J. J. Johnson Quotes

I am a mass of contradictions.

Her kung fu is that powerful.

because talent alone doesn't make an artist

Tell me what you want, what you really, really want," he said. "Braiiinnnnssss," we said in unison.

What are you?" I asked. "I'm the Ghost of the Night Before Exams." "And how long did it take you to come up with that?" Jazza asked. "I'm a busy man," he replied.

I feel warm and reassured," I whispered. "He's like Santa.

Mouth guard. And I think we'll start you in goal." Goal sounded like a special job. I didn't want a special job, unless that special job involved sitting on the side under a pile of blankets.

I could pretend, at least, and if I pretended long enough, maybe I could make it into a reality.

No sausage?" he asked. Apparently my pork consumption habits were a matter of public record.

Prefects. I had learned this one. Student council types, but with superpowers. They who must be obeyed.

Something about her suggested that her leisure activities included wrestling large woodland animals and banging bricks together.

One of them hung a pink bra from our lighting fixture. I left it there. It was a nice bra

And if we get caught, I will claim I made you go. At gunpoint. I am American. People will assume I'm armed.

One person's crazy is another person's sane, I guess.

Quarrels are a natural part of relationships. Making up is always the best part.

Having your back scratched is not the only reason to be married, but it is a good one, especially for those spots that are so hard to reach by yourself.

People always say they can't do things, that they're impossible. They just haven't been creative enough.

How could you look more stupid than to be the guy accepting a bronze medal in gold shoes?

You owe it to yourself to find your own unorthodox way of succeeding, or sometimes, just surviving.

As an athlete, I was never really comfortable with being a celebrity.

All my life I believed I became an athlete through my own determination, but it's impossible to think that being descended from slaves hasn't left an imprint through the generations.

I had already been into my professional career for six years and had not won an individual gold medal at the Olympics. There was a tremendous amount of pressure going into 1996 to get it done.

I don't always do a lot of predicting, but, when I get a really strong feeling about something, I will tell people.

Difficult as it was to hear, slavery has benefited descendants like me - I believe there is a superior athletic gene in us.

America's craft brewers know that beer, not wine, is the best beverage for accompanying a good meal.

The problem is not that you can buy a congressman for $10000 but that you can buy a Washington lawyer for $100000.

No matter what kind of day I've had at school, I always look forward to golf.

I was happy that I was drafted, and then it was the Yankees and that just made it even better.

I just wanted to go play in the big leagues. But possibly playing for the Yankees is very special.

I just try to get on anyway that I can, hit, hit-by-pitch, walk, home runs, anything.

You play to win, to get that World Series ring, All-Star games and whatever comes with it.

Everything will take care of itself.

A dramatic writer should never tell anything he can show.

Wisdom lies not in possessing knowledge - which quickly becomes outdated - but in perpetually seeking it.

The word 'meaningful' when used today is nearly always meaningless.

There are no inevitabilities in history

Hell is being trapped in a night-club with the'beautiful people'and forced to live in a'luxury penthouse flat'.

A capitalist economy hums when leading businessmen are bubbling with animal spirits and are prepared to sink their money into risky ventures.

The writer learns to write, in the last resort, only by writing. He must get words onto paper even if he is dissatisfied with them.

It takes less than a decade for today's luxury to become a universal necessity.

The richness and variety, and indeed the advance, of our culture depend upon the continuation of this conflict [between conservatives and radicals], which is deeply rooted in human nature.

Scanning the newspapers and absorbing with a mixture of incredulity and indignation the enormities they report, I conclude that what England lacks today is, quite simply, sense.

Long periods of recession, which tend to be self-perpetuating, are usually ended by war, or by preparations for it.

If we want foxes, to observe and delight in, we must have hunting.

Human beings are infinitely worth studying, especially the peculiarities that often go along with outstanding gifts.

John Major is what he is: a man from nowhere, going nowhere, heading for a well-merited obscurity as fast as his mediocre talents can carry him.

I like that lady - Sarah Palin. She's great. I like the cut of her jib.

As the CIA and KGB, like God and Satan, fight Miltonic battles across five continents.

At some time in their careers, most good historians itch to write a history of the world, endeavor to discover what makes humanity the most destructive and creative of species.

You know you're an Arizona native when you have to look up "mass transit" in the dictionary.