Jottings from the notebook

 

Broadway: an institution which brings great writers to the attention of the world by never producing any of their plays.

 

Life is a divorce that masquerades as a wedding.

For my whole life, sex was the axe behind the sign IN CASE OF EMERGENCY, BREAK GLASS.

                -- Mandi Seaton

 

What do you call six redheads on a skewer?

A shiksa-bab.

Reality: an illusion caused by mescaline deficiency.

                -- NF Simpson

To the caterpillar, it’s death; to the butterfly, it’s birth.

You’re always the villain in your ex-lover’s story.

“The love of form is a love of endings.”

                -- Louise Glück

Life is the gift God loans you until He figures out how He’s going to take it away.

When it comes to love, version always trumps vision.

To live is to crochet according to a pattern we were given. 

                -- Fernando Pessoa

Time is the pond; life is the stone; we are the ripples.

“I never hate in the plural.”

                -- Stewart Granger, Bhowani Junction

Death is the recluse in the neighborhood,

The old coot with the nasty disposition

Who calls the cops every time we make noise.

We never talk of him because we know

That if we do, he’ll come knock on our door.

Sanity: an illusion caused by alcohol deficiency.

                -- NF Simpson

Life is a barracks where everyone trains to be one of the fallen.

“ . . . My own lowest and most indefensible judgments of myself, which are the only judgments anyone ever trusts.”

                -- Paul Rudnick, Gorgeous

It’s the machine that’s old; the driver’s still young.

Relationships are like wars—you’re always fighting the last one.

Whenever I see a dead body . . . the corpse looks to me like a suit that was left behind.  Someone went away and didn’t need to take the one and only outfit he’d worn.

                -- Fernando Pessoa

INTERVIEWER:  So what’s your secret to attracting men?

MANDI SEATON:  Simple.  All you have to do is act like an exquisitely blasé slut.

 

Never ask: “Where do you work?” or “What do you do?”

Always ask: “What are you fighting for?”

Love is the name we give to the fever we deliberately catch once we’ve infected someone else with our desire.

“I thought you were mysterious, and then I realized mysterious meant depressed.”

              -- Christian Bale to Jennifer Lawrence, American

                  Hustle

In politics, you only check the eggs after the omelet comes out bad.

The lonely will always tell you where they were before they tell you what happened.

NICO:  First you’re on top of the world, and then the world is on top of you.

MANDI SEATON:  The world can get on top of me all it wants as long as it pays for dinner.

Love: an illusion caused by self-esteem deficiency.

                -- Teo Pozzi