so hard she was snorting, and I couldn’t help but laugh with her. “I would have paid to see that!” “I’m pretty sure I looked like the abominable snowman on crack. You didn’t miss anything too thrilling.
”
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Molly McAdams (Deceiving Lies (Forgiving Lies, #2))
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The aforementioned Teresa Wright shall not be required to pose for photographs in a bathing suit unless she is in the water. Neither may she be photographed running on the beach with her hair flying in the wind. Nor may she pose in any of the following situations: In shorts, playing with a cocker spaniel; digging in a garden; whipping up a meal; attired in firecrackers and holding skyrockets for the Fourth of July; looking insinuatingly at a turkey for Thanksgiving; wearing a bunny cap with long ears for Easter; twinkling on prop snow in a skiing outfit while a fan blows her scarf; assuming an athletic stance while pretending to hit something with a bow and arrow.
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Noah Gittell (Baseball: The Movie)
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Their tumultuous love story was adapted into the 1974 Broadway musical Mack & Mabel. * Peeping Pete was released on June 23, 1913, with A Bandit; they are the oldest surviving Arbuckle movies. * Custard tended to break up in flight, and it faded into the background when shot in monochrome, so later pies consisted of blackberries and whipped cream—a concoction local bakeries readily learned to devise.
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Greg Merritt (Room 1219: The Life of Fatty Arbuckle, the Mysterious Death of Virginia Rappe, and the Scandal That Changed Hollywood)