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It Is Much, Much Worse To Receive Bad News Through The Written Word Than By Somebody Simply Telling You, And I’m Sure You Understand Why. When Somebody Simply Tells You Bad News, You Hear It Once, And That’s The End Of It. But When Bad News Is Written Down, Whether In A Letter Or A Newspaper Or On Your Arm In Felt Tip Pen, Each Time You Read It, You Feel As If You Are Receiving The Bad News Again And Again.

-Daniel Handler

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It Is Much, Much

Daniel Handler

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It Is Much, Much Worse To Receive Bad News Through The Written Word Than By Somebody Simply Telling You, And I’m Sure You Understand Why. When Somebody Simply Tells You Bad News, You Hear It Once, And That’s The End Of It. But When Bad News Is Written Down, Whether In A Letter Or A Newspaper Or On Your Arm In Felt Tip Pen, Each Time You Read It, You Feel As If You Are Receiving The Bad News Again And Again.

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I Find Reading Screenplays Difficult, As They're Only A Roadmap For What A Movie Might End Up Being.

Dead Women Tell No Tales. Sad Men Write Them Down.

There Is No Way Of Knowing For Sure Whether Or Not You Can Trust Someone, For The Simple Reason That Circumstances Change All Of The Time.

Accidents Happen All The Time.

Accidents Happen

There Are Many, Many Types Of Books In The World, Which Makes Good Sense, Because There Are Many, Many Types Of People, And Everybody Wants To Read Something Different.

Like Most Writers, I Look Back On All Of My Finished Works With Utter Regret, And The Trouble With Writing A Series Of Novels Is That You Have To Go Back And Read Them, And Make Sure That You Haven't Forgotten Anything You've Created, And Then When You Do That, You're Faced With Your Own Mistakes On Every Trick, From The Wrong Word In Places To Entirely The Wrong Incident.

How Do You Do?" Said Violet. "how Do You Do?" Said Klaus. "odo Yow!" Said Sunny.

You Know, There's A Big World Out There Filled With Desperate Orphans Who Would Gladly Swim Across An Ocean Of Thumbtacks Just To Be Eclipsed By The Long Shadow That Is Cast By My Accomplishments.

All Cannot Be Lost When There Is Still So Much Being Found

I Know What Is Going On," Said Sir. "i Am The Boss! Of Course I Know!

With The Publishing Of The Basic Eight, It Was Often Assumed That I Was Really Immature And Callow, And With The Publishing Of Watch Your Mouth, It Was Assumed That I Was Oversexualized, And With Lemony Snicket, It's Often Assumed That I'm Erudite And Depressed. But All The Voices More Or Less Came Naturally To Me.

Labor Day Is A Holiday Honoring Those Who Work For A Living. Laborious Day Is A Lesser Known Holiday Honoring Those Who Cannot Stop Talking About Their Work.

It Is A Miracle If You Can Find True Friends, And It Is A Miracle If You Have Enough Food To Eat, And It Is A Miracle If You Get To Spend Your Days And Evenings Doing Whatever It Is You Like To Do, And The Holiday Season - Like All The Other Seasons - Is A Good Time Not Only To Tell Stories Of Miracles, But To Think About The Miracles In Your Own Life, And To Be Grateful For Them, And That's The End Of This Particular Story.

The Whole Thing Of What I’ve Been Trying,” You Said, “is That You’re Different, And You Keep Asking About The Other Girls, But What I Mean Is That I Don’t Think About Them, Because Of The Way You Are.

But The Law Is An Odd Thing. For Instance, One Country In Europe Has A Law That Requires All Its Bakers To Sell Bread At The Exact Same Price. A Certain Island Has A Law That Forbids Anyone From Removing Its Fruit. And A Town Not Too Far From Where You Live Has A Law That Bars Me From Coming Within Five Miles Of Its Borders.

Members Of Your Family Might Say They Are Working Hard All Day Long, While You Are Off At School Or Clarinet Lessons, But The Only Way To Know This For Sure Is To Follow Them At A Discreet Distance.

Stealing, Of Course, Is A Crime, And A Very Impolite Thing To Do. But Like Most Impolite Things, It Is Excusable Under Certain Circumstances. Stealing Is Not Excusable If, For Instance, You Are In A Museum And You Decide That A Certain Painting Would Look Better In Your House, And You Simply Grab The Painting And Take It There. But If You Were Very, Very Hungry, And You Had No Way Of Obtaining Money, It Would Be Excusable To Grab The Painting, Take It To Your House, And Eat It.

A Girl Meets A Boy, Ed, And Everything Changes, Or So She Says.

There Is A Pair Of Snakes Who Have Learned To Drive A Car So Recklessly That They Would Run You Over In The Street And Never Stop To Apologize.

There Was Something I Was Always Very Good At, However, And That Was Teaching Myself Not To Be Frightened While Frightening Things Are Going On. It Is Difficult To Do This, But I Had Learned. It Is Simply A Matter Of Putting One’s Fear Aside, Like The Vegetable On The Plate You Don’t Want To Touch Until All Of Your Rice And Chicken Are Gone, And Getting Frightened Later, When One Is Out Of Danger. Sometimes I Imagine I Will Be Frightened For The Rest Of My Life Because Of All Of The Fear I Put Aside During My Time In Stain’d-by-the-sea.

...everyone Was Right About You- Prove Them Wrong.

Prove Them Wrong

What Happens In A Certain Place Can Stain Your Feelings For That Location, Just As Ink Can Stain A White Sheet.

Are You Ready?" Klaus Asked Finally. "no," Sunny Answered. "me Neither," Violet Said, "but If We Wait Until We're Ready We'll Be Waiting For The Rest Of Our Lives, Let's Go.

Even The Best Plans Can Change If There's An Accident.

And A Refrigerator May Hold A Basket Of Strawberries, Which Would Be Important If A Maniac Said To You, "if You Don't Give Me A Basket Of Strawberries Right Now, I'm Going To Poke You With This Large Stick." But When The Two Elder Baudelaires And Quigley Quagmire Opened The Refrigerator, They Found Nothing That Would Help Someone Who Was Wounded, Dying Of Thirst, Or Being Threatened By A Strawberry-crazed, Stick-carrying Maniac.

I Never Thought About Whether Film Is Inherently More Sincere, Because Certainly I Think If Guy Maddin Had Directed A Series Of Unfortunate Events, There Probably Could Have Been More Of The Stage-y Irony That Is In The Books. But I Was Just Interested To See What People Would Do With It, And Worrying That Brad Silberling Wouldn't Do What I Had In Mind.

They Were Almond Cookies, Although They Could Have Been Made Of Spinach And Shoes For All I Cared. I Ate Eleven Of Them, Right In A Row. It Is Rude To Take The Last Cookie.

I Go To Bed Early And Rise Late And Feel As If I Have Hardly Slept, Probably Because I Have Been Reading Almost The Entire Time.

There Was Still Plenty Of Water In The Basement, And I Felt It Soaking Me From The Knees On Down. If Someone Wanted To Torture Me Until I Told Them A Critical Piece Of Information, All They Would Have To Do Is Get My Socks Wet. It Feels Terrible.

Miracles Are Like Pimples, Because Once You Start Looking For Them You Find More Than You Ever Dreamed You'd See.

It Is Always Cruel To Laugh At People, Of Course, Although Sometimes If They Are Wearing An Ugly Hat It Is Hard To Control Yourself.

Sometime During Your Life—in Fact, Very Soon—you May Find Yourself Reading A Book, And You May Notice That A Book’s First Sentence Can Often Tell You What Sort Of Story Your Book Contains.

Finding Yourself

Nobody Wants To Fall Into A Safety Net, Because It Means The Structure In Which They've Been Living Is In A State Of Collapse And They Have No Choice But To Tumble Downwards. However, It Beats The Alternative.

For Beatrice- When We Were Together I Felt Breathless. Now You Are.

I Don't Know Why Wicked Places Generally Look Wicked. You'd Think They'd Look Nice, To Fool People, But They Hardly Ever Do.

I Wrote Rick Before I Was Published, And I Had No Vision Of It, Really. It Was Just A Story That Occurred To Me, And That Put Its Little Claws In My Brain, And I Wrote It, And I Showed It To A Couple People, And They All Said, "this Is Ghastly."

If You Are Trying To Fool A Farsighted Or Dimwitted Person, A Veiled Facial Disguise Might Be Enough.

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In Love, As In Life, One Misheard Word Can Be Tremendously Important. If You Tell Someone You Love Them, For Instance, You Must Be Absolutely Certain That They Have Replied "i Love You Back" And Not "i Love Your Back" Before You Continue The Conversation.

Someone You Love

And Then Like A Song We'd Forgotten Was Even On The Mix, You Stepped Into The House And My Whole Life.

I Have A Dream Of What Would Have Happened If What Happened Instead Hadn't.

Never Look A Gift Lion In The Mouth.

Hup Hup Ha Ha Hammy Hee Hee!

I'm Always Interested To See What Films Are Made Of Books. I Kind Of Don't Participate As A Filmgoer In Any Kind Of Debate About What's Better, The Book Or The Movie. So I Think It's Interesting When People Want To Do It.

This Is An Absurd Moral, For You And I Both Know That Sometimes Not Only Is It Good To Lie, It Is Necessary To Lie.

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Friends For Life

Like A Lot Of People Whose Children Were Small In The 2000s, I Read [daniel Handler] Books Out Loud And I Loved Them.

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The Sea Is Nothing But A Library Of All The Tears In History.

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What Should We Call Him?" Klaus Asked. "you Should Call Him Dr. Montgomery," Mr. Poe Replied, "unless He Tells You To Call Him Montgomery. Both His First And Last Names Are Montgomery, So It Doesn't Make Much Difference." "his Name Is Montgomery Montgomery?" Klaus Said, Smiling. "yes, And I'm Sure He's Very Sensitive About That, So Don't Ridicule Him," Mr. Poe Said, Coughing Again Into His Handkerchief.

Hal Is On His Way." The Nurse Announced Reentering The Room.

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First Impression

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I Am Heartbroken, But I Have Been Heartbroken Before, And This Might Be The Best For Which I Can Hope.

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Nowhere In The World Is Safe," Count Olaf Said. Not With You Around," Violet Agreed. I'm No Worse Than Anyone Else," Count Olaf Said.

Anyone Who Thinks The Pen Is Mightier Than The Sword Has Not Been Stabbed With Both.

Normally It Is Not Polite To Go Into Somebody’s Room Without Knocking, But You Can Make An Exception If The Person Is Dead, Or Pretending To Be Dead.

Sometimes, Just Saying That You Hate Something, And Having Someone Agree With You, Can Make You Feel Better About A Terrible Situation.

One Of The Remarkable Things About Love Is That, Despite Very Irritating People Writing Poems And Songs About How Pleasant It Is, It Really Is Quite Pleasant.

If We Wait Until We're Ready, We'll Be Waiting For The Rest Of Our Lives.

[i]t Was The Color Of Someone Buying You An Ice Cream Cone For No Reason At All.

I Often Can't Remember Which Scenes Are And Aren't In The Final Product, Because I Saw So Many Different Versions Of The Lemony Snicket That I Forget Which Ended Up On The Cutting-room Floor.

A Passport, As I'm Sure You Know, Is A Document That One Shows To Government Officials Whenever One Reaches A Border Between Two Countries, So That The Official Can Learn Who You Are, Where You Were Born, And How You Look When Photographed Unflatteringly.

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There Are Times To Stay Put, And What You Want Will Come To You, And There Are Times To Go Out Into The World And Find Such A Thing For Yourself.

There Is No Worse Sound In The World Than Someone Who Cannot Play The Violin But Insists On Doing So Anyway.

When I Was Researching My Very First Novel, "the Basic Eight," I Was Calling Right-wing Political And Religious Organizations And Asking Them To Mail Me Their Material So That I Could Mock Them In My Novels.

It Is Very Useful, When One Is Young, To Learn The Difference Between "literally" And "figuratively." If Something Happens Literally, It Actually Happens; If Something Happens Figuratively, It Feels Like It Is Happening. If You Are Literally Jumping For Joy, For Instance, It Means You Are Leaping In The Air Because You Are Very Happy. If You Are Figuratively Jumping For Joy, It Means You Are So Happy That You Could Jump For Joy, But Are Saving Your Energy For Other Matters.

I Like To Give People Novels I Think They Would Like, On No Particular Occasion - Just When We're In A Bookstore Together. I Like To Receive Reference Books On My Birthday.

Literature Doesn’t Exactly Have A Strong Mental-health Track Record.

One Of The Most Difficult Things To Think About In Life Is One’s Regrets. Something Will Happen To You, And You Will Do The Wrong Thing, And For Years Afterward You Will Wish You Had Done Something Different.

My Chauffer Once Told Me That I Would Feel Better In The Morning, But When I Woke Up The Two Of Us Were Still On A Tiny Island Surrounded By Man-eating Crocodiles, And, As I'm Sure You Can Understand, I Didn't Feel Any Better About It.

Blinded Following The Blindfolded

A Good Library Will Never Be Too Neat, Or Too Dusty, Because Somebody Will Always Be In It, Taking Books Off The Shelves And Staying Up Late Reading Them.

Thought Provoking

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Most Schools Have A Loud System Of Loud Bells, Which Startle The Students And Teachers At Regular Intervals And Remind Them That Time Is Passing Even More Slowly Than It Seems.

A Newspaper, As I'm Sure You Know, Is A Collection Of Supposedly True Stories Written Down By Writers Who Either Saw Them Happen Or Talked To People Who Did. These Writers Are Called Journalists, And Like Telephone Operators, Butchers, Ballerinas, And People Who Clean Up After Horses, Journalists Can Sometimes Make Mistakes.

Announcing Your Death Should Be Like Announcing That You Are A Lunar Moth: It Must Be Done Quietly Or It Will Not Be Believed.

Miracles Are Like Meatballs, Because Nobody Can Exactly Agree On What They Are Made Of, Where They Come From, Or How Often They Should Appear.

They Say Love's Like A Bus, And If You Wait Long Enough Another One Will Come Along, But Not In This Place Where The Buses Are Slow And Most Of The Cute Ones Are Gay.

For Beatrice, Summer Without You Is As Cold As Winter. Winter Without You, Is Even Colder.

Every Problem Has A Solution. Sometimes It Just Takes A Long Time To Find The Solution - Even If It's Right In Front Of Your Nose.

Whenever You Are Examining Someone Else's Belongings, You Are Bound To Learn Many Interesting Things About The Person Of Which You Were Not Previously Aware.

So She Loved Him. She Just Did Immediately And Again Often And Clearly Naturally And Soundly And Obviously And Many Others.

Hello, Freaky Peoples!

The Smell Of Cooking Food Is Often A Calming One.

You Know I Want To Be A Director, But You Could Never Truly See The Movies In My Head And That, Ed, Is Why We Broke Up.

I'm Sure You Have Heard It Said That Appearance Does Not Matter So Much, And That It Is What's On The Inside That Counts. This Is, Of Course, Utter Nonsense, Because If It Were True Then People Who Were Good On This Inside Would Would Never Have To Comb Their Hair Or Take A Bath, And The Whole World Would Smell Even Worse Than It Already Does.

It Is My Fate That Some Of My Questions Will Never Be Answered.

Once More, This Is Love: It Rings And You Open Up Unless It Looks Like An Ax Murderer.

This Knowledge Sits In My Heart, Heavy As A Paperweight.

This Story Is About The Baudelaires. And They Are The Sort Of People Who Know That There’s Always Something. Something To Invent, Something To Read, Something To Bite, And Something To Do, To Make A Sanctuary, No Matter How Small. And For This Reason, I Am Happy To Say, The Baudelaires Were Very Fortunate Indeed.

I Started Making Plans, Thinking We Would Get That Far.

It Was A Curious Feeling, That Something Could Be So Close And So Distant At The Same Time.

Having A Personal Philosophy Is Like Having A Pet Marmoset, Because It May Be Very Attractive When You Acquire It, But There May Be Situations When It Will Not Come In Handy At All.

Grammar Is The Greatest Joy In Life, Don't You Find?

What You Don't Read Is Often As Important As What You Do Read.

The Last Time I Saw You I Was Trying To Throw Thumbtacks Into Your Cradle!

Miracles Can Happen, Even To Those Who Are Small, Flammable, And Dressed All In Black.

Miracles Can Happen

Death Is Something You Cannot Escape, Such As Death, Or A Cheesecake That Has Curdled, Both Of Which Always Turn Up Sooner Later.

Santa Claus Has Nothing To Do With It," The Latke Said. "christmas And Hanukah Are Completely Different Things." "but Different Things Can Often Blend Together," Said The Pine Tree. "let Me Tell You A Funny Story About Pagan Rituals.

It Was A Secret Time And Place, You Next To Me, Untraceable And Out Of This World

...the Moron Who Thought Love Was Forever.

Desperate Times Call For Desperate Measures" Is An Aphorism Which Here Means "sometimes You Need To Change Your Facial Expression In Order To Create A Workable Disguise." The Quoting Of An Aphorism, Such As "it Takes A Village To Raise A Child," "no News Is Good News," And "love Conquers All," Rarely Indicates That Something Helpful Is About To Happen, Which Is Why We Provide Our Volunteers With A Disguise Kit In Addition To Helpful Phrases Of Advice.

The Edith Head Trio, I Would Say, Would Be Even Less Of A Musical Career Than Playing The Accordion, Particularly Because I Played The Accordion In The Edith Head Trio. I'm Very Impressed By Your Googling. The Edith Head Trio And Another Band, Tzamboni, Were Two Bands I Was In After College That Played At Tiny Clubs To Little Acclaim. Our Gypsy Tango Version Of "when Doves Cry" Was Our Biggest Hit.but We Were Not Destined For Greatness.

Sometimes When Someone Tells A Ridiculous Lie, It Is Best To Ignore It Entirely.

The End Of 'the End' Is The Best Place To Begin 'the End', Because If You Read 'the End' From The Beginning Of The Beginning Of 'the End' To The End Of The End Of 'the End', You Will Arrive At The End.

Various Parts Of My Body Told Me That In The Future They Would Appreciate It If I Slept Lying Down On A Bed Instead Of Sitting At The Counter Of Black Cat Coffee. I Quietly Reassured Them That This Was An Unusual Situation, And Had The Machinery Make Me Some Bread As A Breakfast.

Here We Are At The Bottom, Almost Empty. It's Like Confetti, These Dried Remnants You Find In The Street For A Party No One Invited You To. But They Used To Be, I Can Admit, Part Of Something Beautiful.

For Beatrice, I Cherished, You Perished, The World's Been Nightmarished.

The Way Sadness Works Is One Of The Strangest Riddles Of The World.

I Will Love You If I Never See You Again, And I Will Love You If I See You Every Tuesday.

I Will Love You As Misfortune Loves Orphans, As Fire Loves Innocence, And As Justice Loves To Sit And Watch While Everything Goes Wrong.

Reading Is One Form Of Escape. Running For Your Life Is Another.

I Do What I Do," I Said, "in Order To Do Something Else.

And What Might Seem To Be A Series Of Unfortunate Events May In Fact Be The First Steps Of A Journey.

I Waited Just To See You At That Kind Of Peace, I Wanted To Be Beside You, I Wanted You To Wake Up Slowly Or Startle, Or Just Half Awaken And Turn Over Or Murmur My Name. I Wanted To Watch You Forever, Or Sleep Beside You Forever, Or Sleep Forever While You Woke And Watched Me, Something Forever Anyway. I Wanted To Kiss You, Rumple Your Hair, Rest Three Fingertips On Your Hip Bone Warm And Smooth, Wake You That Way Or Hush You Back To Sleep.

The Expression 'those Who Can't Do, Teach' Is A Curious One, Because If You Look At The World , You'll See That Teachers Aren't Particularly Worse At Doing Things Than Anyone Else, So Perhaps The Expression Might Be Better Worded As 'nobody Can Do Anything

If He’s Not Gay And He Hung Out With You The Whole Time, He Wanted To Be. It’s Boyfriend Or Want To Be Boyfriend Or I Guess Gay. Those Are The Choices.

We Need Things, And The Opposite Of Them, And We Are So Rarely Completely Comfortable.

The Table Of Elements Does Not Contain One Of The Most Powerful Elements That Make Up Our World, And That Is The Element Of Surprise.

I Like Writing For Movies. It's Nice To Be Alone Working On Fiction In Your Room, And Then It's Nice To Be In A Room With A Bunch Of People Working On A Movie.

Those Unable To Catalog The Past Are Doomed To Repeat It.

I Like To Think That I Get Better And Better As A Writer, But It Seems Pretty Easy To Me To Slip On Disguises Of Various People.

Maybe, Generations Ago, Young People Rebelled Out Of Some Clear Motive, But Now, We Know We're Rebelling. Between Teen Movies And Sex-ed Textbooks We're So Ready For Our Rebellious Phase We Can't Help But Feel It's Safe, Contained. It Will Turn Out All Right, Despite The Risk, Snug In The Shell Of Rebellion Narrative. Rebellion Narrative, Does That Make Sense? It Was Appropriate To Do, So We Did It.

Appearance Matters A Great Deal Because You Can Often Tell A Lot About People By Looking At How They Present Themselves.

If Everyone Fought Fire With Fire, The Whole World Would Go Up In Smoke.

The World Is Quiet Here.

So You’re Reluctant, I Said To Myself. Many, Many People Are Reluctant. It’s Like Having Feet. It’s Nothing To Brag About.

And Then Of Course The Music Sprang Up, Lousy Rock As Bold And Dull As A Giant Potato. "love This Song," Todd Said, Like It Was Unusually Brave To Like What Was Number One On The Radio.

I Was Stupid, The Official Descriptive Phrase For Happy.

There Are Many Things In Life That Become Different If You Take A Long Look At Them.

What Happens In A Certain Place Can Stain Your Feelings For That Location, Just As Ink Can Stain A White Sheet. You Can Wash It, And Wash It, And Still Never Forget What Has Transpired - A Word Which Here Means 'happened, And Made Everybody Sad'.

It Is Very Unnerving To Be Proven Wrong, Particularly When You Are Really Right And The Person Who Is Really Wrong Is Proving You Wrong And Proving Himself, Wrongly, Right.

I First Told The Idea To An Editor I Had Met Who, After Reading One Of My Novels For Adults That Was Set In A High School, Had An Idea That I Might Write Something For Children.

It Is Often Difficult To Admit That Someone You Love Is Not Perfect, Or To Consider Aspects Of A Person That Are Less Than Admirable.

Someone You Love

There Are Those Who Say That Life Is Like A Book, With Chapters For Each Event In Your Life And A Limited Number Of Pages On Which You Can Spend Your Time. But I Prefer To Think That A Book Is Like A Life, Particularly A Good One, Which Is Well To Worth Staying Up All Night To Finish.

...that's Not Why We Broke Up. I Love It, I Miss It, I Hate To Give It Back To You, This Complicated Thing, It's Why We Stayed Together

One Has To Adopt A Sort Of Zen Calm, In Which You Know You Wrote The Best Book That You Could At The Time.

It Is Almost As If Happiness Is An Acquired Taste, Like Coconut Cordial Or Ceviche, To Which You Can Eventually Become Accustomed, But Despair Is Something Surprising Each Time You Encounter It.

But There Are Times In This Harum-scarum World When Figuring Out The Right Thing To Do Is Quite Simple, But Doing The Right Thing Is Simply Impossible.

Love Can Smack You Like A Seagull, And Pour All Over Your Feet Like Junkmail. You Can't Be Ready For Such A Thing Any More Than Salt Water Taffy Gets You Ready For The Ocean.

It Is Very Difficult To Make One's Way In This World Without Being Wicked At One Time Or Another, When The World's Way Is So Wicked To Being With.

Life Isn't Fair," He Said, In His Undisguised Voice, And For Once The Baudelaire Orphans Agreed With Every Word The Man Said.

Oftentimes. When People Are Miserable, They Will Want To Make Other People Miserable, Too. But It Never Helps.

Anyone Who Knew Violet Well Could Tell She Was Thinking Hard, Because Her Long Hair Was Tied Up In A Ribbon To Keep It Out Of Her Eyes. Violet Had A Real Knack For Inventing And Building Strange Devices, So Her Brain Was Often Filled With Images Of Pulleys, Levers, And Gears, And She Never Wanted To Be Distracted By Something As Trivial As Her Hair.

Certain People Have Said That The World Is Like A Calm Pond, And That Anytime A Person Does Even The Smallest Thing, It Is As If A Stone Has Dropped Into The Pond, Spreading Circles Of Ripples Further And Further Out, Until The Entire World Has Been Changed By One Tiny Action.

The Right Boys I Always Toss And The Wrong Ones I Keep On Top Of Me Like Paperweights.

I Think If I Were Walking Someplace And I Saw A Corpse My Brain Would Tell Me It Was A Million Things Before I Believed It Was A Corpse.

The Last Safe Place Is Safe No More.

There Are Almost As Many Kinds Of Libraries As There Are Kinds Of Readers.

We Laughed The Rest Of The Way, Because The Point Of This Story Is, It Is Not The Cookies. It Is The Love.

A Long Time Ago, There Was No Such Thing As School, And Children Spent Their Days Learning A Trade, A Phrase Which Here Means "standing Around Doing Tedious Tasks Under The Instruction Of A Bossy Adult." In Time, However, People Realized That The Children Could Be Allowed To Sit, And The First School Was Invented.

Let’s Go, Let’s Go Together Toward Something Extraordinary And I Started Making Plans, Thinking We Would Get That Far.

...in Life It Is Often The Tiny Details That End Up Being The Most Important.

It Is A Lonely Feeling When Someone You Care About Becomes A Stranger.

There Are Few Sights Sadder Than A Ruined Book.

Everything. A Letter May Be Coded, And A Word May Be Coded. A Theatrical Performance May Be Coded, And A Sonnet May Be Coded, And There Are Times When It Seems The Entire World Is In Code. Some Believe That The World Can Be Decoded By Performing Research In A Library. Others Believe That The World Can Be Decoded By Reading A Newspaper. In My Case, The Only Thing That Made Sense Of The World Was You, And Without You The World Will Seem As Garbled And Tragic As A Malfunctioning Typewrit9.

I Was Never A Fan Of Anything, And Yet Some People Are Fans Of My Books. That's A Bit Odd. But I Like Meeting Them.

This Toast Feels Raw. Is It Safe To Eat Raw Toast?

The Movie Was Kickass, Which Was Appropriate, Because Tonight It Was Called Kickass: The Movie.

Every Time You Enter A Library You Might Say To Yourself, "the World Is Quiet Here," As A Sort Of Pledge Proclaiming Reading To Be The Greater Good.

Lemony Snicket. Now, I'm Told - The Books, Of Course, Starting From The Very First One, Became Hugely Popular, Selling Millions And Millions. And I Understand That When You Used To Go Around To Talk To Your Very Young Fans, You Would Appear As Lemony Snicket's Representative Or Agent.

Life Never End When You Are In It.

I Will Love You As The Iceberg Loves The Ship, And The Passengers Love The Lifeboat And The Lifeboat Loves The Teeth Of The Sperm Whale, And The Sperm Whale Loves The Flavor Of Naval Uniforms.

One's Home Is Like A Delicious Piece Of Pie You Order In A Restaurant On A Country Road One Cozy Evening - The Best Piece Of Pie You Have Ever Eaten In Your Life - And Can Never Find Again. After You Leave Home, You May Find Yourself Feeling Homesick, Even If You Have A New Home That Has Nicer Wallpaper And A More Efficient Dishwasher Than The Home In Which You Grew Up.

I'd Made Pretty Clear To The People At Paramount And Dreamworks That, If They Wanted Lemony Snicket To Comment, He Would Be Completely Horrified By The Entire Film. And As Long As They Understood That, It Was Okay. I'm Not Much Of A Fan Of Dvd Commentaries Myself, So This Was My Way Of Getting Revenge, In A Sense, For All The Puffed-up Directors And Stars Who Talk Endlessly About The Self-aggrandizing Minutiae Of Making A Movie.

For Beatrice, Our Love Broke My Heart, And Stopped Yours.

It Doesn't Take Courage To Kill Someone,' Klaus Said. 'it Takes A Severe Lack Of Moral Stamina.

Tell Me What It Is, Or Prepare To Eat Harpoon.

Even Though There Are No Ways Of Knowing For Sure, There Are Ways Of Knowing For Pretty Sure.

Put Your Hair Up, Min. The Secret Ingredient Is Not Your Hair.

You May Want To Keep A Commonplace Book Which Is A Notebook Where You Can Copy Parts Of Books You Think Are In Code, Or Take Notes On A Series Of Events You May Have Observed That Are Suspicious, Unfortunate, Or Very Dull. Keep Your Commonplace Book In A Safe Place, Such As Underneath Your Bed, Or At A Nearby Dairy.

This Is Like A Cookie, It Tastes Like A Cookie Having Sex With A Doughnut.

Count Olaf Sounds Like An Awful Person. I Hope He Is Torn Apart By Wild Animals Someday. Wouldn't That Be Satisfying?

Shyness Is A Curious Thing, Because, Like Quicksand, It Can Strike People At Any Time, And Also, Like Quicksand, It Usually Makes Its Victims Look Down.

The Expression "following Suit" Is A Curious One, Because It Has Nothing To Do With Walking Behind A Matching Set Of Clothing. If You Follow Suit, It Means You Do The Same Thing Somebody Else Has Just Done. If All Of Your Friends Decided To Jump Off A Bridge Into The Icy Waters Of An Ocean Or River, For Instance, And You Jumped In Right After Them, You Would Be Following Suit. You Can See Why Following Suit Can Be A Dangerous Thing To Do, Because You Could End Up Drowning Simply Because Somebody Else Thought Of It First.

The Story Of The Baudelaires Takes Place In A Very Real World, Where Some People Are Laughed At Just Because They Have Something Wrong With Them, And Where Children Can Find Themselves All Alone In The World, Struggling To Understand The Mystery That Surrounds Them.

Everybody Has A Theory.

Like People, Animals Will Become Frightened And Likely Do Whatever You Say If You Whip Them Enough.

I Love No One But You, I Have Discovered, But You Are Far Away And I Am Here Alone.

Long Distance Relationship

It Is Always Terrible To Be Told To Go Play With People One Doesn't Know.

One Of The World's Most Tiresome Questions Is What Object One Would Bring To A Desert Island,because People Always Answer "a Deck Of Cards" Or "anna Karenina" When The Obvious Answer Is "a Well Equipped Boat And A Crew To Sail Me Off The Island And Back Home Where I Can Play All The Card Games And Read All The Russian Novels I Want.

Chestnuts In Stuffing Tastes Like Someone Chewed Up A Tree Branch And Then French-kissed It Into Your Mouth.

They Looked At Each Other Like A Pair Of Parentheses.

The Thing You Hope Will Never Happen To You Might Just Happen To Someone Else Instead, Who Has Been Spending Their Life Dreading The Thing That Will Happen To You.

One Cannot Spend Forever Sitting And Solving The Mysteries Of Oone's History.

In America Now There Is This Phenomenon Called Helicopter Parenting, Where You're Hovering Over Your Child For The Whole Time. Parents There View Their Job As Being To Make Sure Their Kid Never Has A Moment Of Unhappiness. Of Course, As A Parent Myself, I Can Understand The Urge, But I Don't Know Whether It Would Be Healthy Or Possible.

Off With You" Is A Phrase Used By People Who Lack The Curtesy To Say Something More Polite, Such As, "if There's Nothing Else You Require I Must Be Going" Or "i'm Sorry But I'm Going To Have To Ask You To Leave, Please" Or Even "excuse Me But I Believe You Have Mistaken My Home For Your Own And My Valuable Belongings For Yours And I Must Ask You To Return The Items In Question To Me And Leave My Home After Untying Me From This Chair, As I'm Unable To Do It Myself, If It's Not Too Much Trouble.

The Only Thing He Cares About.

The Thing With Your Heart's Desire Is That Your Heart Doesn't Even Know What It Desires Until It Turns Up. Like A Tie At A Tag Sale, Some Perfect Thing In A Crate Of Nothing, You Were Just There, Uninvited, And Now Suddenly The Party Was Over And You Were All I Wanted. I Hadn't Even Been Looking, Not For You, And Now You Were My Heart's Desire.

That Night Was A Dark Day. Of Course, All Nights Are Dark Days, Because Night Is Simply A Badly Lit Version Of Day.

Numbersign Questionmark You" And "asterisk Exclamation Point The World.

Exclamation Points

It Was Darker Than A Pitch-black Panther, Covered In Tar, Eating Black Licorice At The Very Bottom Of The Deepest Part Of The Black Sea.

Strange As It May Seem, I Still Hope For The Best, Even Though The Best, Like An Interesting Piece Of Mail, So Rarely Arrives, And Even When It Does It Can Be Lost So Easily.

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George A. Smith

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