Quotes by John Varley

“Leadership thats reliant on mergers and acquisitions is dangerous leadership.”

“As we continue to increase earnings, we continue to invest for the future.”

“We have delivered what we said we would deliver, ... We have got very strong profit growth in a number of our businesses.”

“Our expectation looking forward is that risk will rise broadly in line with the size of the loan book as it has over the last 12 months,”

“The profit growth in the first half demonstrates that our strategy is delivering strongly.”

“[Barclays said the move was driven by changing customer preferences and technological advances.] The industry in the United Kingdom is going through a sea change, ... Technology is steadily reducing the number of people we employ in the industry.”

“Im looking for high growth rates. The powerful banking forces of the next 10 years will have lead to a big exposure to one or more of Brazil, Russia, India or China. We have exposure at the moment in both India and China and Id like to see that exposure grow.”

“It was nearly as contentious as wolf reintroduction.”

“The UK is a vital part of the bank, and we wont achieve our goals unless the UK business is successful. But I expect the rate of growth of our international business to exceed the rate of growth of our UK businesses.”

“I am pleased to report that 2005 was another record year for Barclays.”

When I started writing I wanted the best tools. I skipped right over chisels on rocks, stylus on wet clay plates, quills and fountain pens, even mechanical pencils, and went straight to one of the first popular spin-offs of the aerospace program: the ballpoint pen. They were developed for comber navigators in the war because fountain pens would squirt all over your leather bomber jacket at altitude. (I have a cherished example of the next generation ballpoint, a pressurized Space Pen cleverly designed to work in weightlessness, given to me by Spider Robinson. At least, I cherish it when I can find it. It is also cleverly designed to seek out the lowest point of your desk, roll off, then find the lowest point on the floor, under a heavy piece of furniture. Thats because it is cylindrical and lacks a pocket clip to keep it from rolling. In space, I presume it would float out of your pocket and find a forgotten corner of your spacecraft to hide in. NASA spent $3 million developing it. Good job, guys. Im sure its around here somewhere.)

Cirocco liked space, reading, and sex, not necessarily in that order. She had never been able to satisfactorily combine all three, but two was not bad.

We all love after-the-bomb stories. If we didnt, why would there be so many of them? Theres something attractive about all those people being gone, about wandering in a depopulated world, scrounging cans of Campbells pork and beans, defending ones family from marauders. But some secret part of us thinks it would be good to survive. All those other folks will die. Thats what after-the-bomb stories are all about.

I had thought Chicago was inevitable, like diarrhea.

He couldnt think of a good place. At first he thought she hated all living beings equally. Lately he had come to believe he held a special place in her heart, just below rattlesnakes, pederasts, and spirochetes. Definitely a tough place to start from, but determination had always been Conals strong point.

There is a certain concentrated, avid-for-blood look that appears on the faces of reporters on the trail of a very big story that youd have to visit the big cat house at the zoo to see duplicated in its primal state. From the look on Brendas face, if a tiger was standing between her and this story right now, the cat would soon have a tall-journalist-sized hole in him.

Looking around me, I saw that all my colleagues were busy at the same task. Eyes were rolled up, mouths hung open, here and there a finger twitched. It had to be either a day trip from the Catatonic Academy, or the modern press at work.