Gene Doucette > Quotes

“I was suicidal for two solid centuries once. That was during the early part of what they now call the Dark Ages, in medieval Europe. Suicidal tendencies were de rigueur at the time, and I’m nothing if not trendy.”
― Gene Doucette, Immortal

“Religion is still the very best way to get someone to accept something unabashedly ridiculous.”
― Gene Doucette, Hellenic Immortal

“Impending death makes one run faster. I think that's probably why they fire a gun before track meets.”
― Gene Doucette, Immortal

“Morning conversations should be between very close friends or lovers, and otherwise avoided entirely.”
― Gene Doucette, Hellenic Immortal

“...while there may have been gods, they weren't particularly well defined. If, for instance, something unusually lucky happened, one might declare that a god--pick one--was feeling generous that day. And if a particularly bad thing happened, a god (usually a different one) was upset about something or other. Gods, in other words, were what most of us would now call chance or luck. And in that sense they served their purpose, by making a random existence seem less random.”
― Gene Doucette, Hellenic Immortal

“Like most remarkable things, nobody realized it was remarkable as it happened.”
― Gene Doucette, The Spaceship Next Door

“New York is the one place in the world that actively encourages rudeness, because that's the only way to get past the fake bag carriers, homeless people, newspaper thieves, Jesus freaks, and everyone else who wants something and isn't afraid to ask for it, repeatedly, at close range.”
― Gene Doucette, Immortal

“[T]he truth is the percentage of vampires that are also evil killers is about the same as the percentage of normal people who are also evil killers.”
― Gene Doucette, Immortal

“I'm a pretty sad example of what one should do with eternal life. I've never reached any higher level of consciousness, I don't have access to any great truths, and I've never borne witness to the divine or transcendent. Some of this is just bad luck. Like working in the fishing industry in Galilee and never once running into Jesus.”
― Gene Doucette, Immortal

“I know in another decade or two I’m going to have to get used to the idea of reading without paper in my hands, but I’m going to be making that trip kicking and screaming. Maybe that sounds stubborn, but my relationship with the printed word is the longest one I’ve ever had and I’m not ready to quit on it yet.”
― Gene Doucette, Immortal at the Edge of the World

“[M]ost of the people I have ever met who claim not to care about money already have more than they could ever need.”
― Gene Doucette, Hellenic Immortal

“(As a side note: I thought money was a bad idea way back when it was first invented. I remember the moment very clearly. This guy owed me a sheep, but instead of giving me an actual sheep he gave me five coins he said were worth the same as a sheep. "But I can't eat round pieces of metal, asshole," were my exact words.)”
― Gene Doucette, Immortal

“To ward off these disasters, they spent a whole lot of time trying to keep their gods happy via a number of complex rituals, many involving copious amounts of sex ("the gods wish us to have sex" is the oldest pickup line in the world).”
― Gene Doucette, Hellenic Immortal

“The thing is, we all have a little animal in us, and if you ask us to, we can do a very good job of behaving like one.”
― Gene Doucette, Hellenic Immortal

“Religious fanatics are the worst. They're basically impossible to bargain with, they accept no outside opinion about anything, and they departed from reality well before you met them.”
― Gene Doucette, Immortal at the Edge of the World

“Karyos's people adopted an ingenious, if somewhat perplexing attitude that life was a circle. Not like Disney's circle of life thing, which was really just a nice way to say, "death is normal, children, so suck it up.”
― Gene Doucette, Hellenic Immortal

“It’s how I figured out what you’re actually facing.  But before I prove I’m actually useful here, why don’t you tell me why the man who used it has to die?”
― Gene Doucette, Regency Immortal

“The dragon roared. Terrible sound, that. Made my testicles shrink.”
― Gene Doucette, Immortal

“(Yes, I had disabled a six foot five satyr, caught him, and hoisted him into a chair without dropping my beer. If you think that’s unlikely, you don’t know how I feel about beer.)”
― Gene Doucette, Hellenic Immortal

“Most every old civilizations looks at others--members of the same species but not of the same tribe--as wild men. It's a common rationalization, because when you reduce someone else to a level of something like an animal, it makes them easier to kill.”
― Gene Doucette, Hellenic Immortal

“(A note: succubi are notorious amateur psychologists and have been since well before Freud. In fact I have it on good authority that Freud stole his whole gig from a particularly talkative succubus he used to know. And if you don't believe Freud knew a succubus, you haven't read Freud.)”
― Gene Doucette, Immortal

“If there's one thing I know, it's that the minute someone feels obligated to tell you not to be afraid of them, that's the time to start being afraid of them.”
― Gene Doucette, Immortal

“We just met and we're already doing heroin?" I said. "Seems sudden.”
― Gene Doucette, Immortal

“Silly. Moon for you?” “No, the moon is for everyone,” I said. “Tree is for everyone.” Pixies, the first communists.”
― Gene Doucette, Immortal

“He made a gesture and a man came over from the other side of the room with the bottle, and refilled my snifter.  Having people around to do that is why one strives to be rich.”
― Gene Doucette, Immortal and the Madman

“Kings associate themselves with one god or another, sometimes Re, but generally Osiris or his father Horus.”
― Gene Doucette, Immortal

“History was by definition one long chaotic, violent mess sometimes interrupted by magnificent eras of peace that remind everybody life occasionally wasn't awful.”
― Gene Doucette, Immortal at the Edge of the World

“(Most jobs I've had have been variations on hunter-gatherer and farmer. I was one of the first to say "Hey, if we grow our own food, we won't have to hunt it down all the time." Mostly, I was just tired of moving around constantly, but you have to admit it was a pretty good idea.)”
― Gene Doucette, Immortal

“Pixies, the first communists.”
― Gene Doucette, Immortal

“I used to face charging lions in the Serengeti with nothing more than a stone axe and a loincloth. People today disappoint me.”
― Gene Doucette, Immortal