aven, I have given up smoking again!... God! I feel fit. Homicidal, but fit. A different man. Irritable, moody, depressed, rude, nervy, perhaps; but the lungs are fine.

I'm a gentleman and I was always taught it's rude, to talk about a woman's age or weight unless you are breaking up with her.

Courtesy is fine and heaven knows we need more and more of it in a rude and frenetic world, but mechanized courtesy is as pallid as Pablum ... in fact, it isn't even courtesy.

In any case, A New Kind of Science is a wonderful book, and I'm still absorbing its teachings.

One of the nice things about science fiction is that it lets us carry out thought experiments.

A tinkerer,” snapped Pasiphaë. “Even worse. I knew Daedalus. His inventions brought me nothing but trouble.” Leo blinked. “Daedalus…like, the Daedalus? Well, then, you should know all about us tinkerers. We’re more into fixing, building, occasionally sticking wads of oilcloth in the mouths of rude ladies—

In some cases, she was actively trying not to make friends, though she usually stopped short of being rude. (Uptight, tense, and mildly misanthropic? Yes. Rude? No.)

Humanitarianism is rude.

Letting events end is not rude. Everything ends.

The easiest way to get 15 minutes of fame is to be rude to somebody.