AN ANTHOLOGY OF THOUGHT & EMOTION... Un'antologia di pensieri & emozioni
הידע של אלוהים לא יכול להיות מושגת על ידי המבקשים אותו, אבל רק אלה המבקשים יכול למצוא אותו

Friday 28 April 2017

THE WISDOM OF SYLVESTER THE CAT


In the course of his fruitful years, my cat Sylvester has collected a number of sapiential quotes, mottos, and apothegms — and wishes for me to post them here. Enjoy...

"Make everything as simple as possible, but not simpler."
~Albert Einstein


Everything has beauty but not everyone sees it.

Look busy: Jesus's coming!

"There is a charm about the forbidden that makes it unspeakably desirable."
~Mark Twain


"I would rather live my life as if there is a God and die to find out there isn't, than live my life as if there isn't and die to find out there is."
~Albert Camus


"I think God, in creating man, somewhat overestimated his ability."
~Oscar Wilde


Quitters never win, and winners never quit, but those who never quit AND never win are idiots.

"If I am not for myself, then who will be for me? And if I am only for myself, what am I? And if not now, when?"
~ Rabbi Hillel


"If you can't annoy somebody, there's little point in writing."
~Kingsley Amis


The enemy invariably attacks on one of two occasions:
1. When you're ready for them.
2. When you're not ready for them.


"Only two things are infinite, the universe and human stupidity, and I'm not sure about the former."
~Albert Einstein


"Insane people are always sure that they are fine. It is only the sane people who are willing to admit that they are crazy." 
~Nora Ephron

"Computers make it easier to do a lot of things, but most of the things they make it easier to do don't need to be done."
~Andy Rooney

"I don't want to achieve immortality through my work ... I want to achieve it through not dying."
~Woody Allen

"Everyone who got to where they are had to begin where they were."
~Richard Paul Evans

Always remember you're unique, just like everyone else!

"Every day, in every way, I'm getting better and better."
~The Pink Panther, on behalf of Couéism

"As you get older three things happen. The first is your memory goes, and I can't remember the other two."
~Sir Norman Wisdom

"Aging seems to be the only available way to live a long life."
~Daniel Francois Esprit Auber

"If people never did silly things, nothing intelligent would ever get done."
~Ludwig Wittgenstein

From Groucho Marx:
  1. "Outside of a dog, a book is man's best friend. Inside of a dog it's too dark to read.
  2. "I never forget a face, but in your case I'll be glad to make an exception.
  3. "The secret of life is honesty and fair dealing. If you can fake that, you've got it made.
  4. "One morning I shot an elephant in my pajamas. How he got in my pajamas I'll never know.
  5. "If you're not having fun, you're doing something wrong.
  6. "He may look like an idiot and talk like an idiot but don't let that fool you. He really is an idiot.
  7. "Blessed are the cracked, for they shall let in the light.
  8. “If a black cat crosses your path, it signifies that the animal is going somewhere.
  9. "Whatever it is, I don't like it."
"When I die, I want to go peacefully like my grandfather did–in his sleep. Not yelling and screaming like the passengers in his car."
~Bob Monkhouse
"The scientific theory I like best is that the rings of Saturn are composed entirely of lost airline luggage."
~ Mark Russell

"First the doctor told me the good news: I was going to have a disease named after me."
~Steve Martin


"My therapist told me the way to achieve true inner peace is to finish what I start. So far I’ve finished two bags of M&Ms and a chocolate cake. I feel better already."
~Dave Barry


"Knowledge is knowing a tomato is a fruit; wisdom is not putting it in a fruit salad."
~Mile Kington

"The only mystery in life is why the kamikaze pilots wore helmets."
~Al McGuire

"I asked God for a bike, but I know God doesn’t work that way. So I stole a bike and asked for forgiveness."
~Emo Philips


"Going to church doesn’t make you a Christian any more than standing in a garage makes you a car."
~Billy Sunday



"A bargain is something you don’t need at a price you can’t resist."
~Franklin Jones


"If at first you don’t succeed . . . so much for skydiving."
~Henny Youngman


"Never, under any circumstances, take a sleeping pill and a laxative on the same night."
~Dave Barry

"If you think nobody cares if you’re alive, try missing a couple of car payments."
~Flip Wilson


"My mother never saw the irony in calling me a son-of-a-bitch."
~Jack Nicholson

"God gave us our relatives; thank God we can choose our friends."
~Ethel Mumford

"Some cause happiness wherever they go; others, whenever they go."
~Oscar Wilde

"Patience is something you admire in the driver behind you, but not in one ahead."
~Bill McGlashen

"I intend to live forever. So far, so good." 
~Steven Wright

"A diplomat is someone who can tell you to go to hell in such a way that you will look forward to the trip."
~Caskie Stinnet

Money can’t buy happiness, but it sure makes misery easier to live with.

Nothing sucks more than that moment during an argument when you realize you’re wrong.

"By the time a man realizes that his father was right, he has a son who thinks he’s wrong." 
~Charles Wadsworth

"We’ve all heard that a million monkeys banging on a million typewriters will eventually reproduce the entire works of Shakespeare. Now, thanks to the Internet, we know this is not true."
~Robert Wilensky


Why didn’t Noah swat those two mosquitoes?

A good few from Woody Allen:
  1. "It's not that I'm afraid to die, I just don't want to be there when it happens."
  2. “I don't know the question, but sex is definitely the answer.” 
  3. “The difference between sex and love is that sex relieves tension and love causes it.” 
  4. “If you want to make God laugh, tell him about your plans.” 
  5. “My one regret in life is that I am not someone else.” 
  6. “To love is to suffer. To avoid suffering one must not love. But then one suffers from not loving. Therefore, to love is to suffer; not to love is to suffer; to suffer is to suffer. To be happy is to love. To be happy, then, is to suffer, but suffering makes one unhappy. Therefore, to be happy one must love or love to suffer or suffer from too much happiness.” 
  7. “I'm not afraid of death; I just don't want to be there when it happens.” 
  8. “I don't know the question, but sex is definitely the answer.” 
  9. “In my next life I want to live my life backwards. You start out dead and get that out of the way. Then you wake up in an old people's home feeling better every day. You get kicked out for being too healthy, go collect your pension, and then when you start work, you get a gold watch and a party on your first day. You work for 40 years until you're young enough to enjoy your retirement. You party, drink alcohol, and are generally promiscuous, then you are ready for high school. You then go to primary school, you become a kid, you play. You have no responsibilities, you become a baby until you are born. And then you spend your last 9 months floating in luxurious spa-like conditions with central heating and room service on tap, larger quarters every day and then Voila! You finish off as an orgasm!” 
  10. “Life doesn't imitate art, it imitates bad television.” 
  11. “The difference between sex and love is that sex relieves tension and love causes it.” 
  12. “To you, I'm an atheist. To God, I'm the loyal opposition.” 
  13. “If you want to make God laugh, tell him about your plans.” 
  14. “Is sex dirty? Only when it's being done right.” 
  15. “God is silent. Now if only man would shut up.” 
  16. “Men learn to love the woman they are attracted to. Women learn to become attracted to the man they fall in love with.” 
  17. “My one regret in life is that I am not someone else.” 
  18. “To love is to suffer. To avoid suffering one must not love. But then one suffers from not loving. Therefore, to love is to suffer; not to love is to suffer; to suffer is to suffer. To be happy is to love. To be happy, then, is to suffer, but suffering makes one unhappy. Therefore, to be happy one must love or love to suffer or suffer from too much happiness.” 
  19. “Love is the answer, but while you are waiting for the answer, sex raises some pretty good questions.” 
  20. “I'm not anti-social. I'm just not social.” 
  21. “I just can't listen to any more Wagner, you know...I'm starting to get the urge to conquer Poland.” 
  22. “Sex is the most fun you can have without laughing.” 
  23. “I don't want to achieve immortality through my work; I want to achieve immortality through not dying. I don't want to live on in the hearts of my countrymen; I want to live on in my apartment.” 
  24. “It's a match made in heaven...by a retarded angel.” 
  25. “I feel that life is divided into the horrible and the miserable. That's the two categories. The horrible are like, I don't know, terminal cases, you know, and blind people, crippled. I don't know how they get through life. It's amazing to me. And the miserable is everyone else. So you should be thankful that you're miserable, because that's very lucky, to be miserable.” 
  26. “Eighty percent of success is showing up.” 
  27. “I took a test in Existentialism. I left all the answers blank and got 100.” 
  28. “If you're not failing every now and again, it's a sign you're not doing anything very innovative.” 
  29. “If it turns out that there is a God...the worst that you can say about him is that basically he's an underachiever.” 
  30. “I believe there is something out there watching us. Unfortunately, it's the government.” 
  31. “You can live to be a hundred if you give up all the things that make you want to live to be a hundred.” 
  32. “Confidence is what you have before you understand the problem.” 
  33. “If Jesus came back and saw what was being done in his name, he'd never stop throwing up.” 
  34. “Sex without love is a meaningless experience, but as far as meaningless experiences go its pretty damn good.”
  35. “There are two types of people in this world, good and bad. The good sleep better, but the bad seem to enjoy the waking hours much more.” 
“Adults...struggle desperately with fiction, demanding constantly that it conform to the rules of everyday life. Adults foolishly demand to know how Superman can possibly fly, or how Batman can possibly run a multibillion-dollar business empire during the day and fight crime at night, when the answer is obvious even to the smallest child: because it's not real.”
~Grant Morrison

“Socrates should have written comics.”
~Mark Waid


“Abstract art is a product of the untalented, sold by the unprincipled to the utterly bewildered.”
~Al Capp


"Life is what happens to you while you’re busy making other plans."
~John Lennon

"Life shrinks or expands in proportion to one's courage."
~Anais Nin

"I have been impressed with the urgency of doing. Knowing is not enough; we must apply. Being willing is not enough; we must do."
~Leonardo da Vinci

A truly rich man is one whose children run into his arms when his hands are empty.

"It does not matter how slowly you go as long as you do not stop."
~Confucius


"If evolution really works, how come mothers only have two hands?"
~Milton Berle


I dream of a better tomorrow, where chickens can cross the road and not be questioned about their motives.

"Those people who think they know everything are a great annoyance to those of us who do."
~Isaac Asimov


When tempted to fight fire with fire, remember that the Fire Department usually uses water.

"It’s true hard work never killed anybody, but I figure, why take the chance?"
~Ronald Reagan

Some from P.G. Wodehouse:
  1. The fascination of shooting as a sport depends almost wholly on whether you are at the right or wrong end of the gun.
  2. It is a good rule in life never to apologize. The right sort of people do not want apologies, and the wrong sort take a mean advantage of them. 
  3. There is only one cure for gray hair. It was invented by a Frenchman. It is called the guillotine.
  4. I know I was writing stories when I was five. I don't know what I did before that. Just loafed I suppose.
  5. Unseen in the background, Fate was quietly slipping lead into the boxing-glove.
  6. And she's got brains enough for two, which is the exact quantity the girl who marries you will need.
  7. Few of them were to be trusted within reach of a trowel and a pile of bricks.
  8. It was my Uncle George who discovered that alcohol was a food well in advance of modern medical thought.
  9. There is no surer foundation for a beautiful friendship than a mutual taste in literature.
  10. Everything in life that’s any fun, as somebody wisely observed, is either immoral, illegal or fattening.
  11. I always advise people never to give advice.
  12. If there is one thing I dislike, it is the man who tries to air his grievances when I wish to air mine.
Everyone is entitled to be stupid, but some abuse the privilege.

War doesn't determine who's right. War determines who's left.

The real trouble with reality is that there's no background music.

If you think things can't get worse it's probably only because you lack sufficient imagination.

A train station is where the train stops. A bus station is where the bus stops. On my desk, I have a work station...

You can't be late until you show up.

Knowledge is realizing that the street is one-way, wisdom is looking both directions anyway.

Parents spend the first part of our lives teaching us to walk and talk, and the rest of it telling us to sit down and shut up.

Expecting the world to treat you fairly because you are good is like expecting the bull not to charge because you are a vegetarian.

A single death is a tragedy; a million deaths is a statistic.

The secret to creativity is knowing how to hide your sources.


Books have knowledge, knowledge is power, power corrupts, corruption is a crime, and crime doesn't pay..so if you keep reading, you'll go broke.


Advice for the day: If you have a headache, do what it says on the aspirin bottle: Take two, and KEEP AWAY FROM CHILDREN.

Optimism: Waiting for a ship to come in when you haven't sent one out.

As Long As There Are Tests, There Will Be Prayer In Public Schools.

Never interrupt your opponent while he's making a mistake.

You can go anywhere you want if you look serious and carry a clipboard.

If you don't pray in my school, I won't think in your church.

You know your god is man-made when he hates all the same people you do.

Love is like pi - natural, irrational, and very important.

Life, n.: A whim of several billion cells to be you for a while.

Evolutionists have proof without any certainty. Creationists have certainty without any proof.

It isn't homework unless it's due tomorrow.

You never learn anything by doing it right.

Friendships last when each friend thinks he has a slight superiority over the other.

It may look like I'm doing nothing, but I'm actively waiting for my problems to go away.

I come from a small town whose population never changed. Each time a woman got pregnant, someone left town.

Anyone who uses the phrase "easy as taking candy from a baby" has never tried taking candy from a baby.

It only takes 20 years for a liberal to become a conservative without changing a single idea.

The shortest distance between two points is under construction.

Drawing on my fine command of language, I said nothing.

A criminal is a person with predatory instincts who has not sufficient capital to form a corporation.

I don't suffer from insanity. I enjoy every minute of it.

Last night I lay in bed looking up at the stars in the sky and I thought to myself, where the heck is the ceiling.

Anything you say will be held against you. ... "tits"


A computer once beat me at chess, but it was no match for me at kick boxing.


In the beginning the Universe was created. This has made a lot of people very angry and is widely regarded as a bad move.

I am not a vegetarian because I love animals; I am a vegetarian because I hate plants.

"War is God's way of teaching Americans about geography."
~Ambrose Bierce

I could've eaten Alphabits and crapped out a better essay!!

Everyone is entitled to their own opinion. It's just that yours is stupid.

Few women admit their age. Few men act theirs.

When people talk to God, it's called prayer. When God talks back, it's called schizophrenia.


The only reason people get lost in thought is because it's unfamiliar territory.


Don't sweat the petty things, and don't pet the sweaty things.

Murderer? Well, that's a harsh word. I prefer to think of myself as a Mortality Technician.

Corduroy pillows: They're making headlines!

I love deadlines. I especially like the whooshing sound they make as they go flying by.

There is a time and a place for everything, and it's called college.

I planted some bird seed. A bird came up. Now I don't know what to feed it.

If you don't like the way I drive, stay off the sidewalk.

Worst excuse for not turning in homework: I couldn't find anyone to copy it from.

After twelve years of therapy my psychiatrist said something that brought tears to my eyes. He said, "No hablo ingles."

Go into a store's fitting room and announce loudly "there's no toilet paper in here!"

Everyone must believe in something. I believe I'll have another drink.

I sat down beside her, said hello, offered to buy her a drink... and then natural selection reared its ugly head.

Every rule has an exception. Especially this one.

...And finally a final finality:

Death is not an event in life: we do not live to experience death. ~ Ludwig Wittgenstein
Ciao!