#ted

...we see this tendency to throw off restraints in life, in art - it's an inglorious gesture of thumbing the nose - it makes me laugh... ↗

— John Geddes

#free-spirited #restraints #art

The Special Operations Network was instigated to handle policing duties considered either too unusual or too specialized to be tackled by the regular force. There were thirty departments in all, starting at the more mundane Neighborly Disputes (SO-30) and going onto Literary Detectives (SO-27) and Art Crime (SO-24). Anything below SO-20 was restricted information, although it was common knowledge that the ChronoGuard was SO-12 and Antiterrorism SO-9. It is rumored that SO-1 was the department that polices the SpecOps themselves. Quite what the others do is anyone's guess. What is known is that the individual operatives themselves are mostly ex-military or ex-police and slightly unbalanced. 'If you want to be a SpecOp,' the saying goes, 'act kinda weird... ↗

— Jasper Fforde

#art #crime #detectives #literary #military

What we at first deem useless might end up being the next bestseller. It can be the product's novelty, fun factor or sheer stupidity. Whatever the case, just remember there's always room on the market for an original business idea. ↗

— Simon Zingerman

#business #creativity #feel-good #good-hearted #goodness

As an observer of human nature, let's just face the facts: stupid stuff sells, and often the more stupid and silly it is, the better it sells. ↗

— Simon Zingerman

#business #creativity #feel-good #good-hearted #goodness

It's just that life felt the right size in there... not too big and not too small. Wasn't so hard to work up a bit of courage. It's got so bloody complicated since then. ↗

— Athol Fugard

#complicated #courage #life #master-harold #master-harold-and-the-boys

A more accurate statement would be that I was the first person since Jedi who was permitted to stick a fork into the piecrust to see if there was still any steam underneath. ↗

— Timothy Zahn

#any #first #fork #i #into

But as the arms-control scholar Thomas Schelling once noted, two things are very expensive in international life: promises when they succeed and threats when they fail. ↗

— Fareed Zakaria

#fail #international #life #national life #noted

As so many commitments demand your time Or your shut-eye important be, Your attraction to me must in some way lack, Such a pity to spend time on thee. ↗

— Charlotte M. Liebel

#attention #attitude #attraction #commitment #demands

A sincere attitude of gratitude is a beatitude for secured altitudes. Appreciate what you have been given and you will be promoted higher. ↗

— Israelmore Ayivor

#altitudes #appreciate #appreciation #attitude #attitudes

President Obama's reelection started the countdown for lawmakers to address the fiscal cliff and the statutory debt limit. Unless the President and House Republicans can agree on changes to current law, the U.S. economy will be in recession by spring. ↗

— Mark Zandi

#agree #changes #cliff #current #current law