B Quotes
Browse famous quotes beginning with B. This page is a child index of the full Popular Quotes A-Z directory.
“By the time it's considered socially acceptable to start screwing, most of us are sexually constipated, and this is often an incurable condition. I think young people should be able to have their first sexual love affair whenever they feel like it. In the case of most girls, this would be around 13 or 14; with most boys, around 15 or 16.”
“By the time John F. Kennedy became involved in 1961, the situation was out of control. So Kennedy simply invaded the country. In 1962, he sent the U.S. Air Force to start bombing South Vietnam, using planes with South Vietnamese markings. Kennedy authorized the use of napalm, chemical warfare, to destroy the ground cover and crops. He started the process of driving the rural population into what were called 'strategic hamlets,' essentially concentration camps, where people were surrounded by barbed wire, supposedly to protect them from the guerillas who the U.S. government knew perfectly well they supported. This 'pacification' ultimately drove millions of people out of the countryside while destroying large parts of it. Kennedy also began operations against North Vietnam on a small scale. That was 1961.”
Source: Power Systems: Conversations on Global Democratic Uprisings and the New Challenges to U.S. Empire
“By the time John F. Kennedy became involved in 1961, the situation was out of control. So Kennedy simply invaded the country. In 1962, he sent the U.S. Air Force to start bombing South Vietnam, using planes with South Vietnamese markings. Kennedy authorized the use of napalm, chemical warfare, to destroy the ground cover and crops. He started the process of driving the rural population into what were called 'strategic hamlets,' essentially concentration camps, where people were surrounded by barbed wire, supposedly to protect them from the guerillas who the U.S. government knew perfectly well they supported. This 'pacification' ultimately drove millions of people out of the countryside while destroying large parts of it. Kennedy also began operations against North Vietnam on a small scale. That was 1962.”
Source: Power Systems: Conversations on Global Democratic Uprisings and the New Challenges to U.S. Empire
“By the time Kafka was seven or eight years old, he already had a relatively dark view of the world derived from experiences in his own family. This told him that the world was organized in a strictly hierarchical manner and that those on the top were allowed to mete out punishment in any way they chose. They were entitled to leave those on the bottom uninformed about the rules to which they subscribed; they weren't even required to follow their own rules - this is how Kafka described it in his later Letter to My Father.”
“By the time kids are 15, they're drunks and they're drug addicts and they're getting chicks pregnant. The parents wonder, "What did I do wrong?" What you did wrong was, you were never there. You had the kid as a status symbol, that's what went wrong. And you're paying the price for it.”
“By the time Lillian had turned twelve ears old, cooking had become her family. It had taught her lessons usually imparted by parents- economy from a limp head of celery left too long in the hydrator, perseverance from the whipping of heavy cream, the power of memories from oregano, whose flavor only grew stronger as it dried. Her love of new ingredients had brought her to Abuelita, the owner of the local Mexican grocery store, who introduced her to avocados and cilantro, and taught her the magic of matching ingredients with personalities to change a person's mood or a life. But the day when twelve-year-old Lillian had handed her mother an apple- fresh-picked from the orchard down the road on an afternoon when Indian summer gave over to autumn- and Lillian's mother had finally looked up from the book she was reading, food achieved a status for Lillian that was almost mystical.
"Look how you've grown," Lillian's mother had said, and life had started all over again. There was conversation at dinner, someone else's hand on the brush as it ran through her hair at night. A trip to New York, where they had discovered a secret fondue restaurant, hidden behind wooden shutters during the day, open by candlelight at night. Excursions to farmers' markets and bakeries and a shop that made its own cheese, stretching and pulling the mozzarella like taffy. Finally, Lillian felt like she was cooking for a mother who was paying attention, and she played in an open field of pearl couscous and Thai basil, paella and spanakopita and eggplant Parmesan.”
Source: The Lost Art of Mixing
“By the time Lillian had turned twelve years old, cooking had become her family. It had taught her lessons usually imparted by parents- economy from a limp head of celery left too long in the hydrator, perseverance from the whipping of heavy cream, the power of memories from oregano, whose flavor only grew stronger as it dried. Her love of new ingredients had brought her to Abuelita, the owner of the local Mexican grocery store, who introduced her to avocados and cilantro, and taught her the magic of matching ingredients with personalities to change a person's mood or a life. But the day when twelve-year-old Lillian had handed her mother an apple- fresh-picked from the orchard down the road on an afternoon when Indian summer gave over to autumn- and Lillian's mother had finally looked up from the book she was reading, food achieved a status for Lillian that was almost mystical.
"Look how you've grown," Lillian's mother had said, and life had started all over again. There was conversation at dinner, someone else's hand on the brush as it ran through her hair at night. A trip to New York, where they had discovered a secret fondue restaurant, hidden behind wooden shutters during the day, open by candlelight at night. Excursions to farmers' markets and bakeries and a shop that made its own cheese, stretching and pulling the mozzarella like taffy. Finally, Lillian felt like she was cooking for a mother who was paying attention, and she played in an open field of pearl couscous and Thai basil, paella and spanakopita and eggplant Parmesan.”
Source: The Lost Art of Mixing
“By the time May rolls around, I'm probably going to want to spend a month on an island. But if Steven Spielberg or Steven Soderbergh or any number of directors were to say 'Hey, there's this role, are you interested?' I'd be there in a flash”
“By the time most people say 'I'm sorry' it is already too late.”
“By the time my lesson ended, almost everyone I knew was watching me – which wasn’t at all uncomfortable, because I cope wonderfully under pressure. Ahem.”
Source: A Little Bit Vampy
“By the time Natalie realized what Viola was doing, it was too late. She was a senior in high school, and nothing whatsoever about music made her happy. Music was something to win, to be first and best at. She snapped at her parents and was too proud to apologize. She shrank from Uncle Kevin because it was easier than admitting the truth. She listened to all of Hunky Dory, to Ziggy Stardust and Heroes, and tried to feel lovely and strange and weightless, but she couldn’t; she played the piano, she listened to music, and nothing stirred, nothing sang inside. Natalie was earthbound and ordinary, marooned, alone.”
Source: Bellweather Rhapsody
“By the time of Andi Parhamovich death, I had already grown skeptical of the Iraq war. What her death made me realize was what the actual price was. Going through that kind of loss and seeing how devastating it was on her family and friends made me decide that I was only going to write about things that I really believed in. I'm not going to compromise on that.”
“By the time of the '90s boom, CEOs had become superheroes, accorded celebrity treatment and followed with a kind of slavish scrutiny that Alfred P. Sloan could never have imagined.”
“By the time of the GDR's demise, two in every 13 citizens were informers.”
Source: The Snowden Files: The Inside Story of the World's Most Wanted Man
“By the time of the Singularity, there won't be a distinction between humans and technology. This is not because humans will have become what we think of as machines today, but rather machines will have progressed to be like humans and beyond. Technology will be the metaphorical opposable thumb that enables our next step in evolution.”
Source: The Singularity Is Near: When Humans Transcend Biology
“By the time of the sixth patriarch, Hui-neng, it is recorded, monks were polishing rice as well as cutting firewood. That is to say, at this time manual labor had become an essential part of Zen training. The Zen master Pai-chang (720–814), whose Ching-kuei (Monastic Regulations) forms the model for Zen communal life, set the example himself for this kind of life by participating in manual labor with the other monks even in his old age. This was in accordance with his famous expression, "If one does not do any work for a day, one should not eat for a day." The Zen goal of living with an "ordinary mind" may be said to have been developed through a life such as this.”
Source: The Zen Life
“By the time of the United States Tricentennial, there will be more government workers than there are workers.”
“By the time ordinary life asserted itself once more, I would feel I had already lived for a while in some other lifetime, that I had even taken over someone else's life.”
“By the time [people] finish entering all the data onto the form, it is too late. The cheating is done and over with, and no one will say, 'Oh, I need to sign this thing, let me go back and give honest answers'.”
Source: The Honest Truth About Dishonesty: How We Lie to Everyone - Especially Ourselves
“By the time President Obama took office, Guantánamo was viewed internationally as a symbol of a counterterrorism approach that flouted our laws and strayed from our values, undercutting the perceived legitimacy - and therefore the effectiveness - of our efforts.”
“By the time Ramuel decided to let me serve as his assassin, it had been nine years since I'd seen sunlight. Since I'd heard the wind or smelled the rain. Since I'd seen grass, or a river, or a mountain. Since I'd flown.”
Source: House of Earth and Blood
“By the time Rosie struggled to sit up, Henry sat in front of her with a pink pastry box. He lifted the lid, and Rosie peered inside to see the tiny apple rose tart, the "petals" impossibly thin, caramelized and shining with a dusting of sugar.
"It's a rose- get it?" Henry said, and Rosie felt her breath catch in her throat.
"It's beautiful." Carefully, Rosie lifted the tart out of the box. "Look at how thin the petals are- they must have used a mandoline. And the bake on the bottom is so even. It's hard to be so accurate with something so small."
"Are you going to analyze it or eat it?" he joked.
It looked delicious, but she almost didn't want to eat it. Henry had gotten her a rose, something far more beautiful than any flower could ever be. She wished she could keep it in her room forever, but that was part of the magic of food. It didn't last. It couldn't. Each bite was only a moment that transformed into a memory.”
Source: Love à la Mode
“By the time she a year old Mae Mobley following me around everwhere I go….Miss Leefolt, she’d narrow up her eyes at me like I done something wrong, unhitch that crying baby off my foot. I reckon that’s the risk you run, letting somebody else raise you chilluns”
Source: The Help
“By the time she awoke she couldn’t even remember if she had a dream or a nightmare. There had only been a deathlike peace.”
Source: No Hope For The Hopeless At Kings Park
“By the time she'd finished with him, with a little encouraging pat and a request that he rest quiet like a good lad, there was no point in denying it: Holly Evernight would be the death of him.”
Source: Evernight
“By the time she entered the hidden garden, early light was sifting through the autumn-sparse canopy. Eliza took a deep breath. She'd come to the garden because it was the place in which she always felt settled, and today more than ever she needed it to work its magic.
She ran her hand along the little iron seat, beaded with rain, and perched on its damp edge. The apple tree was fruiting, shiny globes of orange and pink. She could pick some for Cook, or perhaps she should tidy the borders, or trim the honeysuckle.”
Source: The Forgotten Garden
“By the time she got back to work, the only thing Gabby knew for certain was that as forgiving as he'd been, she'd never live down what she'd done, and since there wasn't a rock large enough to crawl under, it was in her best interest to find a way to avoid him.”
Source: The Choice
“By the time she had finished unburdening herself, someone had turned off the moon”
Source: Love in the Time of Cholera
“By the time she had interpreted Harry's dreams at the top of her voice (all of which, even the ones that involved eating porridge, apparently foretold a gruesome and early death), he was feeling much less sympathetic toward her.”
“By the time she was given the role (of Ilsa Lund) in April, Bergman would have accepted a script much worse than Casablanca. She had been stuck in Rochester, New York, where her husband was in medical school, since August, and she despaired of ever making another movie.”
Source: Round Up the Usual Suspects: The Making of Casablanca--Bogart, Bergman, and World War II
“By the time she was six, even her own parents were dead. God must have seemed less likely than chance, goodness less likely than evil--so Gertie knocked on wood and crossed fingers, tossed coins into fountains and rice over shoulders. When she prayed, she bargained.”
Source: The Immortalists
“By the time someone gave me some samples of standard screenplays I was already beyond that stuff, because I was not only a tinkerer in ways to do things, I'd started from Dylan Thomas. As a screen dramatist he was a very intense visualist, with great timing and fluency.”
“By the time someone recognizes the need for a deposit limit, their dopamine pathways may already be rewired in a way that makes it difficult to slow their gambling -- and therefore makes them unwilling to opt into a program to do so.”
Source: Losing Big: America's Reckless Bet on Sports Gambling
“By the time something reaches the cover of Time magazine, it's old news anyway.”
“By the time Sthenno reached her, [Medusa] was completely in darkness again. But the sun shone on the snakes, and it shone on her.”
Source: Stone Blind
“By the time Talking Heads were starting, my feeling was to throw out everything and start from scratch onstage; strip it down to as close to zero as you can get and then you can make it yours.”
“By the time that book So You Want to Be President? came along, we had already had enough presidents that had shown us that presidents are human beings. So I felt I was contributing to the common knowledge there, but not revealing anything really new - sort of supporting what everybody already was suspicious of.”
“By the time that product is ready to be distributed widely, it will already have established customers.”
Source: The Lean Startup: How Today's Entrepreneurs Use Continuous Innovation to Create Radically Successful Businesses
“By the time the average Christian gets his temperature up to normal, everybody thinks he has a fever!”
“By the time the average person finishes college, he or she will have taken over 2,600 tests, quizzes, and exams. The right answer approach becomes deeply ingrained in our thinking. This may be fine for some mathematical problems where there is in fact only one right answer. The difficulty is that most of life isn’t this way. Life is ambiguous; there are many right answers- all depending on what you’re looking for. But if you think there is only one right answer, then you’ll stop looking as soon as you find one.”
“By the time The Band did The Last Waltz, the chemistry had changed, and it wasn't a thrill anymore to live that studio kind of life.”
“By the time the blooms
Unfurl themselves for a few hours of light, the women who tend them
Are already at work. Blue. I’ll never know who started the lie that we are lazy,
But I’d love to wake that bastard up
At foreday in the morning, toss him in a truck, and drive him under God
Past every bus stop in America to see all those black folk
Waiting to go work for whatever they want.”
Source: The Tradition
“By the time the child can draw more that scribble, by the age of four or five years, an already well-formed body of conceptual knowledge formulated in language dominates his memory and controls his graphic work. Drawings are graphic accounts of essentially verbal processes. As an essentially verbal education gains control, the child abandons his graphic efforts and relies almost entirely on words. Language has first spoilt drawing and then swallowed it up completely.”
“By the time the children go to bed, I am as drained as any mother who has spent her day working, car pooling, building Lego castles and shopping for the precisely correct soccer cleat.”
“By the time the civil service has finished drafting a document to give effect to the principle, there may be little of the principle left.”
“By the time the clever reaches the clouds, the genius is already on the stars.”
“By the time the Deputy Minister presents a matter for decision to cabinet, he or she tends to present three options: ' the unacceptable', 'the politically courageous', and 'the bureaucrat-preferred' options. As such, it is usually best to get down into the department to the person doing the first drafts of any policy.”
“By the time the Egyptian civilization had begun to flourish, the earth's aura had already become so dense it was impossible to discover the secret meditation techniques.”
“By the time the final death toll is known for Hurricane Ian, it may be higher than 9-11.”
“By the time the first light appeared in the sky she felt herself transformed by the desire to be known, completely.”
Source: Home Fire