Unforgettable Opening Paragraphs
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Alynna Lis Eachann
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Okay, I swallowed my pride and looked it up: One Hundred Years of Solitude by Gabriel Garcia Marquez.
"We probably could have saved ourselves, but we were too damned lazy to try very hard... and too damn cheap." - Kurt Vonnegut
"Now if you remember all great paintings have an element of tragedy to them. Uh, for instance if you remember from last week, the unicorn was stuck on the aircraft carrier and couldn't get off. That was very sad. " - Kids in the Hall
"Now if you remember all great paintings have an element of tragedy to them. Uh, for instance if you remember from last week, the unicorn was stuck on the aircraft carrier and couldn't get off. That was very sad. " - Kids in the Hall
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MsMary
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*ding ding ding ding ding*
You win the prize.
You win the prize.
"The Cheat is GROUNDED! We had that lightswitch installed for you so you could turn the lights on and off, not so you could throw lightswitch raves!"
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- I'm always all right.
- Is all right special Time Lord code for really not all right at all?
- You're all irresponsible fools!
- The Doctor: But we're very experienced irresponsible fools.
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THOOLAH member since 2005
EZBoard Survivor
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- I'm always all right.
- Is all right special Time Lord code for really not all right at all?
- You're all irresponsible fools!
- The Doctor: But we're very experienced irresponsible fools.
__________________________
THOOLAH member since 2005
EZBoard Survivor
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MsMary
- The Gap Into Spam
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I think this thread became sort of neglected when it was moved here...
"The Cheat is GROUNDED! We had that lightswitch installed for you so you could turn the lights on and off, not so you could throw lightswitch raves!"
***************************************
- I'm always all right.
- Is all right special Time Lord code for really not all right at all?
- You're all irresponsible fools!
- The Doctor: But we're very experienced irresponsible fools.
__________________________
THOOLAH member since 2005
EZBoard Survivor
***************************************
- I'm always all right.
- Is all right special Time Lord code for really not all right at all?
- You're all irresponsible fools!
- The Doctor: But we're very experienced irresponsible fools.
__________________________
THOOLAH member since 2005
EZBoard Survivor
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Sorus
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Not his best work, but I've always liked the opening lines."Most of the crowd at Mallorys Bar & Sleep over in Delta Sector had no idea what was really going on. As far as they were concerned, it was just another example of animal passion, men and women driven together by lust - the kind of thing everybody understood, or at least dreamed about. The only uncommon feature was that in this case the passion included some common sense. Only a few people knew there was more to it."
Oh, a change is coming, feel these doors now closing
Is there no world for tomorrow, if we wait for today?
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Alynna Lis Eachann
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Why, The Real Story, of course. 
How about this one:
How about this one:
'DESCRIBE, USING DIAGRAMS WHERE APPROPRIATE, THE EXACT CIRCUMSTANCES LEADING TO YOUR DEATH.'
Saunders had been dead for almost two weeks now, and, so far, he hadn't enjoyed a minute of it. What he wasn't enjoying at this particular moment was having to wade through the morass of forms and legal papers he'd been sent to complete by the Department of Death and Deceaseds' Rights.
"We probably could have saved ourselves, but we were too damned lazy to try very hard... and too damn cheap." - Kurt Vonnegut
"Now if you remember all great paintings have an element of tragedy to them. Uh, for instance if you remember from last week, the unicorn was stuck on the aircraft carrier and couldn't get off. That was very sad. " - Kids in the Hall
"Now if you remember all great paintings have an element of tragedy to them. Uh, for instance if you remember from last week, the unicorn was stuck on the aircraft carrier and couldn't get off. That was very sad. " - Kids in the Hall
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Alynna Lis Eachann
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- Posts: 3060
- Joined: Wed Mar 20, 2002 8:23 pm
- Location: Maryland, my Maryland
It is indeed the original Red Dwarf.
And here I was, all proud of getting one right.Didn't intend for that to be trivia, though I should have tagged it.
"We probably could have saved ourselves, but we were too damned lazy to try very hard... and too damn cheap." - Kurt Vonnegut
"Now if you remember all great paintings have an element of tragedy to them. Uh, for instance if you remember from last week, the unicorn was stuck on the aircraft carrier and couldn't get off. That was very sad. " - Kids in the Hall
"Now if you remember all great paintings have an element of tragedy to them. Uh, for instance if you remember from last week, the unicorn was stuck on the aircraft carrier and couldn't get off. That was very sad. " - Kids in the Hall
"Once a guy stood all day shaking bugs from his hair. The doctor told him there were no bugs in his hair. After he had taken a shower for eight hours, standing under hot water hour after hour suffering the pain of the bugs, he got out and dried himself, and he still had bugs in his hair;in fact, he had bugs all over him. A month later he had bugs in his lungs."
So begins Philip K. Dick's masterpiece A Scanner Darkly.
So begins Philip K. Dick's masterpiece A Scanner Darkly.
"There is only one basic human right, the right to do as you damn well please. And with it comes the only basic human duty, the duty to take the consequences." - PJ O'Rourke
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"Men and women range themselves into three classes or orders of intelligence; you can tell the lowest class by their habit of always talking about persons; the next by the fact that their habit is always to converse about things; the highest by their preference for the discussion of ideas." - Charles Stewart
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"I believe there are more instances of the abridgment of the freedom of the people by gradual and silent encroachments of those in power than by violent and sudden usurpations." - James Madison
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"Men and women range themselves into three classes or orders of intelligence; you can tell the lowest class by their habit of always talking about persons; the next by the fact that their habit is always to converse about things; the highest by their preference for the discussion of ideas." - Charles Stewart
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"I believe there are more instances of the abridgment of the freedom of the people by gradual and silent encroachments of those in power than by violent and sudden usurpations." - James Madison
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my favorite opening paragraph of all time....
No live organism can continue for long to exist sanely under conditions of absolute reality; even larks and katydids are supposed, by some, to dream. Hill House, not sane, stood by itself against its hills, holding darkness within; it had stood so for eighty years and might stand for eighty more. Within, walls continued upright, bircks met neatly, floors were firm, and doors were sensibly shut; silence lay steadily against the wood and stone of Hill House, and whatever walked there, walked alone.
The Haunting of Hill House
Shirley Jackson
No live organism can continue for long to exist sanely under conditions of absolute reality; even larks and katydids are supposed, by some, to dream. Hill House, not sane, stood by itself against its hills, holding darkness within; it had stood so for eighty years and might stand for eighty more. Within, walls continued upright, bircks met neatly, floors were firm, and doors were sensibly shut; silence lay steadily against the wood and stone of Hill House, and whatever walked there, walked alone.
The Haunting of Hill House
Shirley Jackson
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Sorus
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My bad. Here are two to make up for it.Alynna Lis Eachann wrote:It is indeed the original Red Dwarf.
And here I was, all proud of getting one right.Didn't intend for that to be trivia, though I should have tagged it.
The seller of lightning rods arrived just ahead of the storm. He came along the street of Green Town, Illinois, in the late cloudy October sky, sneaking glances over his shoulder. Somewhere not so far back, vast lightnings stomped the earth. Somewhere, a storm like a great beast with terrible teeth could not be denied.
The Deliverator belongs to an elite order, a hallowed sub-category. He's got esprit up to here. Right now, he is preparing to carry out his third mission of the night.
Oh, a change is coming, feel these doors now closing
Is there no world for tomorrow, if we wait for today?
The second one is from Neal Stephenson's superb cyberpunk classic, 'Snow Crash'.
I love that book!
I love that book!
Check out my digital art at www.brian.co.za
Go Edge...The island of Gont, a single mountain that lifts its peak a mile above the storm-wracked Northeast Sea, is a land famous for wizards.
Check out my digital art at www.brian.co.za
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Alynna Lis Eachann
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Would never have gotten those.
Ha! Found the one I've been looking for. A great book, but not one I've had a chance to finish. It is quite emotionally draining and follows a storytelling pattern that I don't generally like:
Ha! Found the one I've been looking for. A great book, but not one I've had a chance to finish. It is quite emotionally draining and follows a storytelling pattern that I don't generally like:
Barrabas came to us by sea, the child Clara wrote in her delicate calligraphy. She was already in the habit of writing down important matters, and afterward, when she was mute, she also recorded trivialities, never suspecting that fifty years later I would use her notebooks to reclaim the past and overcome terrors of my own.
"We probably could have saved ourselves, but we were too damned lazy to try very hard... and too damn cheap." - Kurt Vonnegut
"Now if you remember all great paintings have an element of tragedy to them. Uh, for instance if you remember from last week, the unicorn was stuck on the aircraft carrier and couldn't get off. That was very sad. " - Kids in the Hall
"Now if you remember all great paintings have an element of tragedy to them. Uh, for instance if you remember from last week, the unicorn was stuck on the aircraft carrier and couldn't get off. That was very sad. " - Kids in the Hall
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danlo
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This thread's been dead for awhile. How about:
Hapscomb's Texaco sat on US 93 just north of Arnette, a pissant four-street burg about 110 miles from Houston. Tonight the regulars were there, sitting by the cash register, drinking beer, talking idly, watching the bugs fly into the big lighted sign.
Hapscomb's Texaco sat on US 93 just north of Arnette, a pissant four-street burg about 110 miles from Houston. Tonight the regulars were there, sitting by the cash register, drinking beer, talking idly, watching the bugs fly into the big lighted sign.
fall far and well Pilots!