Quotes from Ned Vizzini

What's a triumph is that you woke up this morning and decided to live. That's a triumph.

I wish I was Dumbo the Octopus. Adapted to freezing deep-ocean temperatures, I'd flop around down there at peace. The big concerns of my life would be what sort of bottom-coating slime to feed off of—that's not so different from now—plus I wouldn't have any natural predators; then again, I don't have any now, and that hasn't done me a whole lot of good. But it suddenly makes sense: I'd like to be under the sea, as an octopus.

You are blessed with a good mind. You just have to have confidence in it and talk when people call on you.

I was happy about different things. I was happy because someday I'd be walking across this bridge looking at this city, owning some piece of it, being valuable here.

Like I'm on the verge of just blowing up. All the stress and pressure and anxiety just bubbling up.

A working brain is probably a lot like a map, where anybody can get from one place to another on the freeways.

My Tentacles have Tentacles and I'm never going to cut them off. But my Anchor, that's easy: it's killing myself. That's what gets me through the day. Knowing that I could do it. That I'm strong enough to do it and I can get it done.

IT's all about being able to live a sustainable life. I don't think I'm going to be able to have one.

She puts on her poker face; I don't have any extra faces to put on, just the normal Craig face.

I didn't want to wake up. I was having a much better time asleep. And that's really sad. It was almost like a reverse nightmare, like when you wake up from a nightmare you're so relieved. I woke up into a nightmare.

But most of all I feel my brain, up there taking in blood and looking out on the world and noticing humor and light and smells and dogs and every other thing in the world—everything in my life is all in my brain, really, so it would be natural that when my brain was screwed up, everything in my life would be.

I click END. I think it's a little harsh how the END button is red.

I don't believe in destiny; I just believe in biology, and hotness, and wanting girls.

in my life is all in my brain, really, so it would be natural that when my brain was screwed up, everything in my life would be.

Honor? What do you care about honor? Honor gets people killed!' 'At least they die for something,' I say, and he doesn't protest further.

Wherever Cool is, anyway, I missed it, and now I'm stuck observing these machinations or sex and status and dancing and parties and people sucking at each other under the bleacher seating like some kind of freak, when I'm not the freak; Rich is the freak. Clearly. When I grow up, that had better be understood and I had better be compensated, or I'm going to shoot myself in the head.

You can't see stars in New York. That's horrible. How can you live without stars? What keeps you from thinking about yourself all the time?

I don't like to spend money. Every time I spend it, I feel as if I'm being raped.

What about: I got Jack and shit and Jack left town.

Rudy is a mutt; my father says he's a cross between a chihuahua and a German shepherd, which must've been some wild dog sex.

We wear our problems differently.

then I decided I didn't want any regrets. I'm done with those; regrets are an excuse for people who have failed.

Verbal Greeting, Refusal to Touch Hands, Public Denial of Formerly Agreed-upon Opinion, Refusal to Repeat a Joke and Mortification Event (a catch-all). I use the Humiliation

So you're just going to give up? That's the plan.