Quotes from C.E. Murphy

I had come to regard pride as the defining characteristic of a gentleman, when indeed I should think the word itself, gentleman, should impress upon me what aspect I ought to have settled on as the defining one.

It's an impossible castle in an enchanted snowstorm in a haunted forest, I said in a voice slightly more shrill than I had hoped for. Naturally there are invisible servants to care for the horses. Naturally. Father sounded as rattled as I, which made me feel a little better.

except my eyes had fallen right off the vista and landed on a black 1967 Chevy Impala. It didn't belong up here in the woods any more than Petite might've, but it was a beautiful car. Gary parked a few spaces down from it and I got out to walk circles around it. Kansas license plates. I patted the Impala's hood and mumbled, "Long way from home, aren't you, baby?" before reluctantly turning away.

I was bad at relationships. I was bad at reading between lines, at figuring out what people really meant if they didn't actually say it, and at being charming or flirty or whatever it was, exactly, that women were supposed to do to attract men.

Cute. Who is she?" "The devil." "Really. I thought the devil would be taller.

If you're going to get technical, you're going to lose all your friends.

At least if I was picking guys up in fits of drunken idiocy, they were not only handsome, but also even mildly clever.

Behaving never got anybody anywhere fun

he had a tail. A bear's tail, short and waggily and not at all in keeping with the general size and ferocity of him. Except it was, because bears, after all, were large and ferocious. But they were also round through the waist and hip, whereas the Beast narrowed more like a lion. I might have expected a longer, lashing tail, but not the stubbly little thing that stuck out from the back of his trousers. I

Much of my life appeared to be a lesson in not judging books by their covers.

Americans and Irish. Separated by a common language.

society dictated foolish amounts of discretion in response to bad behavior, especially for women.

I updrive a Bronco. How environmentally irresponsible of you.

Thou shalt have no other gods before Me. She had always thought that meant other gods were false, and so not to be worshipped. Not once had she considered it could lend credence to their existence, and was meant to establish a hierarchy of belief.

Obviously I'm doing something wrong," Russell said dryly. "I thought vacations involved white sand beaches and cerulean skies, not concussions and working over the weekend.

Disaster's good for the oligarchy. Ha," Billy said to my goggle-eyes. "Fair's fair. You pull out 'exsanguinate,' I pull out 'oligarchy.'" "I'm in awe. There's nothing sexier than a guy with a big vocabulary. Don't tell your wife I said that.

I lay on my back, whimpering at the dark sky, and tried to remember when I'd last gotten my ass kicked this thoroughly. Less than a week ago, probably, because it had been a bad couple of weeks, but

All I've got is a pocketful of attitude.

I'm not a goddamned faith healer! I don't talk to God! I'm a mechanic and her goddamned engine was broken! --Joanne

friends don't threaten friends' distributor caps

One forgets the fear of heights when one cannot fall

To my embarrassment, I was crying again. Real girl tears for the second time, these ones born out of frustration. That didn't happen to me very often, but I hated it when it did. It was faulty wiring in the female body, tear ducts attached directly to the frustration meter. Trying to explain to men that no, I wasn't being manipulative, I just couldn't stop my eyes from leaking salt water, only added to the aggravation.

Thank God genuine video phones hadn't been invented. I hadn't even grabbed a towel. Ford Prefect would despair of me.

He fell ass over tea Kettle