Leandra Maccarthy > Leandra's Quotes

“What else can it predict?”
Now the other jocks encircled her like a bullseye.
“Any event with data,” Holly said and really felt the need to leave. This was a set-up.
Big Bob grinned. “Like when I’ll get a date?”
Holly’s smile slid across her face. “Low probability events are hard to forecast.”
“Huh?”
Josh punched his shoulder. “She means, you are not likely to get a date.”
― Michael Grigsby, Segment of One

“Yeah,” Fred said and turned to the skinny teenager waiting on him. “Give me two bear crawlers and two chocolate eclairs.”
“I thought Mimi made you promise no donuts.”
Fred looked surprised. “This is not a donut, it’s a bear crawler. And this is not a donut, it’s an eclair.”
I rolled my eyes.”
― Michael Grigsby, Segment of One

“David sat in the teacher’s lounge. Two other shlemiels sat on the other side, getting coffee. Sports, movies, conversation. He would have to join the group.
The new assistant principal was to join them this afternoon. Just say hello. He got up and got coffee.
David held the hot coffee and pretended to drink it. Didn’t want to spill on his white shirt.
Then a tall slender woman walked in with the main campus principal, Edmond, and she looked around. Now would come the meet and greet. Fresh meat.
Edmond turned to him. “This is David Bar David, Doctor Bar David. Math.”
The thin woman reached out her hand and David shook it. “My,” she said, “such a warm hand.”
“But a cold heart,” he said.”
― Michael Grigsby, Segment of One

“David turned on the TV and sat on the couch. He could grade the Calc I homework but that always depressed him. It would almost put him in mourning, sitting Shiva, but it had to be done.
He would get up early in the morning and do it. He chuckled.
The TV had a stupid dog commercial. Cocker Spaniel mix. Same kind of mutt Miriam brought into their marriage. She was a dog person. Named it Lucky.
Lucky died of poisoning while David was at home one afternoon. Somehow the dog had gotten into Clorox. Not so lucky.
That had been their only fight. David did not want to get another dog. Claimed it would remind him of Lucky.
When David was little, about eight or nine years old, he had learned Clorox would kill a dog. Their neighbor had a German shepherd. Sol would throw rocks at it when they walked to school.
One day the dog got out and bit Sol, and if the neighbors had not stopped it, the dog may have mauled Sol to death. The dog’s name was Roxx, short for Roxanne. It was found dead a couple of days later. Poisoned.
David was not a dog person.”
― Michael Grigsby, Segment of One

“Holly screwed up her nose, like she always did when concentrating, which was all the time. My granddaughter was heading for a nose job.”
― Michael Grigsby, Segment of One

“I got in my car and started it up and sighed. The radio station was about to do some Bartok crap and I couldn’t stand that atonal stuff, so I flipped it off. I’d rather head back to my place in silence.”
― Michael Grigsby, Segment of One

“Hair brushed and face washed, Holly put her jeans and top on, a plain, blue, cotton shirt with cute thin stripes. She had no bra because she had no boobs. She didn’t even have her period yet. Such a little kid. The other girls talked a lot about bras and boobs and periods.”
― Michael Grigsby, Segment of One

“His cellphone alarm beeped. Now. Who would he nail?
A single target tonight. So, a single bullet in the gun.
David put the crosshairs on one of the guys walking out of the Quick Trip. Tall man, longish hair, scruffy beard. The guy pulled keys from his pocket and the crosshairs settled on his face.
What was next? David pulled the trigger. The back of the guy’s head exploded. A massive wound.
The guy’s friend looked around. The pregnant woman screamed. The black guy ran. The girls hugged each other.
David pulled the trunk lid back down. Clicked and locked. A gentle walkway wound around the mall. Sol slowly drove away.
David’s breaths came fast, almost pants. He then took his black pants off and removed his soiled underwear. He reached in the plastic bag for the fresh pair. Changing in the trunk of a dark and hot and moving car was difficult. Just part of the job now.
When he pulled the trigger, he orgasmed. Always did.
David slowed his breathing. Taylor series for ex = 1 + x + X2 / 2! + X3 / 3! etc.
Yes, that was better.
He closed his eyes and let go of the rope and let the rifle roll to one side. That guy’s head exploded.
They drove away, below the speed limit. Didn’t want to attract attention. No need to, in no hurry.”
― Michael Grigsby

“They all looked at Holly. She turned to face the cheerleader and said, “You need to learn that some things are more valuable than good looks. Data manipulation is more important than big boobs. Analytics is more useful than lip gloss.”
Wow, she said that? Everyone laughed a bit, surprised, shocked. Holly turned and headed toward the concert hall. Grinning.”
― Michael Grigsby, Segment of One

“Truth is a hard master, and costly to serve, but it simplifies all problems.”
― Ellis Peters

“It's a kind of arrogance to be so certain you're past redemption.”
― Ellis Peters, A Morbid Taste for Bones

“First they came for the verbs, and I said nothing because verbing weirds language. Then they arrival for the nouns, and I speech nothing because I no verbs.”
― Peter Ellis

“Only people who're positive enough to have friends have enemies. When you're as glum and morose as he was, people just give up and go away.”
― Ellis Peters, A Nice Derangement of Epitaphs

“The voices of cold reason were talking, as usual, to deaf ears.”
― Ellis Peters, Brother Cadfael's Penance

“I do believe I begin to grasp the nature of miracles! For would it be a miracle, if there was any reason for it? Miracles have nothing to do with reason. Miracles contradict reason, they strike clean across mere human deserts, and deliver and save where they will. If they made sense, they would not be miracles.”
― Ellis Peters, A Morbid Taste for Bones

“Mary was under water. She’d been under water for a long time. Rhiannon was there. No, it was just her severed head talking. The murdered girl’s hair billowed out from under the torc.”
― Susan Rowland, The Sacred Well Murders

“Janet showed her teeth. “Time to get real, Sarah. No more human sacrifices, got it?”
― Susan Rowland, The Sacred Well Murders

“Don’t we know any. . .er. . .cheap lawyers?”
― Susan Rowland, The Sacred Well Murders

“Anna did say the wife of Lir had left her?” whispered Mary.
“Yes,” said Caroline. “She said, ‘for now.”
― Susan Rowland, The Sacred Well Murders

“So, Mr. Jeffreys,” she inquired of the human bluebottle, “you went to the gym?”
― Susan Rowland, The Sacred Well Murders

“We're part of the same constellation, your father and I”
― Claire Vanderpool

“So, Kate, Russell and I drove to the station and there was Paul, sitting in a chair in the foyer, looking like he always did: no better, no worse. Except that he wasn’t sitting in the chair. He hovered above it. You could have easily slid a thick book under him.”
― Ernie Gammage, What Awaits?

“Could one small divot in the stainless steel of fidelity begin a relentless rust that would eat out the strength of a union?”
― Ernie Gammage, What Awaits?

“You mean…you were eating those things…raw?’
‘Well not eating, exactly. More like drinking”
― Ernie Gammage, What Awaits?

“I was destined for Great Things, confirmed by a physical welling of promise I couldn’t deny or explain. One just knows these things. Like good luck, you have it or you don’t. I always knew I had it.”
― Ernie Gammage, What Awaits?

“You eat my popcorn?’
‘No sir, I did not eat your popcorn.’
‘Good. That’s my lunch.’ He sat down beside her with a bottled water in hand, his bagged popcorn waiting in the chair. A complete lunch, both food groups.”
― Ernie Gammage, What Awaits?

“I don’t think any of us expected it to look like it did! Most of the dry surface was ‘sand,’ grains of hydrocarbons like coffee grounds. It was piled in giant dunes that ran on for miles over the ice—like in the Sahara or Canada.”
― Ernie Gammage, What Awaits?

“Beauty can be a trap for the vapid…”
― Ernie Gammage, What Awaits?

“Briefly stated, the Gell-Mann Amnesia effect is as follows. You open the newspaper to an article on some subject you know well. In Murray's case, physics. In mine, show business. You read the article and see the journalist has absolutely no understanding of either the facts or the issues. Often, the article is so wrong it actually presents the story backward—reversing cause and effect. I call these the "wet streets cause rain" stories. Paper's full of them.
In any case, you read with exasperation or amusement the multiple errors in a story, and then turn the page to national or international affairs, and read as if the rest of the newspaper was somehow more accurate about Palestine than the baloney you just read. You turn the page, and forget what you know.”
― Michael Crichton

“Briefly stated, the Gell-Mann Amnesia effect is as follows. You open the newspaper to an article on some subject you know well. In Murray's case, physics. In mine, show business. You read the article and see the journalist has absolutely no understanding of either the facts or the issues. Often, the article is so wrong it actually presents the story backward—reversing cause and effect. I call these the "wet streets cause rain" stories. Paper's full of them.

In any case, you read with exasperation or amusement the multiple errors in a story, and then turn the page to national or international affairs, and read as if the rest of the newspaper was somehow more accurate about Palestine than the baloney you just read. You turn the page, and forget what you know.

That is the Gell-Mann Amnesia effect. I'd point out it does not operate in other arenas of life. In ordinary life, if somebody consistently exaggerates or lies to you, you soon discount everything they say. In court, there is the legal doctrine of falsus in uno, falsus in omnibus, which means untruthful in one part, untruthful in all. But when it comes to the media, we believe against evidence that it is probably worth our time to read other parts of the paper. When, in fact, it almost certainly isn't. The only possible explanation for our behavior is amnesia.”
― Michael Crichton