Zodiac Quotes

“If you've put yourself in a position where someone has to see you in order for you to be safe - to see you, and to give a fuck - you've already blown it.”
― Neal Stephenson, Zodiac

“I had to ride slow because I was taking my guerrilla route, the one I follow when I assume that everyone in a car is out to get me. My nighttime attitude is, anyone can run you down and get away with it. Why give some drunk the chance to plaster me against a car? That's why I don't even own a bike light, or one of those godawful reflective suits. Because if you've put yourself in a position where someone has to see you in order for you to be safe--to see you, and to give a fuck--you've already blown it... We had a nice ride through the darkness. On those bikes we were weak and vulnerable, but invisible, elusive, aware of everything within a two-block radius.”
― Neal Stephenson, Zodiac

“Plastic is essentially frozen gasoline.”
― Neal Stephenson, Zodiac

“Down by the river,
Down by the banks of the River Charles
That’s where you’ll find me
Along with lovers, muggers and thieves
Well I love that dirty water,
Oh Boston, you’re my home. —The Inmates”
― Neal Stephenson, Zodiac

“Debbie insisted on following the rhythm of the waves. Typical duck-squeezer sex: slow, frustrating, in-tune with nature.”
― Neal Stephenson, Zodiac

“The big lie of American capitalism is that corporations work in their own best interests. In fact they’re constantly doing things that will eventually bring them to their knees. Most of these blunders involve toxic chemicals that any competent chemist should know to be dangerous. They pump these things into the environment and don’t even try to protect themselves. The evidence is right there in public, almost as if they’d printed up signed confessions and sprinkled them out of aeroplanes. Sooner or later, someone shows up in a Zodiac and points to that evidence, and the result is devastation far worse than what a terrorist, a Boone, could manage with bombs and guns. All the old men within twenty miles who have come down with tumors become implacable enemies. All the women married to them, all the mothers of damaged children, and even those of undamaged ones. The politicians and the news media trample each other in their haste to pour hellfire down on that corporation. The transformation can happen overnight and it’s easy to bring about. You just have to show up and point your finger.”
― Neal Stephenson, Zodiac

“It irritates the hell out of me to be in a situation where I’m forced to do exactly what’s expected.”
― Neal Stephenson, Zodiac

“Find it on the map, you can always get to it. Try to follow someone’s half-assed directions, and once you lose the trail, you’re sunk.”
― Neal Stephenson, Zodiac

“I had to ride my bike to and from their god damn plant way up north in the high-chemical crime district, and reachable only by riding on the shoulder of some major freeways. I could feel the years ticking off my life expectancy as the mile markers struggled by.”
― Neal Stephenson, Zodiac

“There are certain people who are just genetically made to get up at four in the morning and wake everyone else up. They usually become scoutmasters or camp counselors.”
― Neal Stephenson, Zodiac

“That’s actually an idea,” he said. “If the infection got totally out of hand, we might have to save the world by detonating some nukes in the Harbor. We’d lose Boston but it would be worth it.”
― Neal Stephenson, Zodiac

“that’s exactly why I don’t want to move to Europe. Because it’s dirty everywhere. Because nobody has idealism, nobody gives a shit when you expose a toxic criminal. And because after six months there, I won’t have any balls left. Geographic castration.”
― Neal Stephenson, Zodiac

“Let’s say you own a whaling ship that needs a total overhaul. It’s insured for three times its value. You’ve been thinking about getting out of the business. The bank has turned you down for a loan and your five-year-old granddaughter has a whale poster on her bedroom wall. What do you do?” “Put a limpet mine on it and send it to the bottom of the harbor. Then say you’d been getting threats,”
― Neal Stephenson, Zodiac

“Activated charcoal,” I said. “Go home and buy some aquarium charcoal. Grind it up fine, heat it up, and eat it. Give yourself an enema.”
― Neal Stephenson, Zodiac

“The EPA is so anemic, and this country so dirty, that they have to contract out a lot of their work.”
― Neal Stephenson, Zodiac

“One of my uncles grew up in New York and he used to tell me about diving for condoms in the Hudson. There was one stretch where you could dive down, holding your breath like a Polynesian pearl diver, and pick them off the river bottom. They’d dry them out, put them on broomsticks, dust them with talcum powder, roll them up, and sell them for a nickel. This was during the war and there were plenty of sailors in the market.”
― Neal Stephenson, Zodiac

“We all owe a toxic debt to our bodies, and sooner or later it comes due.”
― Neal Stephenson, Zodiac

“I don’t like sewing machines. I don’t understand how a needle with a thread going through the tip of it can interlock the thread by jamming itself into a little goddamn spool. It’s contrary to nature and it irritates me.”
― Neal Stephenson, Zodiac

“These guys were Negro-haters all, and their heros were gigantic black men with clubs, a contradiction I wasn’t brave enough to point out.”
― Neal Stephenson, Zodiac

“You’re paranoid, S.T.,” Jim said.
“I’m alive, too,” I said.”
― Neal Stephenson, Zodiac

“a fortuitous accident.”
― Neal Stephenson, Zodiac

“It was black, the proper color for domestic terrorism during the evening hours,”
― Neal Stephenson, Zodiac

“Of course, happy is a concept for fat Americans. Immigrants don’t seem to care about happy very much. Healthy, wealthy and wise, yes, but happiness alone is something their children worry about, maybe.”
― Neal Stephenson, Zodiac

“It was stupid for a fugitive terrorist to go to a gas station, but in order to be a fugitive you have to fuge, and it's hard to fuge without gas.”
― Neal Stephenson, Zodiac

“I think it’s possible to create some terror just by confronting people with their own sins.”
― Neal Stephenson, Zodiac

“other people’s perfume sticks with you like a bladder infection.”
― Neal Stephenson, Zodiac

“Maybe we should start an institute on nonviolent terrorism.” “Catchy. But if it’s not violent, there’s no terror involved.”
― Neal Stephenson, Zodiac

“It might interest you to know that our state is tired of being used as a chemical toilet so that people in Utah can have plastic lawn furniture.”
― Neal Stephenson, Zodiac

“candelabras”
― Neal Stephenson, Zodiac

“I wanted to shout: one Far Side on the door does not an interesting person make.”
― Neal Stephenson, Zodiac