Jen > Jen's Quotes

“I believe people who shower twice a day are hiding a secret, or a sandwich.”
― Chelsea Handler, Uganda Be Kidding Me

“I can tell by now that you are wondering whether I can be trusted as a narrator. Why didn’t I dump Inge and head for a Singles Bar? The answer is her breasts.”
― Jeanette Winterson, Written on the Body

“There is no reason why good cannot triumph as often as evil. The triumph of anything is a matter of organization. If there are such things as angels, I hope that they are organized along the lines of the Maffia.”
― Kurt Vonnegut, The Sirens of Titan

“It took us that long to realize that a purpose of human life, no matter who is controlling it, is to love whoever is around to be loved.”
― Kurt Vonnegut, The Sirens of Titan

“It is absurd that we eat pigs and love dogs and don't even know why. Many of us spend long minutes in the aisle of the drugstore mulling over what toothpaste to buy. Yet most of us don't spend any time at all thinking about what species of animal we eat and why. Our choices as consumers drive an industry that kills ten billion* animals per year in the United States alone.”
― Melanie Joy, Why We Love Dogs, Eat Pigs, and Wear Cows: An Introduction to Carnism

“A cow is a cow even if you call it beef.”
― Matt Haig, The Humans

“We are here for no purpose, unless we can invent one. Of that I am sure. The human condition in an exploding universe would not have been altered one iota if, rather than live as I have, I had done nothing but carry a rubber ice-cream cone from closet to closet for sixty years.”
― Kurt Vonnegut, Jailbird

“Our grandchildren will ask us one day: Where were you during the Holocaust of the animals? What did you do against these horrifying crimes? We won't be able to offer the same excuse for the second time, that we didn't know. —Helmut Kaplan”
― Melanie Joy, Why We Love Dogs, Eat Pigs, and Wear Cows: An Introduction to Carnism

“Every troublemaker’s excuse! Put it up your bum with the rest of the dirt!”
― Stephen King, Wolves of the Calla

“All I can do is say again what I’ve said already: when one isn’t sure about ka, it’s best to let ka work itself out. If one meddles, one almost always does the wrong thing.”
― Stephen King, Wolves of the Calla

“Sir Paul McCartney once claimed that if slaughterhouses had glass walls, everyone would be vegetarian. He believed that if we knew the truth about meat production, we'd be unable to continue eating animals.”
― Melanie Joy, Why We Love Dogs, Eat Pigs, and Wear Cows: An Introduction to Carnism

“Becoming aware of the intense suffering of billions of animals, and of our own participation in that suffering, can bring up painful emotions: sorrow and grief for the animals; anger at the injustice and deception of the system; despair at the enormity of the problem; fear that trusted authorities and institutions are, in fact, untrustworthy; and guilt for having contributed to the problem. Bearing witness means choosing to suffer. Indeed, empathy is literally “feeling with.” Choosing to suffer is particularly difficult in a culture that is addicted to comfort—a culture that teaches that pain should be avoided whenever possible and that ignorance is bliss. We can reduce our resistance to witnessing by valuing authenticity over personal pleasure, and integration over ignorance.”
― Melanie Joy, Why We Love Dogs, Eat Pigs, and Wear Cows: An Introduction to Carnism

“What interesting other kinds of sitting-up mud I met!” “I loved everything I saw!”
― Kurt Vonnegut, Cat's Cradle

“I just peed and forgot to take off my underwear.”
― Chelsea Handler, Uganda Be Kidding Me

“being articulate is not a facility of language but a fidelity to vision. And so we are all articulate when finding the courage to say what we see.”
― Mark Nepo, Seven Thousand Ways to Listen: Staying Close to What Is Sacred

“Being human, we are constantly broken apart by experience. To reconcile our humanness means we are ever learning how to accept our suffering and to restore our Wholeness.”
― Mark Nepo, Seven Thousand Ways to Listen: Staying Close to What Is Sacred

“The things that frighten us just want to be held.”
― Mark Nepo, Seven Thousand Ways to Listen: Staying Close to What Is Sacred

“Something is always going wrong with our teeth. They don’t last anything like a lifetime, usually. What chain of events in evolution should we thank for our mouthfuls of rotting crockery?”
― Kurt Vonnegut, Galápagos

“The saying that money doesn’t buy you happiness is true. But it sure as fuck helps.”
― Chelsea Handler, Uganda Be Kidding Me

“It’s just hard to go from seeing elephants living their lives in the wild and not being bothered by humans, to seeing them put in a bunker every night and then being forced to take assholes like us on rides.”
― Chelsea Handler, Uganda Be Kidding Me

“Why are babies allowed to cry when they wake up, but adults crying when they wake is frowned upon? Babies are permitted to act like assholes whenever they feel like it and no one blinks...”
― Chelsea Handler, Uganda Be Kidding Me

“I had a therapist once tell me to “sit with my shit,” and I believe that to be a necessary evil of being constantly disappointed.”
― Chelsea Handler, Uganda Be Kidding Me

“History is full of decapitations, and Iowa is no exception.”
― Andrew Smith, Grasshopper Jungle

“All good books are about everything, abbreviated.”
― Andrew Smith, Grasshopper Jungle

“Because, in an empty bedroom with creaky old wood floors, it is a natural human response to just stand there and shift your weight from foot to foot, and think about sex.”
― Andrew Smith, Grasshopper Jungle

“Nor was that strange; everyone knows that, for such an unforgiving thing, time is uniquely malleable.”
― Stephen King, 11/22/63

“Sometimes life coughs up coincidences no writer of fiction would dare copy.”
― Stephen King, 11/22/63

“But stupidity is one of two things we see most clearly in retrospect. The other is missed chances.”
― Stephen King, 11/22/63

“On a long enough time line, the survival rate for everyone drops to zero.”
― Chuck Palahniuk, Fight Club

“In my humble opinion, things do happen for a reason, but do we like the reason? Rarely.”
― Stephen King, 11/22/63