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Quote - "Too many people thinking too much ... spending all day thinking about things couldn't influence, where did that lead?

Tue, 17/02/2026 - 7:51pm — Carol

“Too many people thinking too much was the key problem with the modern world. Think about your garden, sure, think about what you're going to have for tea, think about some things you have some actual power over, but everybody spending all day thinking about things they couldn't influence, where did that lead?”

 

 

"― Richard Osman, The Impossible Fortune
"

Quotes "... we mustn’t forget all the things still going on in quiet corners. There’s the news, and then there’s life

Tue, 17/02/2026 - 7:38pm — Carol

“When things are noisy, and everyone is asking you to look at something right this instant, we mustn’t forget all the things still going on in quiet corners. There’s the news, and then there’s life..”

 

 

"― Richard Osman, The Impossible Fortune
"

Quote - "obsess over your flaws and weaknesses, constantly update balance sheet of your own personality and find it wanting..

Tue, 17/02/2026 - 7:35pm — Carol

“Joyce’s love for her is unconditional, Joanna knows that, but, really, unconditional love has a huge flaw. If you love me no matter what, who I actually am doesn’t matter. If someone loves your essence, your very being, what can you do to make them love you more or love you less? Nothing: there is no space. So the only option left to you is to continually prod at that unconditional love, to test it and stretch it, to mock it even. And it’s not just that. There is a further problem with unconditional love, isn’t there? Because what if you don’t love yourself? What if, like Joanna, you obsess over your flaws and weaknesses, you constantly update the balance sheet of your own personality and find it wanting? Well, then the unconditional love of a parent is a sign that they simply don’t know you. If they truly knew you, their love would be peppered with caveats. “I love you, but….”

 

 

"― Richard Osman, The Impossible Fortune
"

Quote - "... Any good, therefore, I can do, or any kindness that I can show to any fellow-creature, let me do it now ..."

Sat, 19/07/2025 - 11:10am — Carol

“I expect to pass through this world but
once.  Any good, therefore, I can
do, or any kindness that I can show to any
fellow-creature, let me do it now.  Let me not
defer or neglect it, for I shall not pass this way
again.”

 

 

"Attributed to William Penn."

Quote - "There are broadly two communities of people, living unequal lives–one with rights, freedoms, and access to services..."

Sat, 26/04/2025 - 4:57pm — Carol

Describing what he witnessed as "sobering," Mr George stated: "The
International Court of Justice has deemed Israel an apartheid state.   I
don’t feel qualified to make such a judgment, but I can confirm I
witnessed extreme segregation and discrimination."

He added: "There are broadly two communities of people, living unequal
lives – one with rights, freedoms, and access to services; the other
with restrictions, no right to vote for the government controlling their
lives, and daily hardship."

...

He stressed that achieving peace requires addressing this inequality:
"Seeking peace after decades of conflict can only work if it benefits
both Israelis and Palestinians.

“Achieving this will require political change and herculean diplomatic effort.   Peace can’t come until this inequality ends."

Mr. George proposed a "Two-Stage Solution" as a necessary foundation for future peace:

1.     Full democratic rights – votes for all 

2.     A truth and reconciliation process.

Quote - Conversation Among the Machines the Simple Man and the Commercial Idealist; 14 July 1932

Wed, 26/02/2025 - 8:53pm — Carol

PAGES FROM A
NOTEBOOK

CONVERSATION AMONG THE
MACHINES

THE SIMPLE MAN AND THE
COMMERCIAL IDEALIST.

(By “Aitch-Jay.”’)

"And don’t you think it wonderful (asked
the Guide who was showing us over a great
factory) that the mind of man could have
Invented this?”    The Guide, whose duty it
Was to impress upon all visitors the size and
importance of the factory he was explaining,
made a magnificent gesture towards Q& great
complicated machine which meant nothing
to us. “That,” he said, “is one of the greatest
achievements of mankind. It can produce
goods on a scale unthinkable before. It is
almost human; in fact, it is much more
than human.”

Quote - "We will love her while the light lasts, and when darkness comes, we will not forget her.”

Sun, 15/12/2024 - 1:40pm — Carol

 

Quote - "We will love her while the light lasts, and when darkness comes, we will not forget her.”

 

 

Quote - "disappointment ..."

Tue, 03/12/2024 - 1:38pm — Carol

‘Do animals .. .” she said, and paused to consider, ‘feel disappointment
in each other, Jack, the way humans do?’

‘Well...

‘Or is that what makes us human, the fact that we can feel
immense disappointment in each other?’ She poured herself another
glass of wine.

‘I don’t know,’ said Jack, cautiously. “What do you think?’

‘I wonder if they ever go through the trauma of sensing that
someone they once liked, maybe even loved, is now turning into
someone they don’t respect.’

‘Why do you say that, Martha? Where’s that coming from?’ Jack
was chewing on his cheeks again.

‘Do animals, birds, fish, whatever, fall in and out of love?’

‘I believe they can.’

‘In that case,’ she continued drowsily, ‘can a fish, Jack, listen, can
a fish love another fish, but then one day imagine that they do not in
fact love that fish and that they now love another fish, only to realise at
some later date that they did actually love that first fish more than they
would ever love another fish for the rest of their lives, and therefore
feel that their existence is overcome with a feeling of regret that they

Quote - "We get so tangled up in knots, we humans, trying to think everything through, trying to guess at outcomes ..."

Sat, 19/10/2024 - 9:55am — Carol

‘I learnt a lot of things during the war, Irene,’ he said, after a
pause.   ‘Most of them of no use whatsoever.   But there’s one thing
I can’t unlearn, even if I wanted to, and it’s that life is very short,
and very precious, and if we can’t find a way to be happy in the
one brief span we’re allowed, then there really isn’t a lot of point
to any of it.’   He paused again and Irene finally turned to look at
him.   He smiled slightly, kindly, and she knew he lived in a
different world to the one she did.   ‘So I’ve a proposition for you,
and I don’t want you to think about it too much. We get so
tangled up in knots, we humans, trying to think everything
through, trying to guess at outcomes we can’t possibly know.   So
please just listen. I adore you. Marry me.’

"The Hiding Places 76 hb by  Katherine Webb"

Quote - "Well, I still hate novels..."

Mon, 23/09/2024 - 3:39pm — Carol

August 1814  : Well, I still hate novels. They still seem to me to be tissues of exaggeration, simplification, a sweetness that falsifics; and now I know this truth from, as it were, the inside, having written one myself, and marked all the sleights and tricks required to tease out a very partial understanding, a perished cloth more holes than thread, into what seems a smooth continuous fabric.

"Golden Hill 335 hb by Francis Spufford"

 


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