i've always wanted a peg leg. it's a boyhood thing i never grew out of. no, i'm not being flippant. i mean, i've given this a lot of thought. if you have a peg leg or hooks for hands, you know, maybe it's enough to simply carry on living, you know, bravely facing life with your disability; it's heroic just to survive. but without these things, you're actually expected to make something of your life, achieve something, earn a raise, wear a necktie. so if anything, i'm actually the antithesis of Ahab because if i did have a peg leg i'd quite possibly be more happy, more content and not feel the need to chase after these creatures of the unknown.
- X-Files 'Quagmire' S03E22
'..for the marjority of people, marriage-ending conversations happen only once, if at all. if you choose to conduct yours on a mobile phone, in a Leeds car park, then you cannot really claim that it is unrepresentative, in the same way that Lee Harvey Oswald couldn't really claim that shooting presidents wasn't like him at all. sometimes we have to be judged by our one-offs.'
- p1
''why don't you play Cluedo with us, Mummy?'
and i do, until tea time. and after tea, we play Junior Scrabble. we are the ideal nuclear family. we eat together, we play improving board games instead of watching television, we smile a lot. i fear at any moment i may kill somebody.'
- p64, How to be Good - Nick Hornby
'when i look back, i think that being a little naive was actually a positive thing, because i had no fear. sometimes, when you know too much, you can overdo it.'
- p32, Phillip Lim
some people caution against going out on your own too early, but you had a big job at a young age. do you think, under certain circumstances, it's okay to skip a long apprenticeship? and how do you compensate for it?
'yes. look at Proenza Schouler. those guys totally have a grasp of their craft, but they're still learning, and you can see it in the way they push themselves every season. Zac Posen is the same way. there's nothing wrong with being young and successful, and young people sometimes have a better way of looking at the world.'
- p39, Patrick Robinson: Gap's Head Designer, The Teen Vogue Handbook
'when you're growing up in a small town, you don't know that the rest of the world isn't like that. i had no reason to leave Yorkshire; i wasn't trying to get away - i just knew i wanted to see more of life.
i'd never felt particularly British. but the funny thing about spending a long time abroad is that it makes you feel more British.
overseas, people know the English accent if you sound like David Niven, but if you don't sound like that, as far as they're concerned, you coud be Australian. so you spend a lot of time talking about where you come from. you're almost giving yourself a crash course in who you are. you get more of a sense of yourself, somehow, than you had when you were back home, surrounded by people who are similar to you.'
- p39, Harland Miller: Artist and Author
'my father often used to talk about that old proverb, 'even a stopped clock is right twice a day'. in other words, everybody you meet has something to teach you - if you take the trouble to find it. the most unlikely person can enlighten your life. that's tremendously important for the self-worth of the people you meet, as well as your own.
there are all sorts of ways in which we're not equal, but we are all equal in what we can strive for. when i interviewed Senator Robert Kennedy back in 1968 - the last interview he gave before his assassination - i asked him how he would like to be remembered. he replied, 'well, there is a line of Albert Camus that says, 'this is a world in which children suffer.' i'd like to have made a contribution to lessening that suffering.' Kennedy spoke a lot about making a contribution. he used to say, 'for if we do not do this, then who will do this?' it's so simple: if you have a talent, you have a duty to use it to the full.
making a contribution and making a difference - they should be linked - is not only something that famous people can do, or that dead politicians can be quoted on. it is something that everyone can do in their own lives..'
- p41, Sir David Frost: Broadcaster and Producer
things to hate - CUM-an iritating form of speech:
a moratorium must be imposed on the artist-cum-musican. the hotel-cum-gallery, and the pub-cum-restaurant. simply, on CUM. this three-letter preposition-cum-conjunction has stolen the limelight from the once omnipotent slash (eg. model/actor). linguistically, CUM is the latin word for 'with', as in 'magna cum laude'. in colloquial English, it has taken the form of either preposition of conjunction. the conjunction form suffers the most abuse. recent outings include: bass-cum-keystar, boxer-cum-carpet cleaner, and cum-technology-cum-ecology - as found in The Guardian, of all places. by retiring CUM and saying what one actually means, sentences will find themselves inherently more handsome.
- p70
how would you describe society in New York?
'there's something about the density of it. the fact that its density produces a kind of care and concern and emotional investment in every aspect of the urban fabric in a way that doesn't happen in any other American city. it's still a city that's remarkably easy to get around in. you're pushed together with so many different kinds of people. there's the immense diversity, and at the same time the ability to run into people you know throughout the course of your day in different parts of town. no matter how much New York changes, it feels somehow aunthentic to itself.'
- p217, Peter Eleey, Fantastic Man magazine SS11
- X-Files 'Quagmire' S03E22
'..for the marjority of people, marriage-ending conversations happen only once, if at all. if you choose to conduct yours on a mobile phone, in a Leeds car park, then you cannot really claim that it is unrepresentative, in the same way that Lee Harvey Oswald couldn't really claim that shooting presidents wasn't like him at all. sometimes we have to be judged by our one-offs.'
- p1
''why don't you play Cluedo with us, Mummy?'
and i do, until tea time. and after tea, we play Junior Scrabble. we are the ideal nuclear family. we eat together, we play improving board games instead of watching television, we smile a lot. i fear at any moment i may kill somebody.'
- p64, How to be Good - Nick Hornby
'when i look back, i think that being a little naive was actually a positive thing, because i had no fear. sometimes, when you know too much, you can overdo it.'
- p32, Phillip Lim
some people caution against going out on your own too early, but you had a big job at a young age. do you think, under certain circumstances, it's okay to skip a long apprenticeship? and how do you compensate for it?
'yes. look at Proenza Schouler. those guys totally have a grasp of their craft, but they're still learning, and you can see it in the way they push themselves every season. Zac Posen is the same way. there's nothing wrong with being young and successful, and young people sometimes have a better way of looking at the world.'
- p39, Patrick Robinson: Gap's Head Designer, The Teen Vogue Handbook
'when you're growing up in a small town, you don't know that the rest of the world isn't like that. i had no reason to leave Yorkshire; i wasn't trying to get away - i just knew i wanted to see more of life.
i'd never felt particularly British. but the funny thing about spending a long time abroad is that it makes you feel more British.
overseas, people know the English accent if you sound like David Niven, but if you don't sound like that, as far as they're concerned, you coud be Australian. so you spend a lot of time talking about where you come from. you're almost giving yourself a crash course in who you are. you get more of a sense of yourself, somehow, than you had when you were back home, surrounded by people who are similar to you.'
- p39, Harland Miller: Artist and Author
'my father often used to talk about that old proverb, 'even a stopped clock is right twice a day'. in other words, everybody you meet has something to teach you - if you take the trouble to find it. the most unlikely person can enlighten your life. that's tremendously important for the self-worth of the people you meet, as well as your own.
there are all sorts of ways in which we're not equal, but we are all equal in what we can strive for. when i interviewed Senator Robert Kennedy back in 1968 - the last interview he gave before his assassination - i asked him how he would like to be remembered. he replied, 'well, there is a line of Albert Camus that says, 'this is a world in which children suffer.' i'd like to have made a contribution to lessening that suffering.' Kennedy spoke a lot about making a contribution. he used to say, 'for if we do not do this, then who will do this?' it's so simple: if you have a talent, you have a duty to use it to the full.
making a contribution and making a difference - they should be linked - is not only something that famous people can do, or that dead politicians can be quoted on. it is something that everyone can do in their own lives..'
- p41, Sir David Frost: Broadcaster and Producer
things to hate - CUM-an iritating form of speech:
a moratorium must be imposed on the artist-cum-musican. the hotel-cum-gallery, and the pub-cum-restaurant. simply, on CUM. this three-letter preposition-cum-conjunction has stolen the limelight from the once omnipotent slash (eg. model/actor). linguistically, CUM is the latin word for 'with', as in 'magna cum laude'. in colloquial English, it has taken the form of either preposition of conjunction. the conjunction form suffers the most abuse. recent outings include: bass-cum-keystar, boxer-cum-carpet cleaner, and cum-technology-cum-ecology - as found in The Guardian, of all places. by retiring CUM and saying what one actually means, sentences will find themselves inherently more handsome.
- p70
how would you describe society in New York?
'there's something about the density of it. the fact that its density produces a kind of care and concern and emotional investment in every aspect of the urban fabric in a way that doesn't happen in any other American city. it's still a city that's remarkably easy to get around in. you're pushed together with so many different kinds of people. there's the immense diversity, and at the same time the ability to run into people you know throughout the course of your day in different parts of town. no matter how much New York changes, it feels somehow aunthentic to itself.'
- p217, Peter Eleey, Fantastic Man magazine SS11
