Quotes from David Sedaris

Gambling to me is what a telephone pole might be to a groundhog. He sees that it's there but doesn't for the life of him understand why.

On a recent flight from Tokyo to Beijing, at around the time that my lunch tray was taken away, I remembered that I needed to learn Mandarin. "Goddamnit," I whispered. "I knew I forgot something.

We sweat for our pretensions. It

That be common for I, also, but be more strong, you. Much work and someday, you talk pretty. People start love you soon. Maybe tomorrow, okay.

What if I'd wasted my entire life comparing myself with people who didn't really matter? Try as I might, I still can't wrap my mind around it.

Why go to a store when you could go to a museum?" she might ask. "Um, because the museum doesn't sell shit?" My sisters and I refuse to feel bad about shopping. And why should we? Obviously we have some hole we're trying to fill, but doesn't everyone? And isn't filling it with berets the size of toilet-seat covers, if not more practical, then at least healthier than filling it with frosting or heroin or unsafe sex with strangers?

It was the stupidest thing the cat had ever heard of, an AA program in prison.

I don't know why it was, exactly, but nothing irritated my father quite like the sound of his children's happiness. Group crying, he could stand, but group laughing was asking for it, especially at the dinner table.

this former director of the FBI whom we all hated until someone we hated even more fired him.

For the first sixteen years we were together, I'd give Hugh chocolates for Valentine's Day, and he'd give me a carton of cigarettes. Both of us got exactly what we wanted, and it couldn't have been easier.

February 16, 1988 Reasons to live: 1. Christmas 2. The family beach trip 3. Writing a published book 4. Seeing my name in a magazine 5. Watching C. grow bald 6. Ronnie Ruedrich 7. Seeing Amy on TV 8. Other people's books 9. Outliving my enemies 10. Being interviewed by Terry Gross on "Fresh Air

You're not going to throw this away, are you?" she says, and she'll be talking about the grains of rice in the bottom of the salt shaker. "No, Mrs. Peacock, by all means, you take them. They'll come in handy when your son gets out of prison and marries your niece.

Though harsh in other respects, prison would be an excellent place to learn a foreign language - total immersion, and you'd have the new slang before it even hit the streets.

What you call your personality, you know?—it's not the actual bones, or teeth, something solid. It's more like a flame. A flame can be upright, and a flame can flicker in the wind, a flame can be extinguished so there's no sign of it, like it had never been.

On the off chance my caller would tell me to quit drinking, I positioned myself on the sofa with two six-packs and a bottle of nice scotch. Then I turned on the TV and ate a sandwich made from leftover chicken lo mein. I call it a Chanwich.

While I know I can't control it, what I ultimately hope to recall about my late-in-life father is not his nagging or his toes but, rather, his fingers, and the way he snaps them when listening to jazz. He's done it forever, signifying, much as a cat does by purring, that you may approach. That all is right with the world. "Man, oh man," he'll say in my memory, lifting his glass and taking us all in, "isn't this just fantastic

Back in New York I took full advantage of my status as a native speaker. I ran my mouth to shop clerks and listened in on private conversations, realising I'd gone an entire month without hearing anyone complaint that they were "stressed out".

Behind the naive vanities, the daydreams, they had very badly wanted to be writers. Had wanted it without knowing at all what it was they wanted, their fervor making up for their ignorance. His older self was cooler, more noncommittal, for he had learned that to publicize your goals means running the risk of falling short of them.

You just take and take don´t you? Out there with your thumb in the air—not a care in the world, just grabbing whatever you can get. Yes, sir, you just take and take until you´re ready to burst. But what about giving? Did you ever think about that? Of course not—you´re too busy taking, Mr. Handout, Mr. Gimmee, Gimmee, Gimmee.

I dragged my balls across your mother's memorial cake, from cherry to cherry, and to each of the candles.

The autopsy took place in the morning and was the best argument for the buddy systemI had ever seen. Never live alone, I told myself. Before you chane a lightbulb, call someone from the other room and have him watch until you are finished.

People who have nothing to prove offer practical baby gifts: sturdy cotton rompers made to withstand the cycle of vomit and regular washing. People who are competing for the titles of best-loved aunts and uncles - people like my sisters and me - send satin pants and delicate hand-crafted sweaters accompanied by notes reading P.S. The fur collar is detachable.

One year I went as a pirate, but from then on I went as a hobo. It's a word you don't hear anymore. Along with 'tramp,' it's been replaced by 'homeless person,' which isn't the same thing. Unlike someone who was evicted or lost his house in a fire, the hobo roughed it by choice. Being at liberty, unencumbered by bills and mortgages, better suited his drinking schedule, and so he found shelter wherever he could, never a bum, but something much less threatening, a figure of merriment, almost.

I got into the express line behind a middle-aged man in a T-shirt. I never saw the front of it, but the back pictured a Labrador retriever standing on the beach with a bikini top in his mouth. Below him were the words GOOD DOG. Some people, I thought, opening the wet wipes so I could wash the tumor off my hands before I touched my wallet.