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1 " Chapulier's Rule (the law of least resistance). If the machine is not too bright and incapable of reflection, it does whatever you tell it to do. But a smart machine will first consider which is more worth its while: to perform the given task or, instead, to figure some way out of it....The Great Mendacitor, for example, for nine years in charge of the Saturn meliorization project, did absolutely nothing on that planet, sending out piles of fake progress reports, invoices, requisition forms, and either bribed his supervisors or kept them in a state of electronic shock. "
― Stanisław Lem , The Futurological Congress: From the Memoirs of Ijon Tichy
2 " Irish people marry late, as a rule. We have that potato-famine DNA from the old country, that mentality where you don't give birth to anything until you have the potatoes all stored up to feed it. My ancestors were all shepherds who got married in their thirties and then stayed together for life, who had long and happy marriages, no doubt because they were already deaf. My grandparents courted for nine years before they married in 1933. "
― Rob Sheffield , Love Is a Mix Tape: Life and Loss, One Song at a Time
3 " As it is not a settled question, you must clear your mind of the fancy withwhich we all begin as children, that the institutions under which we live,including our legal ways of distributing income and allowing people to own things, are natural, like the weather. They are not. Because they exist everywhere in our little world, we take it for granted that they have always existed and must always exist, and that they are self-acting. That is a dangerous mistake. They are in fact transient makeshifts; and many of them would not be obeyed, even by well-meaning people, if there were not a policeman within call and a prison within reach. They are being changed continually by Parliament, because we are never satisfied with them.... At the elections some candidates get votes by promising to make new laws or to get rid of old ones, and others by promising to keep things just as they are. This is impossible. Things will not stay as they are.Changes that nobody ever believed possible take place in a few generations. Children nowadays think that spending nine years in school, oldage and widows’ pensions, votes for women, and short-skirted ladies in Parliament or pleading in barristers’ wigs in the courts are part of the order of Nature, and always were and ever shall be; but their great-grandmothers would have set down anyone who told them that such things were coming as mad, and anyone who wanted them to come as wicked. "
― George Bernard Shaw , The Intelligent Woman's Guide to Socialism, Capitalism, Sovietism and Fascism
4 " Here, this is for you," the girl said, holding out one of the pages on which she'd been drawing." Oh, I... well, thank you." Meg reached out and took the sketch between her fingers.Gazing down, her eyes widened. Instead of the typical childish scribble she'd expected, she discovered two well-rendered figures. The style was a bit loose, and still immature with a tendency to distort the proportions. Even so, it was refined enough enough to have captured remarkably accurate likenesses of her and Cade seated side by side on the sofa. Esme might be only be nine years of age, but already she was an exceptional artist, better than many adults would ever hope to be." This is... extraordinary," Meg said." It's you and Cade," the girl offered, clutching a small fist against her yellow wool skirt. " Do you like it?" " I most certainly do. How could I not? You've drawn Cade and me so perfectly. It's beautiful." The girl's oval features came alive with a pleased smile. " Good night, Miss Amberley. I'm glad you're going to be my sister." At a sudden loss for what she knew would never be, Meg settled on the only honest reply she could offer." Sweet dreams, Esme. "
5 " Once Seung Sahn Soen-sa and a student of his attended a talk at a Zen center in California. The Dharma teacher spoke about Bodhidharma. After the talk, someone asked him " What's the difference between Bodhidharma's sitting in Sorim for nine years and your sitting here now?" The Dharma teacher said, " About five thousand miles." The questioner said, " Is that all?" The Dharma teacher said, " Give or take a few miles." Later on, Soen-sa asked his student, " What do you think of these answers?" " Not bad, not good. But the dog runs after the bone." " How would you answer?" " I'd say, 'Why do you make a difference?' " Soen-sa said, " Not bad. Now you ask me." " What's the difference between Bodhidharma's sitting in Sorim for nine years and your sitting here now?" " Don't you know?" " I'm listening." " Bodhidharma sat in Sorim for nine years. I am sitting here now." The student smiled. "
6 " I like a lot of sports. Especially football - it's my favourite sport. My uncle played football in Barcelona for nine years and played for Spain in three World Cups. "
7 " I myself spent nine years in an insane asylum and I never had the obsession of suicide, but I know that each conversation with a psychiatrist, every morning at the time of his visit, made me want to hang myself, realizing that I would not be able to cut his throat. "
― Antonin Artaud
8 " And as I ask for your forgiveness, I also ask for your support to keep all things in perspective and keep all things in proportion. The good of nine years versus the bad. "