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I [...] Vowed That Rather Than Let Alzheimer's Take Me, I Would Take It. I Would Live My Life As Ever To The Full And Die, before The Disease Mounted Its Last attack, In My Own Home, In A Chair On The Lawn, With A Brandy In My Hand To Wash Down Whatever Modern version Of The "brompton Cocktail" Some helpful Medic Could Supply. And With thomas Tallis On My Ipod, I Would Shake Hands With Death.

-Terry Pratchett

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I [...] Vowed That

Terry Pratchett

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I [...] Vowed That Rather Than Let Alzheimer's Take Me, I Would Take It. I Would Live My Life As Ever To The Full And Die, before The Disease Mounted Its Last attack, In My Own Home, In A Chair On The Lawn, With A Brandy In My Hand To Wash Down Whatever Modern version Of The "brompton Cocktail" Some helpful Medic Could Supply. And With thomas Tallis On My Ipod, I Would Shake Hands With Death.

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The Hippo Of Recollection Stirred In The Muddy Waters Of The Mind.

Nothing I Can Say Or Devise, And Nothing Anybody Else Can Say Or Devise, Is Going To Be Perfect.

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It's Never A Good Idea To Ask A Man On A Tight-rope How He Keeps His Balance: A) He Would Probably Fall Off And B) He Probably Doesn't Know What The Muscles Are Called In Any Case.

What Did They Feed The Lions And Tigers With In The Ark, Sir?

That Was Always The Dream, Wasn't It? 'i Wish I'd Known Then What I Know Now'? But When You Got Older You Found Out That You Now Wasn't You Then. You Then Was A Twerp. You Then Was What You Had To Be To Start Out On The Rocky Road Of Becoming You Now, And One Of The Rocky Patches On That Road Was Being A Twerp.

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The Baby Boomers Are Getting Older, And Will Stay Older For Longer. And They Will Run Right Into The Dementia Firing Range. How Will A Society Cope? Especially A Society That Can't So Readily Rely On Those Stable Family Relationships That Traditionally Provided The Backbone Of Care?

No One Thinks That Young Adults Read Hooks For Young Adults, Books For Young Adults Are Read By Kids.

All He Knew Was That You Couldn't Hope To Try For The Big Stuff, Like World Peace And Happiness, But You Might Just About Be Able To Achieve Some Tiny Deed That'd Make The World, In A Small Way, A Better Place. Like Shooting Someone.

If There's One Thing That Really Annoys A God, It's Not Knowing Something.

You Call Yourself Some Kind Of Goddess And You Know Nothing, Madam, Nothing. What Don't Die Can't Live. What Don't Live Can't Change. What Don't Change Can't Learn. The Smallest Creature That Dies In The Grass Knows More Than You.

Just Because Things Are Obvious Doesn't Mean They're True.

Studies Have Shown That An Ant Can Carry One Hundred Times Its Own Weight, But There Is No Known Limit To The Lifting Power Of The Average Tiny Eighty-year-old Spanish Peasant Grandmother.

Lots Of People Would Be As Cowardly As Me If They Were Brave Enough.

After You've Been Working Fairly Intensively On A Novel For Six Months You Never Want To See The Damn Thing Again.

Poetic Simile Was Strictly Limited To Statements Like 'his Mighty Steed Was As Fleet As The Wind On A Fairly Calm Day, Say About Force Three,' And Any Loose Talk About A Beloved Having A Face That Launched A Thousand Ships Would Have To Be Backed By Evidence That The Object Of Desire Did Indeed Look Like A Bottle Of Champagne.

There Was A Man And He Had Eight Sons. Apart From That, He Was Nothing More Than A Comma On The Page Of History. It's Sad, But That's All You Can Say About Some People.

Books Must Be Treated With Respect, We Feel That In Our Bones, Because Words Have Power. Bring Enough Words Together They Can Bend Space And Time.

You Can't Go Around Building A Better World For People. Only People Can Build A Better World For People. Otherwise It's Just A Cage. Besides You Don't Build A Better World By Choppin' Heads Off And Giving Decent Girls Away To Frogs.

Incidentally, It's Best Not To Argue With The Nursing Staff. I Find The Best Course Of Action Is To Throw Some Chocolates In One Direction And Hurry Off In The Other While Their Attention Is Distracted.

I Don't Want Unnecessary Violence, Sergeant," Said Blouse. "right You Are, Sir!" Said The Sergeant. "carborundum! First Man Comes Through That Door Runnin', I Want Him Nailed To The Wall!" He Caught The Lieutenant's Eye, And Added: "but Not Too Hard!

It's Tough At The Top. It's Tough At The Bottom. But In Between You Could Use Them For Horse-shoes.

Fantasy Doesn't Have To Be Fantastic. American Writers In Particular Find This Much Harder To Grasp. You Need To Have Your Feet On The Ground As Much As Your Head In The Clouds. The Cute Dragon That Sits On Your Shoulder Also Craps All Down Your Back, But This Makes It More Interesting Because It Gives It An Added Dimension.

In Genua, Someone Set Out To Make Dreams Come True. Remember Some Of Your Dreams?

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When You're All Singing Together, It Brings Things Together. I Know The Songs That My Grandfather And My Father Sang.

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Do You Think There’s Anything To Eat In This Forest?” “yes,” Said The Wizard Bitterly, “us.

The Trouble With Having An Open Mind, Of Course, Is That People Will Insist On Coming Along And Trying To Put Things In It.

You Know What I'd Really, Really Like? What I'd Pay Money For? A Zx81 With A Disc Drive. I Understood The Zx81. It Was So Easy To Interface Stuff To It.

I Get It,' Said The Prisoner. 'good Cop, Bad Cop, Eh?' If You Like.' Said Vimes. 'but We're A Bit Short Staffed Here, So If I Give You A Cigarette Would You Mind Kicking Yourself In The Teeth?

Good And Bad Is Tricky," She Said. "i Ain't Too Certain About Where People Stand. P'raps What Matters Is Which Way You Face." (pp. 348-349)

When People Say Things Are A Lot More Complicated Than That, They Means They're Getting Worried That They Won't Like The Truth.

...inside Every Old Person Is A Young Person Wondering What Happened.

I Found While Driving In Wyoming That Wearing A Stetson And Driving A Beat-up Pickup Meant You Could Go As Fast As You Like, While The Police Picked Up Californian Winnebagos That Went One Mph Over 55. After All, They Wanted To Bring Money Into The State, Not Merely Circulate It.

Look At Satan. Created As An Angel, Grows Up To Be The Great Adversary. Hey, If You’re Going To Go On About Genetics, You Might As Well Say The Kid Will Grow Up To Be An Angel. After All, His Father Was Really Big In Heaven In The Old Days. Saying He’ll Grow Up To Be A Demon Just Because His Dad Became One Is Like Saying A Mouse With Its Tail Cut Off Will Give Birth To Tailless Mice. No. Upbringing Is Everything. Take It From Me.

I Discovered Fantasy And Science Fiction When I Was About 10, And Read Nothing Else For About Three Years. I Ran Out Of All The Books That There Were To Read In The Library. I Was Keen On Reading Stuff That Took Me To Other Places.

And When The Patrician Was Unhappy, He Became Very Democratic. He Found Intricate And Painful Ways Of Spreading That Unhappiness As Far As Possible.

I Have A Living Will And I Have Friends, And I Have Money And I Have Hope.

It Is At This Point That Normal Language Gives Up, And Goes And Has A Drink.

It’s Quite Easy To Accidentally Overhear People Talking Downstairs If You Hold An Upturned Glass To The Floorboards And Accidentally Put Your Ear To It.

These People Were Not Only Cheering, They Were Throwing Flowers And Hats. The Hats Were Made Of Stone, But The Thought Was There.

Evil In General Does Not Sleep, And Therefore Doesn't See Why Anyone Else Should.

If You Are Going To Write, Say, Fantasy - Stop Reading Fantasy. You've Already Read Too Much. Read Other Things; Read Westerns, Read History, Read Anything That Seems Interesting, Because If You Only Read Fantasy And Then You Start To Write Fantasy, All You're Going To Do Is Recycle The Same Old Stuff And Move It Around A Bit.

This Wasn't Food - It Was What Food Became If It Had Been Good And Gone To Food Heaven.

Destiny Is Important, See, But People Go Wrong When They Think It Controls Them. It's The Other Way Around.

People Are Often So Busy Living That They Never Stop To Wonder Why.

It Is True That Words Have Power, And One Of The Things They Are Able To Do Is Get Out Of Someone’s Mouth Before The Speaker Has The Chance To Stop Them.

When People Say "how Do You Write A Book, How Does It All Happen?" I Say, You Line Things Up, And You Line Them Up As Actually As You Possibly Can, But Sooner Or Later The Book Has Got Momentum And It's Moving Along Under That Momentum. It's Like A Sculpture, If You're Working With The Grain Of The Wood, The Wood Will Start Defining What Shape It's Going To Become.

People Couldn't Become Truly Holy, He Said, Unless They Also Had The Opportunity To Be Definitively Wicked.

And, While It Was Regarded As Pretty Good Evidence Of Criminality To Be Living In A Slum, For Some Reason Owning A Whole Street Of Them Merely Got You Invited To The Very Best Social Occasions.

It Was Also A Room Full Of Books And Made Of Books. There Was No Actual Furniture; This Is To Say, The Desk And Chairs Were Shaped Out Of Books. It Looked As Though Many Of Them Were Frequently Referred To, Because They Lay Open With Other Books Used As Bookmarks.

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