Why is it, I wondered, that old people are always so self-centered and excitable? But I just smiled benignly and stood back, comforted by the thought that soon they would be dead. Bill Bryson More Quotes by Bill Bryson More Quotes From Bill Bryson Romans park their cars the way I would park if I had just spilled a beaker of hydrochloric acid on my lap. Bill Bryson lapcarway The great failure in education, much of the time, is the lack of excitement and stimulus Bill Bryson stimulusexcitement Every dog on the face of the earth wants me dead. Bill Bryson earthdogwant Physicists are atoms' way of thinking about atoms. Bill Bryson atomswaythinking I just use my life story as a kind of device on which to hang comic observations. It's not my interest or instinct to tell the world anything pertinent about myself or my family. Bill Bryson usestoriesworld I hadn't realized quite how extraordinary Charles Lindbergh's achievement was in flying the Atlantic alone. He had never flown over open water before, but he flew straight to Dingle Bay in Ireland and then on to Paris, exactly as planned. Bill Bryson parisachievementwater It was an especially wonderful time to be a noisy moron. Bill Bryson noisymoronwonderful I don't know whether I'm misanthropic. It seems to me I'm constantly disappointed. I'm very easily disappointed. Disappointed in the things that people do; disappointed in the things that people construct. I want things to be better all the time. Bill Bryson misanthropicwantpeople Woods are not like other spaces. To begin with, they are cubic. Their trees surround you, loom over you, press in from all sides. Woods choke off views & leave you muddled & without bearings. They make you feel small & confused & vulnerable, like a small child lost in a crowd of strange legs. Stand in a desert or prairie & you know you are in a big space. Stand in the woods and you only sense it. They are vast, featureless nowhere. And they are alive. Bill Bryson confusedviewschildren When you sit in a chair, you are not actually sitting there, but levitating above it at a height of one angstrom (a hundred millionth of a centimetre), your electrons and its electrons implacably opposed to any closer intimacy. Bill Bryson heightintimacysitting I can wear a baseball cap; I am entitled to wear a baseball cap. I am genetically pre-disposed to wear a baseball cap, whereas most English people look wrong in a baseball cap. Bill Bryson baseballpeoplelooks 99.99 percent of all species that have ever lived are no longer with us. Bill Bryson percentspecies When you consider it from a human perspective, and clearly it would be difficult for us to do otherwise, life is an odd thing. It couldn't wait to get going, but then, having gotten going, it seemed in very little hurry to move on. Bill Bryson perspectivewaitingmoving Have you ever seen Glenn Beck in operation? It is the most terrifying thing. It's so bad that you think he's going to announce in a minute that it's all a great con. He makes Sarah Palin look reasonable and steady. Bill Bryson minuteslooksthinking Human beings would split the atom and invent television, nylon, and instant coffee before they could figure out the age of their own planet. Bill Bryson nyloncoffeeage Coming back to your native land after an absence of many years is a surprisingly unsettling business, a little like waking from a long coma. Time, you discover, has wrought changes that leave you feeling mildly foolish and out of touch. Bill Bryson landlongyears In three minutes, 98 percent of all the matter there is or will ever be has been produced. We have a universe Bill Bryson minutesthreematter The universe is not only queerer than we suppose; it is queerer than we can suppose Bill Bryson funnyscienceknowledge I wish I could adjust my voice, but it's just what's happened to me. It's because I've lived abroad for a long time, and my wife is English and my kids all have English accents, and every voice I hear is English. I've never intentionally changed my accent at all. Bill Bryson voicelongkids I'm not a natural story-teller. Put a keyboard in front of me and I'm fine, but stand me up in front of an audience and I'm actually quite shy and reserved. Bill Bryson keyboardsshystories
