Cheeky Quote Day! 12 August 2009

Photo by Tansan @ flickr

From Denny: For today's funny and ironic quotes it seems I hit the Mother Lode! In my research I ran across an additional category of Back to School quotes that was most amusing to add to the original idea of the Education category. Parents and kids are going back to school this week in Louisiana, very early in order to make room for any lost days due to hurricanes or if there is a flu outbreak. With some of those frazzled nerves out there from all the pressure of working AND getting kids back to school a few grins were in order...



If there were no schools to take the children away from home part of the time, the insane asylums would be filled with mothers. - Edgar W. Howe

Being a child at home alone in the summer is a high-risk occupation. If you call your mother at work thirteen times an hour, she can hurt you. - Erma Bombeck

Labor Day is a glorious holiday because your child will be going back to school the next day. It would have been called Independence Day, but that name was already taken. - Bill Dodds

You send your child to the schoolmaster, but 'tis the schoolboys who educate him. - Ralph Waldo Emerson

The surest way to corrupt a youth is to instruct him to hold in higher esteem those who think alike than those who think differently. - Friedrich Nietzsche

As long as there are tests, there will be prayer in schools. - Anonymous

I like a teacher who gives you something to take home to think about besides homework. - Lily Tomlin as "Edith Ann"

Often, when I am reading a good book, I stop and thank my teacher. That is, I used to, until she got an unlisted number. - Anonymous

There are three good reasons to be a teacher - June, July, and August. - Anonymous

What we want is to see the child in pursuit of knowledge, and not knowledge in pursuit of the child. - George Bernard Shaw

A professor is someone who talks in someone else's sleep. - W.H. Auden

A cross-eyed teacher can keep twice the number of children in order than any other, because the pupils do not know who she's looking at. - Four Hundred Laughs: Or, Fun Without Vulgarity, compiled and edited by John R. Kemble, 1902

Anyone who thinks the art of conversation is dead ought to tell a child to go to bed. - Robert Gallagher

The only person who is educated is the one who has learned how to learn - and change. - Carl Rogers

My education was only interrupted by my schooling. – Winston Churchill

I have never let my schooling interfere with my education. - Mark Twain

It doesn't make much difference what you study, as long as you don't like it. - Finley Peter Dunne

Education is what remains after one has forgotten what one has learned in school. - Albert Einstein

If you think education is expensive, try ignorance. - Attributed to both Andy McIntyre and Derek Bok



It is a miracle that curiosity survives formal education. – Albert Einstein

Education aims to give you a boost up the ladder of knowledge. Too often, it just gives you a cramp on one of its rungs. - Martin H. Fischer

Education would be much more effective if its purpose was to ensure that by the time they leave school every boy and girl should know how much they do not know, and be imbued with a lifelong desire to know it. - William Haley

Education is an admirable thing, but it is well to remember from time to time that nothing worth knowing can be taught. - Oscar Wilde, "The Critic as Artist," 1890

When a subject becomes totally obsolete we make it a required course. - Peter Drucker

Education is learning what you didn't even know you didn't know. - Daniel J. Boorstin, Democracy and Its Discontents

The founding fathers... provided jails called schools, equipped with tortures called education. School is where you go between when your parents can't take you and industry can't take you. ~ John Updike, The Centaur, 1963



You learn something every day if you pay attention. - Ray LeBlond

I am always ready to learn although I do not always like being taught. - Winston Churchill

Education is the silver bullet. Education is everything. We don't need little changes, we need gigantic revolutionary changes. Schools should be palaces. Competition for the best teachers should be fierce. They should be getting six-figure salaries. Schools should be incredibly expensive for government and absolutely free of charge for its citizens, just like national defense. That is my position. I just haven't figured out how to do it yet. - Aaron Sorkin, The West Wing

The art of being wise is the art of knowing what to overlook. - William James, Principles of Psychology

Intelligence appears to be the thing that enables a man to get along without education. Education enables a man to get along without the use of his intelligence. - Albert Edward Wiggam

Every act of conscious learning requires the willingness to suffer an injury to one's self-esteem. That is why young children, before they are aware of their own self-importance, learn so easily. - Thomas Szasz

The illiterate of the 21st century will not be those who cannot read and write, but those who cannot learn, unlearn, and relearn. - Alvin Toffler

It is impossible for a man to learn what he thinks he already knows. - Epictetus

If a doctor, lawyer, or dentist had 40 people in his office at one time, all of whom had different needs, and some of whom didn't want to be there and were causing trouble, and the doctor, lawyer, or dentist, without assistance, had to treat them all with professional excellence for nine months, then he might have some conception of the classroom teacher's job. - Donald D. Quinn

If the Romans had been obliged to learn Latin, they would never have found time to conquer the world. - Heinrich Heine

The man who doesn't read good books has no advantage over the man who can't read them. - Mark Twain

Good teaching is one-fourth preparation and three-fourths pure theatre. – Gail Goodwin



I read Shakespeare and the Bible, and I can shoot dice. That's what I call a liberal education. - Tallulah Bankhead

America believes in education: the average professor earns more money in a year than a professional athlete earns in a whole week. - Evan Esar, American humorist, 1899-1995

No matter how long you teach a fool, he still knows everything. - Leonid S. Sukhorukov, All About Everything (2005)

In the first place, God made idiots. That was for practice. Then he made school boards. - Mark Twain

Home computers are being called upon to perform many new functions, including the consumption of homework formerly eaten by the dog. - Doug Larson

You can get all A's and still flunk life. - Walker Percy

I think everyone should go to college and get a degree and then spend six months as a bartender and six months as a cabdriver. Then they would really be educated. - Al McGuire

The more that learn to read the less learn how to make a living. That's one thing about a little education. It spoils you for actual work. The more you know the more you think somebody owes you a living. - Will Rogers

Did you know America ranks the lowest in education but the highest in drug use? It's nice to be number one, but we can fix that. All we need to do is start the war on education. If it's anywhere near as successful as our war on drugs, in no time we'll all be hooked on phonics. - Leighann Lord

College is about three things: homework fun and sleep ... but you can only choose two. - Andy Stern


Thanks for visiting!



Society and Culture, United States, Kids and Teens, Ralph Waldo Emerson, Oscar Wilde, Winston Churchill, George Bernard Shaw, Mark Twain, Education, Lily Tomlin

Cheeky Quote Day! 5 August 2009

From Denny: A new quote site I found is CoolNSmart and they sure have some funny ones! They don't give attribution as to who said the quotes though so you lose half of the experience. Other than that they go on for days with the funny sayings.

Listed under their category of Clever Quotes and Sayings are a few goodies to whet your word treat appetite:

* A man likes his wife to be just clever enough to appreciate his cleverness, and just stupid enough to admire it.

* A clever man commits no minor blunders.

* How clever you are, my dear! You never mean a single word you say. (Could this be wife to former President Bush...?)

* I am so clever that sometimes I don’t understand a single word of what I am saying. (Now we know this is a Bush quote.)

* It’s good to be clever, but not to show it.

* To love oneself is the beginning of a lifelong romance. (This sounds a lot like Oscar Wilde.)

* Clever people master life; the wise illuminate it and create fresh difficulties. (Love this one!)

* Copying from a single source is called plagiarism, copying from multiple source is called research. (Excepting when you site and/or quote them!)

* If you’re not very clever you should be conciliatory.

* Two things are infinite : the universe and human stupidity; I’m not sure about the universe.

* A lawyer with a briefcase can steal more than a thousand men with guns.

* Nothing shows a man’s character more than what he laughs at.

* Between thought and expression lies a lifetime.

* If you try to fail and succeed, then which have you done?

And under the category of Men Quotes (I'll equally skewer my fellow women on another Cheeky Quote Day, never fear!):

* If you never want to see a man again, say, ‘I love you, I want to marry you. I want to have children…’ - they leave skid marks.

* There are three stages of man: He believes in Santa Claus; he doesn’t believe in Santa Claus; he is Santa Claus.

* The best way to get a man to do something is to suggest they are too old for it. (Works every time!)

* Man has will, but woman has her way.

* If you want something said, ask a man; if you want something done, ask a woman.

* A gentleman is simply a patient wolf. (Yeah, but at least they have more finesse.)

* Never trust a husband too far or a bachelor too near.

* To be happy with a man you must understand him a lot and love him a little. To be happy with a woman you must love her a lot and not try to understand her at all.

* I think men who have a pierced ear are better prepared for marriage. They’ve experienced pain and bought jewelry.

Hike on over to their site for more grins! Have a good work week!

Note: BTW, there wasn't any This Week: Roundup of Sundays Funnies because they were no updates on their site yet for this week. Guess all the internationaly breaking news took precedence over the funnies updating of the late night shows.

Clown Photo by Tansan @ flickr


Santa Claus, George W. Bush, Cheeky Quote Day, Kids and Teens, People and Society, Quotations, Holidays, Christmas, Oscar Wilde

Cheeky Quote Day! 15 July 2009

From Denny: The folks over at Quote Garden have collected an hilarious bunch of Curmudgeon Quotes, of all things to categorize! Well, to my mind, that’s just an invitation to plug their site and place those quotes under a Cheeky Quote Day post!

I’m a sociable person; however, the majority of my relatives are curmudgeons and extreme sport pessimists. I guess I missed the grumpy gene – and my grandfather too. Of course, in my mind (it sure does get busy in there...), grumpy people are basically not mentally tough and don’t want to learn how.

Sure, Life jumps up and bites you hard on the butt, sometimes more often than any of us want to deal with, but the mentally tough figure out coping strategies to work through the situation until it improves or dissipates. I’ve always used humor, writing, meditation and exercise to accomplish that goal.

When I read some of these quotes it made me laugh as I recognized a lot of my relatives, former bosses, the surly grocery cashier and negative teachers, you name it. It’s like someone who was quoted from a 100 years ago actually met the same people I know! See how many people you recognize in your life!

Quotes

“A cynic is a person searching for an honest man, with a stolen lantern.” ~ Edgar A. Shoaff

“It is not a fragrant world.” ~ Raymond Chandler

“I don't answer the phone. I get the feeling whenever I do that there will be someone on the other end.” ~ Fred Couples

“I love mankind - its people I can't stand.” ~ Charles M. Schulz, Go Fly a Kite, Charlie Brown

“Sarcasm is the sour cream of wit.” ~ Author Unknown

“There are people who have an appetite for grief; pleasure is not strong enough and they crave pain. They have mithridatic stomachs which must be fed on poisoned bread, natures so doomed that no prosperity can sooth their ragged and dishevelled desolation.” ~ Ralph Waldo Emerson

“A cynic knows the price of everything and the value of nothing.” ~ Oscar Wilde, Lady Windermere's Fan, 1893

“I've always been interested in people, but I've never liked them.” ~ W. Somerset Maugham

“When we are born, we cry that we are come to this great stage of fools.” ~ William Shakespeare, King Lear

“Nothing is more miserable than man,
Of all upon the earth that breathes and creeps.”
~ Homer, Iliad

“I hate to be near the sea, and to hear it raging and roaring like a wild beast in its den. It puts me in mind of the everlasting efforts of the human mind, struggling to be free and ending just where it began.” ~ William Hazlitt

“We can destroy ourselves by cynicism and disillusion, just as effectively as by bombs.” ~ Kenneth Clark

“Sometimes you wake up in the morning and wish your parents had never met.” ~ Bill Fitch

“Men hate to be misunderstood, and to be understood makes them furious.” ~ Edgar Saltus

“Things are not as bad as they seem. They are worse.” ~ Bill Press

“Happiness in intelligent people is the rarest thing I know.” ~ Ernest Hemingway

“The Bible tells us to love our neighbors, and also to love our enemies; probably because they are generally the same people.” ~ G.K. Chesterton


Bozo Sapiens Photo by I'm Fantastic! @ flickr

Cheeky Quote Day! 27 May 2009

Photo by I'm Fantastic @ flickr

From Denny: OK, I admit it, I’ve dyed my hair so many colors over the years that I actually like these dumb blonde jokes now! This one is a grinner.

How is this joke a cheeky quote? I’ll answer that question with yet another question: Do you realize just how many dumb blonde jokes have been floating around out there on the internet? Sooner or later you just knew one would be quoted here! :)

Cheeky Quotes are always welcome too from the famous writer Oscar Wilde, one wild character and totally larger than life! His was a twisted humor, using truth to illustrate paradox and hypocrisy of society - why he has remained one of my favorites.

*****

Herding Sheep Image via Wikipedia

Counting Sheep

The blonde from Casper had been the brunt of dumb blonde jokes all her life and finally decided to do something about it. Boldly, she entered a beauty salon and had her hair dyed auburn. The change was immediate and drastic.

Suddenly people began to treat her with respect and her self-esteem grew daily. One afternoon she went for a drive in the country-side and happened upon a band of sheep and a herder. Deciding to test her new-found confidence and skill, she stopped and visited with the herder. After charming the herder, she made him a proposition.

She said, "I’d love to have one of those sheep as a pet. Do you suppose if I guessed the exact number you have in your herd you could let me have one to take home?"

The herder, thinking there was no way in the world she could guess the exact number said, "Why sure, little lady, you go ahead and guess."

The auburn/blonde said, "You have exactly 1053 head of sheep.

The herder could not believe it. She had guessed the number right on the button. Chagrined, he told her to go ahead and pick out a sheep to take home. She wandered through the whole herd finally making her selection at the far edge of the flock. Carrying it back to her car, she put it in the back seat. As she was about to drive off, the herder came running towards her car frantically yelling,

"Wait, wait!" She rolled down her window to see what he wanted and he said, "I’ve got a proposition for you. If I can guess the exact color of your hair before you dyed it, can I have my dog back?"



Photo by anaxila @ flickr

From famous humor writer Oscar Wilde:

"A little sincerity is a dangerous thing, and a great deal of it is absolutely fatal."

"Disobedience, in the eyes of any one who has read history, is human's original virtue. It is through disobedience that progress has been made, through disobedience and through rebellion."

"Moderation is a fatal thing. Nothing succeeds like excess."

"We are all in the gutter, but some of us are looking at the stars."

"Always forgive your enemies; nothing annoys them so much."


From Denny: Enjoy the rest of your work week! If you need some more laughs to get through the week I've collected all kinds of funny things over at my humor blog, Ouch Outrageous Obnoxious And Odd, go here.

Libations Friday! 17 April 2009

Featured today is a new coffee recipe, two amusing short poems, some wonderful quotes we know well today in our time period and a few highlights of this famous writer's life: Robert Louis Stevenson.

***

A wonderful coffee recipe from BetterRecipes.com:

Mochacinno Diablo

Coffee, chocolate, cinnamon and a little kick of cayenne make this tall, frosty drink a great mid-day pick me up!

Ingredients:

2 cups cold espresso or double strength coffee

1 cup dry powdered milk

1/4 cup turbinado (raw) sugar

1/4 teaspoon cocoa powder

1/8 teaspoon ground cinnamon

Dash cayenne pepper

1 1/2 cups ice

1/4 teaspoon vanilla extract

Optional Topping:

Diablo Whipped Cream

1/2 cup whipped cream + dash cayenne

Directions: Place all Mochacinno Diablo ingredients in a blender and mix on high until smooth & frosty. Pour into glasses and top with Diablo whipped cream, if desired.

Notes: If you've never tried raw turbinado sugar in your coffee, you are missing a real treat.

Number of Servings: 2

Submitted by: bevjmo10

Photo by Ballistick Coffee Boy @ flickr

***

Here’s are two short poems I should have included on Cheeky Quote Day that will make you grin! From an historical poet, Robert Louis Stevenson (1850-1894), come the 19th century equivalent of their idea of Haiku.

Whole Duty of Children

A child should always say what's true
And speak when he is spoken to,
And behave mannerly at table;
At least as far as he is able.


Looking Forward

When I am grown to man's estate
I shall be very proud and great,
And tell the other girls and boys
Not to meddle with my toys.

***

Image via Wikipedia

Robert Louis Stevenson: Biography Highlights

Stevenson was born in Edinburgh, Scotland in November 1850, an only child. During childhood he spent a lot of time with his maternal grandfather who was a minister and a grand storyteller, instilling in young Robert a love of it as well.

Robert spent most of his childhood winters in bed as he had a delicate constitution. He loved to read Shakespeare, Sir Walter Scott, John Bunyan and The Arabian Nights. A love of reading and his imagination kept him company during those long winters.

Though his family had several generations of lighthouse engineers by 1867 he attended the University of Edinburgh and soon realized he preferred literature. He also acquired a law degree, much to his father’s delight, and was admitted to the bar at the age of twenty-five.

For the next four years Robert went traveling around Europe, mostly Paris. He published essays and articles about his travels, becoming known as a gifted travel writer. By 1876, he met his future wife, Fanny Vandegrift Osbourne. She was not only ten years older than him but also still married.

Soon after they met she decided to return to San Francisco and Robert followed her like any young man in love. Stevenson thought it a brilliant idea to add authenticity to his writing that he travel in steerage. It was almost the death of him as he was close to death when he arrived in Monterey, California by 1879. Nursed back to health he married Fanny the following May once she was divorced.



Photo of Fanny Osbourne shortly before she met Stevenson.

After a few months in America, Stevenson and Fanny returned to Britain with her young son. It was amazing how much writing he was able to produce though he was frequently sick. It was during this difficult time that he wrote his best-loved work. Treasure Island was published in 1884. A Child’s Garden of Verses followed that in 1885. By 1886, he had published The Strange Case of Doctor Jekyll and Mr. Hyde.



During his lifetime Stevenson was immensely popular and a successful writer. He was admired by his writing peers like Ernest Hemingway (born after Stevenson's death), Rudyard Kipling and J. M. Barrie (who wrote Peter Pan). Even popular author Henry James was a vocal supporter of his.



Photo via last.fm

When Stevenson’s father died in 1887, he was off again on his travels back to America. Quite the ambitious sailor he sailed in the Pacific on a chartered yacht with extended stays in the Hawaiian Islands.

By 1890, Stevenson purchased a 400 acre estate on Upolu in the Samoan Islands. It didn’t take him long to get involved in local politics. He even adopted the local native name of Tusitala which means “Story Writer.”

Unfortunately, by 1894, Stevenson had become depressed. He seemed to think his best work was behind not ahead of him, apparently not satisfied to rest on his laurels. He was so depressed that he spoke of how he wished his illnesses would kill him. By December 3rd of that year he got his wish.

When the modernistic aesthetic came along he was set aside and his work fell out of favor. Eventually, he was relegated to the level of only contributing to children’s literature.

As often happens to good writers of a different age, he was ignored during the 20th century and excluded from the Norton and Oxford anthologies of literature. Guess what? Upon retrospection - or embarrassment from sheer pettiness - they now include him.

Talk about the importance level. Who is ranked among the 25 most translated authors of all time? He’s ahead of the beloved Oscar Wilde, Charles Dickens and even Edgar Allen Poe. You guessed right: Robert Louis Stevenson. The readers rest their case.

***



Photo of portrait painted by famous artist John Singer Sargeant. Stevenson paces in his dining room with his wife Fanny seated in Indian dress off to the side.

Some quotes Stevenson:

"A friend is a present you give yourself.

An aspiration is a joy forever, a possession as solid as a landed estate.

Keep your fears to yourself, but share your courage with others.

Quiet minds cannot be perplexed or frightened, but go on in fortune or misfortune at their own private pace, like a clock during a thunderstorm.

So long as we love we serve;
So long as we are loved by others,
I would almost say that we are indispensable;
And no one is useless while they have a friend.

The mark of a good action is that it appears inevitable in retrospect.

The saints are the sinners who keep going.

Don't judge each day by the harvest you reap, but by the seeds you plant.

Our business in life is not to succeed, but to continue to fail in good spirits.

To be what we are, and to become what we are capable of becoming is the only end of life."

Oscar Wilde: Brilliant AND Funniest Playwright

From Denny: Oh, what a treat! I get to blog... drumroll, please, about myself! (Talk about weird but the show must go on...) I started the usual raucous Cheeky Quote Day here at The Social Poets with the idea of a short bio on a funny talented guy from the past: Oscar Wilde. Well, you know how it goes, one thing led to another and before I knew it, well, it was a full-fledged article flying out of the crazy bird nest!

So, I added it to my HubPages list of writings. It reads like a breezy post giving the highlights of a man's life and career. Also listed is my favorite funny movie based on his work: The Ideal Husband.

Biographies always make for good writing prompts; try it sometime of a favorite person you enjoy! For easier navigation just right click on the title link to open a new window to keep your place here at your online coffeehouse. Thanks for visiting!

Oscar Wilde: Brilliant AND Funniest Playwright:

"The Noncomformist Oscar Wilde

A bit about the witty Irish sardonic poet and playwright Oscar Wilde…"

By Denny Lyon

Photo of cheeky Wilde monument in Dublin, Ireland that surely would have amused him greatly by anaxila @ flickr