Those of you that know me know that I don't read. OK, well there is the occasional trade magazine or technical article, of course, if I'm totally baffled I might pull out a manual for a piece of gear, but for the most part, I DON'T READ. Taking that into consideration, my lack of literary exposure might have something to do with my fascination with witty sayings and profound statements.

Over the years I've been making a collection of Quotes. As I go about my normal humdrum day, if I hear something that piques my curiosity I pull out my little electronic daytimer and "Jot" it down. For years now I have collected these and had hoped to one day gather enough into a collection that could be published.

Well as luck would have it, my life is even more humdrum these days spending most of my time in an edit suite or creating graphic animations. This has had a major impact in the rate that quotes are gathered and since it now looks that a book deal is more then a life time away, I thought that I would gather the quotes together here and let you peruse them.

I should also probably say that some of what I have heard might be attributed to someone more famous then the person that I am quoting. Not to hard to believe considering I'm not very well versed in the Who's Who of the last 2000 years. So forgive me if I attribute a great Greek Philosopher's quote to some kid at the end of the block who is just better read then I am. OK?

"The jury system puts a ban upon intelligence and honesty and premium upon ignorance, stupidity, and perjury. Its a shame that we must continue to use a worthless system because it was good a thousand years ago."
Mark Twain - "Roughing it" - July 2009

""It was just in my head and you made it go away."
Paul Koblik - September 2008

"The difference between commitment and involvement is like the difference between eggs and bacon. The chicken is involved and the pig is committed."
Amir Rosenbaum - April 2008

"I was probably one of the smartest kids in my class at the time except, you would have never known it, just because where my intelligence lay wasn't able to be tapped in the particular system and I didn't know how to do it myself until music came along and opened me up, not just to the world of music but to the world period.

"To the events of the day, to the connection between culture and society and those were things that riveted me and engaged me in life, gave me a sense of purpose, what I wanted to do, who I wanted to be, the way that I wanted to do it, what I thought I could accomplish through singing songs and writing about what interests you. Every good writer and film maker has something eating at them that they can't quite get off their back and so your job is to make your audience care about your obsessions."
Bruce Springsteen - October, 2007

"I really hurt my foot this morning."
"How?"
"I kicked that metal pole..."
I didn't hear anything after that.
Dave Veach - August 19, 2007

"The reasonable man adapts himself to the world; the unreasonable one persists in trying to adapt the world to himself. Therefore all progress depends on the unreasonable man."
George Bernard Shaw

"You wouldn't worry so much about what people thought about you if you realized how seldom they do."
Unknown

"I will say this in terms of success, this will surprise you. You have lived a successful life if, as you get older, the people that you hope love you do. And I've known a lot of people at this point in my life and I've seen them in very ordinary jobs and all kinds of situations if the people around them love them, they feel very successful."
Warren Buffett on PBS "Back to School"

"The saddest thing to me, in looking back on my life, has been to recall, not so much the wickedness I have been involved in, the cruel and selfish and egotistic things I have done, the hurt I have inflicted on those I loved – although all that’s painful enough. What hurts most is the preference I have so often shown for what is inferior, tenth-rate, when the first-rate was there for the having. Like a man who goes shopping, and comes back with cardboard shoes when he might have had leather, with dried fruit when he might have had fresh, with processed cheese when he might have had cheddar, with paper flowers when the primroses were out. "
Malcolm Muggeridge - Chronicles of Wasted Time: The Infernal Grove 1973

"If you would not be forgotten as soon as you are dead . . . either write things worth reading or do things worth the writing"
Benjamin Franklin

"The greatest blessing in my life was being introduced to God, Jesus and the Holy Spirit the great I AM at a very early age.  He has been my Guardian, Mentor and Protector all of my life, since age 10 or ll His angels have watched over me.  Though through the sin in my life I have ignored Him at times, He has NEVER left me or forsaken me.  For this I am grateful and want to worship him and eternally thank Him, and serve Him now and forever."
Thomas Clinton Fenwick 1927-2006 on March 5, 2003

"Me bad English?... THAT'S UNPOSSIBLE!"
Bart Simpsons friend...

"Some people are like Slinkies... Not really good for anything, but they still bring a smile to your face when you push them down a flight of stairs."
Unknown

"Its like low fat salad dressing. It'll make the lettus wet and slippery but it isn't very good."
Steve Miller - 05-18-2005

"What the world needs is good taste."
Tad Wagner - 02-07-2005

"I know enough to know that I don't know enough."
Chris Fenwick - 7-10-2006

"You have to be very careful about the words you use because your WORDS become your ACTIONS, your ACTIONS become your HABITS, your HABITS become your DESTINY."
Suze Orman - That annoying lady that talks about money on TV.

"Post Hoc Ergo Propter Hoc - After therefore because of it. One thing follows the other therefore it was caused by the other."
The West Wing

"Religion is when God leaves the room and man fills the space with rules."
Bono

"September 11th marks the end of a selfish and cynical age."
Heard it on the News Somewhere

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"10 Rules for Being a Teen

1. Never listen to the mean 'crap' your firend say to you or about you - you'll realize they're wrong later.

2. If they are mean they probably believe those lies about themselves, just smile.

3. Don't try and stay in-style; make your own - others will follow.

4. Have fun. Do what you enjoy.

5. DON'T DATE, its stupid.

6. Do your work, and get as many classes out of the way as possible.

7. Learn French well.

8. Do missions.

9. Don't fight with mom and dad, it's stupid too.

10. Do all the above and in all talk to Jesus about everything.

I love you."
Fay Johnson - Age 19 to her brother Davey, on his 13th birthday.

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"War is cruelty. There is no use trying to change it. The crueler it is the sooner it is over."
General William Sherman

"Pop music tells you that everything is OK in the world, Rock music tells you that it's not OK but that you can change it."
Bono

"If they give you lined paper, write the other way"
Philip Jose Farmer

"There are three kinds of people, those who make things happen, those who watch things happen, and those that say, 'What happened'".
Unknown

"I will never be a clear lens between the story and the audience, I can only be a prism at best. That is what is so exciting about this art form because everyone of us has a hand in the way things are interpreted, you and you and you and you and you. That is what I think is just glorious."
Meg Ryan on Acting

"Great spirits have always encountered violent opposition from mediocre minds."
Albert Einstein

"The difference between theory and real life is that in theory, there is no difference between theory and real life, but in real life, there is a difference." 
DV Filmmaker Marshall Spight

"Mediocrity knows nothing higher than itself, but talent instantly recognizes genius."
Arthur Conan Doyle (author of Sherlock Holmes)

"Happy is the man whose quiver is full."
Ps 127:5

"True diplomacy is being able to tell someone to go to hell and have them look forward to the trip."
Unknown

"Tradition is what you do when you don't have the time or money to do it right."
Unknown

"The trouble with doing something right the first time is that nobody appreciates how difficult it was."
Unknown

"No, try not, do, or do not."
Yoda

"How daddy is doing - sing doo wah diddy"
LA Story

"Bones heal, chicks dig scars, pain is temporary, glory is forever."
Matt Hoffman BMX bike champion

"Some people don't deserve to live"
Peter Nichols on abortion 5-3-92 (I bother to put the date on this one because he refuses to admit that he ever said this.)

"Excellence is the best deterrent to racism."
Jesse Jackson

"Triplicate of choice, provide a high and a low and the customer will go for the middle."
Unknown

"It's not what happens to you in your life that counts, it's how you deal with what happens to you."
Robert Young

"People are offended buy the notion that they are machines because they are familiar only with stupid machines."
Danny Hillis - founder Connection Machines - TMC, Thinking Machines Corporation

"Study the past... past is prologue... eternal vigilance is the price of liberty..."
JFK book

"We're a technical company. But you can't run a technical company with technicians. You've got to run it with businessmen"
Ross Perot May 3,1970 on EDS

"The principal difference between an adventurer and a suicide is that the adventurer leaves himself a margin of escape (the narrower the margin the greater the adventure)"
Tom Robbins

"Everybody has the right to be a pain in the ass but you abuse the privilege."

"The significant problems we face cannot be solved at the same level of thinking we were at when we created them."
Albert Einstein

"In order to get from what was to what will be you have to go through what is."
Ashley Brilliant

"Resist much. Obey little."
Walt Whitman

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"There are two ways to live your life. One is as though nothing is a miracle. The other is as though everything is a miracle" Albert Einstein

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"I build molecules for a living, I can't begin to tell you how hard that job is. I stand in awe of God because of what he has done through his creation. Only a rookie who knows nothing about science would say science takes away from faith. If you REALLY study science, it will bring you closer to God."
Dr. James Tour

"ALL generalizations lead to stereotypes."
Chris Fenwick

"The only winning move is not to play."
WarGames

"When two people are under the influence of the most violent, most insane, most delusive, and most transient of passions, they are required to swear that they will remain in that excited, abnormal and exhausting condition continuously until death do them part."
George Bernard Shaw

"Somebody once came to me and said if you pay me more money I'll do a better job and I said, you don't have to worry about either"
Herb Kelleher - Southwest Air

"General you better put jam in your pockets cuz we're about to be toast"
A seismologist running past the General in charge of Clark Air Force base after Mt. Pinotubo erupted

"To be successful you don't do one thing 1000 percent better, you must do 1000 things one percent better"
Unknown

"If you want to get ahead you have to take chances, stand out in a crowd, get noticed"
Riker to Picard - "Tapestry"

"I'm in a very dangerous place right now, the 'bleeding edge' - the pioneers who wind up with the arrow's in their back."
Todd Rundgren

"There is no piece of cake."
Peter Nichols

"It's a good day for a bad thing to happen"
Chris Fenwick

"Technology is just wire frame for our imaginations. What really matters is how we use it."
Wired Magazine

"You're not alone you know, what you were and what you are to become will always be with you."
Q "All Good Things"

"Work hard, play hard... but too many people use the excuse of play hard as an escape and not for fulfillment"
Trisha... a girl I met on the plane

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"Five card stud, nothing wild, the skies the limit."
Picard - Last line of dialog on Star Trek: The Next Generation

The very last line from the Next Generation series. On several occasions throughout its long run there were scenes where the senior staff would play poker. Consistently absent from these games was Captain Picard. As the final episode drew to a close Picard made his way into the room where the Officers were about to deal the cards. Not sure if he was welcome, he nervously asked if he might join in. They respectfully offer the cards to Picard to deal and he settles in for a good game, not without one of those famous "when I was a boy" stories. Then, during a very tasteful rotating overhead boom shot Picard says this last line.

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"I'm stimulating my taco shakra."
Andy from Conan O'Brien

"Just because you're paranoid doesn't mean they aren't out to get you."
Paul Postal

"I used a part of my brain I've never used before"
George Hamilton after acting on the Bonnie Hunt show

"Once a new technology starts rolling, if you're not part of the steamroller, you're part of the road."
Stewart Brand

"I don't know if we're pushing the envelope but we certainly aren't folding it neatly"
Robert Wuhl on Arliss the HBO show

"Ya... and chimps can't throw overhand and cats fall at 63 miles an hour."
Unknown

"There is no limit to what you can accomplish if you don't care who gets the credit."
Unknown

"I'm trying to contain an outbreak here and you're driving the monkey to the airport."
King of the Hill - the night that this first aired one of the networks was airing the Dustin Hoffman movie "Outbreak"

"The mind is not a vessel to be filled but a fire to be lit".
Unknown

"Our deepest fear is not that we are inadequate. Our deepest fear is that we are powerful beyond measure. It is our light, not our darkness that most frightens us. We ask ourselves, Who am I to be brilliant, gorgeous, talented, fabulous? Actually, who are you not to be? You are a child of God. Your playing small does not serve the world. There is nothing enlightened about shrinking so that other people won't feel insecure around you. We are all meant to shine, as children do. We were born to make manifest the glory of God that is within us. It's not just in some of us; it's in everyone. And as we let our own light shine, we unconsciously give other people permission to do the same. As we are liberated from our own fear, our presence automatically liberates others."
Marianne Williamson

"We're all looking for something but no one wants to be sold anything"
Unknown

"What is your 'magical in-hand date'?" Meaning... what date in the last two weeks do you need this?)
Megan Shackelford Inside Sales, Rose Brand

"Apple is like a ship with a hole in the bottom and my job is to get the ship pointed in the right direction."
Gil Amelio Former CEO of Apple Computer

Microsoft headquarters being taken over by iPods
February 2 - 13:15 EST   Wired's Leander Kahney reports that even Microsoft's corporate campus in Redmond, Washington, is not immune to iPod fever. "To the growing frustration and annoyance of Microsoft's management, Apple's iPod is wildly popular among Microsoft's workers. 'About 80 percent of Microsoft employees who have a portable music player have an iPod,' said one source, a high-level manager who asked to remain anonymous. 'It's pretty staggering.' The source estimated 80 percent of Microsoft employees have a music player--that translates to 16,000 iPod users among the 25,000 who work at or near Microsoft's corporate campus. 'This irks the management team no end,' said the source. So popular is the iPod, executives are increasingly sending out memos frowning on its use."

"Technology, we kind of equate that with science, it doesn't have to be cold and ugly it can be something beautiful, and magnificent and wondrous."
Wynton Marsalis on the iPod

"What I love about this iTunes Music Store idea is that there is a concern for artists, a concern for protection, a concern for evolution, a concern for people getting music right away, so everyone is being taken into account and no one is being left behind and that's the ultimate convergence of technological evolution and spiritual consideration and that's what I'm all about and that's why I get excited."
Alanis Morissette on the iPod

"The corporate graveyard is studded with the tombstones of once domineering companies that died slow deaths through self-inflicted wounds."
Charles Haddad - BusinessWeek Online, during an admonition to Microsoft August 2002

"Dear Aunt, let's set so double the killer delete select all."
Microsoft Voice Recognition Snafu - 2006

"Canada is like a loft apartment over a really great party."
Robin Williams - 2002 HBO Special

"Going to war without France on your side is like going deer hunting without your accordian."
Donald Rumsfield, US Defense Secretary on IRAQ War 2003

"Viral Marketing Engine" - Dead Head Tapers
John Gilmore - Cofounder of Electronic Frontier Foundation

"Submarines are designed by geniouses so that idiots can operate them"
Jackson Hill - creator of Divorce Court

"nonlinear catastrophic structural exasperation; i.e. it was fundamentally fed up with being where it was."

"I love all this stuff, I gotta get me some of this." - referring to products on the show
Heather Tietsort - New producer for 18th season of Computer Chronicles

"Defies analysis by linear mathematics"
Jeff Dykhouse

"I'm too old to sound bad."
40ish Bass Player I met in a Music Store - Discussing why he spends so much on his Bass Rig

"The French... they build things BIG"
Stan Burns, while standing under the Eiffel Tower in Paris

"Vertically challenged."
Dennis Freeman about short people

"nikenet" - running disks all over the office to facilitate file sharing

"Psycho-babble bullshit" Trying to explain a problem in an overly apologetic "stream of consciousness" fashion

"It has multi-numerable features."
Jeff Dykhouse

"The day Microsoft makes something that doesn't suck is the day they start making vacume cleaners."
Danny Zemanek

"He's a genetic culdesac."
Unknown

"cpe1704tks"
WarGames

"The lunatic fringe, the people on the outside of the bell curve that the marketing people can never hope to satisfy."
Bruce Robertson

"Emotional inoculation." - preparing for the worst
Unknown

"Personal activity generator." - a personal computer
Scott McNealy

"Mac people describe their files instead of naming them."
Brett Trible

"Poverty of imagination."
Unknown

"If I draw a circle on the ground and tell you to stand in it, I want you to ask, 'How long?'"
Unknown

"You have to know what you're aiming for and be able to tell when you're getting it."
Quincy Jones

"I have to get use to these bigger budgets! it's harder.. there's a lot more Zeros!!! "
Paul Koblik March 1, 2007

"As long as you know what numbers look like and have seen letters you can log a tape...."
Steve Miller March 2, 2007

"It is a tale told by an idiot, full of sound and fury, signifying nothing."
Macbeth, act 5, scene 5

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"When you find youself in danger,
When you're threatened by a stranger,
When it looks like you will take a lickin', (puk, puk, puk)
There is someone waiting,
Who will hurry up and rescue you,
Just Call for Super Chicken! (puk, ack!)

Fred, if you're afraid you'll have to overlook it,
Besides you knew the job was dangerous when you took it (puk, ack!)

He will drink his super sauce
And throw the bad guys for a loss
And he will bring them in alive and kickin' (puk, puk, puk)
There is one thing you should learn
When there is no one else to turn to
Call for Super Chicken! (puk, puk, puk)
Call for Super Chicken! (puk, ack!)"
Lyrics to "Super Chicken" because no one can remember them.

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"The secret to creativity is knowing how to hide your sources."
Albert Einstein

"Its easier if I just blame you rather then change any of my own behavior."
Anonymous - Producer - 12-13-2006

"I'm too old and too smart to put up with your shit."
Anonymous

" Sorry I'm late, I got wrapped up in that whole 'Lather - Rinse - Repeat' thing."
Johnny Bongo

"I have no reason to trust you and every reason not to... you work in Television"
Bradley Whitford - Studio60 the new Aaron Sorkin TV Series

"This computer is not long for this world"
Rick Sydel - speaking of a G3 Powerbook in February 2006

"We don't happen to have a picture of a cat licking a lens do we?"
Bruce Campbell in the middle of a long edit.

"There's a lot of Koolaid at Apple and it tastes real good."
Anonymous Apple Employee

"It's like a moving bland thing."
Gordon Fleming (commenting on another producer's video project).

"I understand that we are paying the penalty for any disarray due to our unpreparedness..."
Gordon Fleming (on the eve of a phenomenally unprepared video shoot).

"Knowlege and Apparent Knowledge are the same thing, That's how I got to where I am."
Gordon Fleming (on the day of the phenomenally unprepared video shoot).

"Damn it, I see another trip to The Good Guys in my future and I'm NOT happy about it!"
Kate Donnellon - Producer (realizing the idiot at The Good Guys sold her the wrong stuff) December 2005.

"Hey, for the most part, I'm not really listening to you..."
Melissa Kane - Producer (to me on 1st day of a 5 day edit).

"it never seems like hard work even though it is,
it always seems like fun even though it's not."
Tom Hanks on Work

"Join us tonight as we look for answers to unusual phenomenon, Crop Circles and Paris Hilton."
KRON 4 News Tease December 3, 2003

"Circling the drain"

"Television news is journalism with a itty bitty 'J' "
Danny Zemanek

"We all have but one life to live on earth, and, through Television, we have the choice of encouraging others, to demean this life or to cherish it in creative imaginative ways."
Fred Rogers - aka "Mr. Rogers"

"I really believe that people absorb impressions rather than substance particularly in this day and age."
Michael Deaver - Reagan Aide

"Television is a gift of God, and God will hold those who utilize his divine instrument accountable to him."
Philo T. Farnsworth, Television Pioneer

"Every curve and line has to have real meaning; it can not be arbitrary"
Frank Lloyd Wright

"Directing ain't about drawing a neat little picture and showing it to the cameraman. I didn't want to go to film school. I didn't know what the point was. The fact is, you don't know what directing is until the sun is setting and you've got to get five shots and you're only going to get two."
David Fincher, from IMDB.com

"This is the way we phase cameras in my village."
Robert Landergren, Engineer

"Look, you got a choice of 3 personalities sitting at this table, you might want to stick with the one you got right now..."
Clarence Novak, in Post Production

"I'm gonna go to the Bexel lunch today, it's free and I get to look at equipment and stuff."
Tony Salgado, Director of Photography and confirmed Gear Slut.

"Anyone will watch a great TV show on a crappy TV, they will not watch a crappy TV show on a great TV. Content is King."
Andy Watson, Platinum Studios

"I made some mistakes in drama. I thought the drama was when the actors cried. But drama is when the audience cries."
Frank Capra - 1897 - 1991

"This is what I love doing and I have one life to do it in and I better do it right, I better do it well."
Hans Zimmer on composing for Gladiator

"It's MY world, everyone else is just extras."
Martin Short on Dennis Miller Live

"I'm like a Ferengi, if there's no money in it, I'm out."
A certain Camera Operator I work with who wanted to remain nameless.

"There's nothing that has crossed your mind that hasn't crossed my lips at the very worst possible moment that you could imagine saying it."
Chris Fenwick, I've often been told I have no filter between my mind and my mouth.

"I don't want to tell you how to do your job, but somebody has to."
David Fincher (one of my favorite directors)

"The television business is a cruel and shallow money trench, a long, plastic hallway where thieves and pimps run free and where weak men die like dogs, but you can get free cookies."
Hunter S. Thompson

"When I want your opinion I'll give it to you!"
I heard it somewhere

"He doesn't suffer fools gladly"
Doug Leach about Chris Fenwick

"Foam the runways!"
Bob Briggs, Director. Moments before a live show

"There is allot of closure in what we do, you finish a job and we move on."
Stan Burns Audio Engineer

"NOW I can die."
Jeff Jacobs, Market Research Project Manager, Jeff blurted this out after a respondent explained how he had just discovered chocolate covered pretzels.

"It's all Love."
Amy Matson, Producer, Akamai Technologies. In one of those moments when it all just came together in an Edit.

"For producers, the novelty of being able to flip a picture around on a screen was a message in itself... but now, such an effect is seen for what it is... a gratuitous motion that by itself doesn't enhance a production, for today's more sophisticated audiences, such movement just doesn't add any meaning."
Some Magazine I read a long time ago

"Counsel and sound judgment are mine; I have understanding and power."
Proverbs 8:14

"Appeal to the masses and speak to the few" -
High art is fine and nobel but what good is it if it has no audience. You are more than welcome to create any piece of work you like but wouldn't it be nice if everyone had a chance to experience it? Even the deepest most meaningful art you create should appeal to pop sensibilities.
Chris Fenwick 1989

"Delight the senses and appeal to the mind"
Walt Disney

"I fill voids for a living, sometimes I fill big voids and sometimes I fill little voids."
Linda Giannecchini on being an Assistant Director

"I just said it out loud and it was really stupid."
Katherine Russell - Director

"The so-called learning curve often made a complete circle, with the same errors showing up all too often."
Camcorder Magazine

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"Open the Pod Bay doors HAL"
Paul Trueline - 2001

Every body remembers the scene from "2001: A Space Oddesy" where Dave is trying to get the HAL 9000 to open the doors to the Pod Bay but the most memorable time I ever heard this was in the tense moments right before a live uplink, right at that moment where everyone is taking their last deep breath, right BEFORE the final 10 second countdown when the Video Tape Operator, Paul Trueline, keyed open his mic and said this famous line... it gave everyone a fun chuckle right before the storm hit.

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"Video allows you to illustrate actualities rather than rely on just the perception of a situation."

"This one is a lay-up." i.e. an easy show
Brian Cooper, Director at a Hockey split

"Switching the local news is like one 'shakey toy' after another, anything at all to keep the audience from loosing interest."
Robert Landergren, Engineer

"He wanted to get into television in the worse way... so that is why he's here."

"Don't blame your tools. A craftsman doesn't blame his tools...the (tools) may be slow, buggy, or missing features, but the blame is ultimately yours. Blaming your tools is whimpy: fundamentally, you either do a job or you don't."
Mac User Magazine

"I must have switched this show because it looks totally unfamiliar to me"
Doug Johnson, Technical Director

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"Shoot a bezel, go to jail"
Rene Renard

Rene is the "King of shooting things that don't move". In other words, shooting computer monitors. Rene probably has more HOURS of computer screens that he has shot on national television then anyone. That is not to say that he can't shoot things that move, he's actually quite good at that too. When you shoot a computer screen you must adjust your color balance for the screen and not the room. Consequently, if you accidently shoot the bezel, or the "frame" around the computer screen it will most likely look very orange. That is motivation for Rene's take off of the "Shoot a gun...." campaign.

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"It works. It plays. Leave it. Don't improve it into a disaster."
Robert Rossen, Director of The Hustler

"Theater must delight, once you delight the audience then they lower their resistence and you can introduce an idea or ideal. They go from eeeee to oohh."

"Find your light, remember your lines, and show up on time and if all else fails find your light."
Spencer Tracy to Humphry Bogart

"Good lighting takes time.....we'll be ready in 5 minutes..."
Paul Postal Gaffer

"grocery bagging...." non antialiased graphics
Kelly Moore (not the paint company)

"Art with a capitol F."
Phil Azzopardi

"If you can't say no, you're not really freelance"
Scott McQuaid, Freelance Technical Director

"TV people!, they're so crass."
Julie Nunes

"An eye chart" - a graphic w/ too much text

"I'm assuming it's just for the summer."
Doug Johnson about working in Master Control at KSCM 7-26-93

"The wonderful thing about this industry is you can get there from here...you just have to pick the path."
Marty Pell, Assistant Editor SFPG

"I've never seen life, I've just recreated it."
Chris Fenwick one day when we were recreating a scene with stock brokers trying to buy stocks in the "pit"

"You got to use television to teach otherwise its just lights and wires in a box."
Edward R. Murrow

"Weekends are the days when the traffic is light on you're way to the studio."
David Lyons, freelance camera operator

"It's just television, it should be bad sometimes. When it goes wrong it should go really wrong, not just a low level wrong. When it goes wrong it should be horribly wrong and cause you to sit up in bed and say, 'Honey wake up, Cher just called Letterman an asshole'"
Dennis Miller on "Later with Greg Kinnear"

"Theater is life, film is art, and television is furniture"
Brad Cochran

"As few mistakes as we make... It all adds up"
Barry McArdle

"Don't worry about it, we've f**ked up bigger shows then your's."

"This is the microphone that makes all the other mics jealous"
Lee Popa, Music Producer talking about the lead vocal mic on stage.

"the film studio of today is really the Palace of the 16th century. There one sees what Shakespeare saw; the absolute power of the tyrant, the courtiers, the flatterers, the jesters, the cunningly ambitious intriguers. There are fantastically beautiful women, there are incompetent favorites. There are great men who are suddenly disgraced. There is the most insane extravagance, and unexpected parsimony over a few pence. There is enormous splendor, which is a sham; and also horrible squalor hidden behind the scenery. There are vast schemes, abandoned because of some caprice. There are secrets which everybody knows and no one speaks of. There are even two or three honest advisers. These are the court fools, who speak the deepest wisdom in puns, lest they should be taken seriously. They grimace, and tear their hair privately, and weep”
And they all need Comteks. (from Prater Violet with apologies to Christopher Isherwood) - If you don't know what a Comtek is you won't fully appreciate this one.

"God is the only one with a message, it's a message of hope and urgency because he is not going to wait much longer.

His message is a simple one, we are all connected.

Our hopes, our dreams, our children's future, reflecting back in each others eyes.

We fight our own personal battles but we know we are not alone because only together can we make our short time on this planet mean something.

Only together can we be the stewards of our own destiny.

And we hold in our collective hearts one noble goal, to save ourselves, save the world."

Peter Petrelli Season 3 Premier of Heroes

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"When I first got into this business somebody once told me a piece of advice, they said, "this will be easy, all you do is surround yourself with the best people in the world and coast." And sometimes the best people in the world don't want to do what you want them to do. So somebody else told me another piece of advice where they said, "just hire your friends and at least you'll have a good time." From the people I've worked with, the record companies, and the artists, and especially the crews, I'd like to thank everyone for being the best possible people in the world AND for being my friends. Thank you."

David Fincher: winner Best Video Director MTV Music Awards 1990

Amazingly enough, that year David Fincher had directed all but ONE of the videos that were up for the award that year. His speech and the way he so eloquently carried himself complete overshadowed the tiny little fact that "yet another music video" had won an award. I have NO IDEA what the video was.

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The West Wing

My favorite show on TV is The West Wing. Some people that I know won't watch it because it stars a democratic administration. They don't know what they are talking about. I've learned more about my country, politics, the government and patriotism then I have since Ross Perot's ill concieved run for president in 1992. This is a short exchange between Leo, the Chief of Staff and Toby, the Communications Director during an argument.

LEO

Alexander Hamilton didn't think we should have political parties, neither did John Adams. They thought political parties lead to divisiveness.

TOBY

They do, they should. We have honest disagreements, arguments are good.

LEO

Only if they lead to Statesmanship, or it's just theater. and Statesmanship is compromised.

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Another West Wing Scene from "Two Cathedrals". This is a scene from a flash back to when Josiah Bartlet is in high school and a much younger Mrs. Landingham is pushing "Jeb" to confront his father the head master concerning the inequality of pay between men and women at his school.

MRS. LANDINGHAM

...the chaplin makes 4100, the nurse makes 3100. Miss Mueller gets paid an additional 200 dollars a year to conduct the choir and band while Mr Ryan gets paid an additional 400 dollars a year to coach the rowing team.

JEB

Crew.

MRS. LANDINGHAM

What?

JEB

It's not rowing it's crew. Laurence Chadwick is a married woman with no dependance and Mr Hopkins has a family of 4 to support.

MRS. LANDINGHAM

If we pay people according to how many children they have to support then Malcom Bundy the grounds keeper would get triple what the head master gets.

JEB

Mrs. Landingham

MRS. LANDINGHAM

You know I'm right.

JEB

Look...

MRS. LANDINGHAM

You know I'm right. You've known it since I brought it up. You've known it since before that.

JEB

What do you want me to do about it?

MRS. LANDINGHAM

I want you to bring it up with your father.

JEB

I'm not a woman and I don't work here.

MRS. LANDINGHAM

Women who do are affraid for their jobs. If they bring it up they're affraid for their jobs. What is it you're afraid of?

JEB

Why do you talk to me like this?

MRS. LANDINGHAM

Because you never had a big sister and you need one. Look at you. You're a boy king. You're a foot smarter then the smartest kids in the class. You're blessed with inspiration. You must know that by now, you must have sensed it. Look, if you think we're wrong. If you think Mr. Hopkins should honestly get paid more then Mrs. Chadwick then I respect that, but if you think we're right and you won't speak up because you won't be bothered then God Jeb, I don't even want to know you. Come inside, I'll call AAA.

JEB

Mrs. Mueller gets half as much to teach music as Mr. Ryan gets to coach crew?

MRS. LANDINGHAM

You're gonna do it.

JEB

No, I didn't say that.

MRS. LANDINGHAM

Yes you did.

JEB

When?

MRS. LANDINGHAM

Just then. You stuck your hands in your pocked you looked away and you smiled. That means you made up your mind.

JEB

That doesn't mean anything.

MRS. LANDINGHAM

Yes it does.

JEB

I stuck my hands in my pockets!

MRS. LANDINGHAM

...and looked away... and smiled. We're in!

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In the second season of The West Wing in the episode "Somebodys Going to Emergency, Somebodys Going to Jail" Toby Ziegler is sent to a WTO rally to be a representative of the White House and meet with some protestors. Toby is not happy with their disorganization and gets into a discussion with the officer that has been assigned to him for security.

TOBY

It's activist vacation is what it is, spring break for anarchist wanna be's. The black t-shirts, the gas masks as fasion accessories.

OFFICER RHONDA SACHS

These kids today, with the hair and the clothes.

TOBY

Alright, that's it flat foot.

OFFICER SACHS

I got great feet.

TOBY

You want the benefits of free trade. Food is cheaper.

OFFICER SACHS

Yes.

TOBY

Food is cheeper. Cloths are cheaper, Steel is cheaper, cars are cheaper. Phone service is cheaper. Do you feel me building a rhythm here? That's cuz I'm a speech writer and I know how to make a point.

OFFICER SACHS

Toby...

TOBY

It's lowers prices, it raises income. Did you see what I did with lowers and raises there?

OFFICER SACHS

Yes.

TOBY

It's called the science of listener attention. We did repetition, we did floating opposites, and now you end with the one that's not like the other. Ready? Free trade stops wars. And that's it. FREE TRADE STOPS WARS. And we figure out a way to fix the rest. One world, one peace, I'm sure I've seen that on a sign somewhere.

OFFICER SACHS

God Toby, wouldn't it be great if there was someone around here with communications skills who could go in there and tell them that.

TOBY

Shut up.

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"You do your best work and you hope that it pulls out the best in your audience, that some piece of it spills over into the real world, and into peoples everyday lives, and it takes the edge off the fear and allows us to recognize each other through our veil of differences."

Bruce Springsteen winning Oscar for "Streets of Philadelphia" 1994

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"It is with tremendous ill grace that I grudgingly acknowledge the contribution of a few other people."

Hugh Grant accepting the golden globe for best comedy actor 1994

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"and to Rita Williams Hanks, everyday I stand at a crossroads and I see nothing but love and acceptance in every direction."

Tom Hanks accepting a 2001 Golden Globe for Castaway

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"In this business, you work with a few people whom you can call dedicated. In this business, you work with a few people whom you can call talented. But most of all, in this business, you work with very few people whom you can call friends. I'm proud to have worked with the very talented a dedicated people at SFPG. I'm prouder still, to have worked with the friends I came to admire and respect at SFPG.

Bill Oakley - Creative Director DMB about "Bud Bowl"