Dave Barry

Journalist

1947-07-03

Quotes by Dave Barry

• Violence and smut are of course everywhere on the airwaves. You cannot turn on your television without seeing them, although sometimes you have to hunt around.

  Read quote

• If you're like most members of the Baby Boom generation, you decided somewhere along the line, probably after about four margaritas, to have children. This was inevitable. Mother Nature, in her infinite wisdom, has instilled within each of us a powerful biological instinct to reproduce; this is her way of assuring that the human race, come what may, will never have any disposable income.

  Read quote

• You should not confuse your career with your life.

  Read quote

• In the words of a very famous dead person, 'A nation that does not know its history is doomed to do poorly on the Scholastic Aptitude Test.

  Read quote

• Reading... a vacation for the mind....

  Read quote

• If a Greek woman tells you to do something, you do it.

  Read quote

• At a national political convention, you have hundreds of people who consider themselves at least as important as the Secretary of Commerce. If it's a Democratic convention, you also have dozens of A-list Hollywood and music celebrities. (If it's a Republican convention, you have Bo Derek.) Also you have swarms of lower-ranking Washington minions with titles like Deputy Assistant to the Associate Deputy Assistant Chief of Staff who are trying to move up the ladder to Deputy Associate to the Assistant Acting Deputy Assistant Understudy.

  Read quote

• Palestinian and Israeli leaders finally recover the Road Map to Peace, only to discover that, while they were looking for it, the Lug Nuts of Mutual Interest came off the Front Left Wheel of Accommodation, causing the Sport Utility Vehicle of Progress to crash into the Ditch of Despair.

  Read quote

• Kakimi chertyami oni viigrali holodnuyu voinu?This translates roughly to: How the hell did these people win the Cold War?

  Read quote

• maybe somebody finally shot the dog.

  Read quote

• We don't shoot somebody soon, I'm gonna forget how

  Read quote

• Electricity is actually made up of extremely tiny particles called electrons, that you cannot see with the naked eye unless you have been drinking.

  Read quote

• The best baby-sitters, of course, are the baby's grandparents. You feel completely comfortable entrusting your baby to them for long periods, which is why most grandparents flee to Florida.

  Read quote

• Don't you wish you had a job like mine? All you have to do is think up a certain number of words! Plus, you can repeat words! And they don't even have to be true!

  Read quote

• Panicky despair is an underrated element of writing.

  Read quote

• What I look forward to is continued immaturity followed by death.

  Read quote

• Hobbies of any kind are boring except to people who have the same hobby. This is also true of religion, although you will not find me saying so in print.

  Read quote

• I believe it was Shakespeare, or possibly Howard Cosell, who first observed that marriage is very much like a birthday candle, in that 'the flames of passion burn brightest when the wick of intimacy is first ignited by the disposable butane lighter of physical attraction, but sooner or later the heat of familiarity causes the wax of boredom to drip all over the vanilla frosting of novelty and the shredded coconut of romance.' I could not have phrased it better myself.

  Read quote

• As you get older; you've probably noticed that you tend to forget things. You'll be talking with somebody at a party, and you'll know that you know this person, but no matter how hard you try, you can't remember his or her name. This can be very embarassing, especially if he or she turns out to be your spouse.

  Read quote

• Have you noticed that whatever sport you're trying to learn, some earnest person is always telling you to keep your knees bent?

  Read quote