Quotes from David Sedaris

That," the chief counselor said, "is what happens to people who play around." If this was the punishment for a boy and a girl, I felt certain the penalty for two boys somehow involved barbed wire, a team of donkeys, and the nearest volcano.

Intervention. Corny letters notwithstanding, they have guts. The person they're confronting might storm out of the room and never talk to them again, but at least they're rolling the dice.

Every gathering has its moment. As an adult, I distract myself by trying to identify it, dreading the inevitable down-swing that is sure to follow. The guests will repeat themselves one too many times, or you'll run out of dope or liquor and realize that it was all you ever had in common.

The dialogue fills the auditorium like an unrefrigerated boxcar of month-old steaks.

Then one day you wake up normal, restored to health—a miracle. At first you're incredibly grateful—your appetite's back, and your energy level. There's a bit of you, though, that misses the razor's edge, the terrible thrill that at any moment you might lose control fo yourself and finally know what total disgrace feels like.

Across town, over in the East Village, the graffiti was calling for the rich to be eaten, imprisoned, or taxed out of existence. Though it sometimes seemed like a nice idea, I hoped the revolution would not take place during my lifetime. I didn't want the rich to go away until I could at least briefly join their ranks.

inhabited by hopeless, motor-mouthed simpletons, drifting from a bad place to somewhere even worse. If you're lucky, people on the bus will wake you in order to borrow a cigarette. The man occupying the window seat is likely to introduce himself with the line "What the hell are you staring at?

A place always looks different—worse, most often—after you've made the commitment to buy it

There's something about picking the psychic apart that I don't like. It's cynical and uninteresting.

Buy it." This is my sister Amy's advice in regard to everything, from a taxidermied horse head to a camouflage thong. "Just get it," she says. "You'll feel better." Eye something closely or pick it up for further inspection, and she'll move in to justify the cost. "It's not really that expensive, and, besides, won't you be getting a tax refund? Go on. Treat yourself.

It seemed like such a television moment, the intimacy unearned—grotesque, almost.

Sex is what you boast about when you have exterior signs of wealth. It's a way of saying, Look, I might no own a fancy sport coat, or even a carry-on bag, but I do have two women and all the intercourse I can handle.

the music piped through the speakers was Christian—the new kind, which says that Jesus is awesome.

I often see people on the streets dressed as objects and handing out leaflets. I tend to avoid leaflets but it breaks my heart to see a grown man dressed as a taco. So, if there is a costume involved, I tend not only to accept the leaflet, but to accept it graciously, saying, "Thank you so much," and thinking, You poor, pathetic son of a bitch. I don't know what you have but I hope I never catch it.

You ever been to Tijuana?" he asked. Most of Dupont's stories began with a question and ended with an insatiable woman, buck naked and begging for more.

The last time I was up at five was because I hadn't gone to bed yet.

These tabloids only want to exploit. They don't understand this woman and her life. They don't understand you, let alone someone like me. If you want my opinion, they're nothing but savages and we'd be better off without them.

Wpasowywanie siÄ™ to nie nasza rzecz. My nie z takich, co siÄ™ wpasowujÄ….

You kids might think you're close, but just wait until your father and I are gone, and you're left to divide up our property.

For a while, when I was eleven or so, I used to drop the empty cardboard toilet rolls into the john. They would take a while to disappear, five or six flushes usually, but I was in no hurry.

bowl. It was disgusting to think that this was what a gumdrop might look like in your stomach, and it was insulting to be told not to take too much of something you didn't really want in the first place.

isn't that technology's job? To lighten our burden? To broaden our horizons? To make it possible to talk to your attorney and listen to a Styx album and check the obituaries in the town where your parents continue to live and videotape a race riot and send a text message and stun someone into submission all at the same time?

A few weeks of fanfare and I'd drop show business, just like I had the guitar and my private detective agency. I hated having my life's ambition reduced to the level of a common cold. This wasn't a bug, but a full-fledged virus. It might lay low for a year or two, but this little germ would never go away. It has nothing to do with talent or initiative. Rejection couldn't weaken it, and no amount of success would ever satisfy it. Once diagnosed, the prognosis was terminal.

I'm not sure how long I lay there, blissed-out and farting.