[QOTW] Quote of the Summer 2004

[Quote of the Week]

Voters:

The time has come to conduct the Quote of the Summer Award.  Eleven quotes
have advanced to this final round; only one will emerge victorious.

Last week, for only the second time in Quote of the Week history, two
quotes finished in an exact statistical tie for first place.  Because QOTW
has always been a forgiving and inclusive enterprise, both quotes will
appear here, and both will be eligible for Quote of the Summer honors. 
Additionally, QOTW would like to note that the co-winners have identical
initials.

With the new school year come new duties for QOTW members.  We need you to
submit funny quotes using the handy form at http://www.qotw.net.  We need
you to vote for your favorites each week using the procedure explained at
http://www.qotw.net/~qotw/howtovote.html.  And we need you to volunteer to
be Quoter for a week, especially if you happen to be a sophomore or junior
at Commonwealth.  If you're interested, email us at qotw at qotw.net, and
we'll provide you with details.

Without further ado, the nominees for Quote of the Summer:

"'Why I want to go to Harvard: Or, the Last Place the Feds Will Think to
Look For Me.' If I write it the right way, you get a vague, almost
subconscious impression that you'll be putting your and your children's
lives at risk by not accepting me." -Roswell Thomas, on how to get into
college

"I sort of like itwhen Michael Moore himself gets in the shot, as opposed
to doing the voice-over. He's so very fleshy and charmless! It's
entertaining in its way." -Becca Thal

"Children's literature is a bunny-eat-bunny world." -Kathleen Leverich,
children's book writer

"I hate it when people say Dominicans are thugs. It just makes me want to
shoot them--oh God..." -Gabe Espinal, Dominican

"I'm always more careful in West Cambridge; all the pedestrians have
lawyers." -Christian, truck-driver

"When I told my parents I had become a LEEK editor, my mom was more
excited about the leek than the editing. Actually, my mom put the leek in
a flower pot to make it grow. Then my dad put it in my dinner afterwards."
-Norris Wong, on receiving a vegetable leek as a symbol of his being
appointed editor of the LEEK, school humor magazine

"Bah! I dismiss the eighties with a wave of my hand. Well, I'm gonna try.
If we don't try, how can we know what we might do? I strive ever forward,
pushing the limits of what can be dismissed." -Julian Hyde, on whether one
can offhandedly dismiss entire decades

"Oh, yuck. They're just big bags of throw-up." -Noah, age 5, on the New
York Yankees

"Okay, I'm going to light the candles with this candle, and I won't get
any wax on the cake, because I'm going to do it the way I told Alex not
to. That's what I call my nurturing parental--ouch! Okay, that was God
punishing me for my nurturing parental--aah!" -Ms. Grant, lighting
birthday candles after warning her son Alex that he might burn himself

"Tell the freshmen it's fine to eat the chocolate they find on the
scavenger hunt, but remind them to save the wrappers as proof they found
it.... If they eat the wrappers, they're going to end up at Milton
[Academy] anyway." -Larry Geffin

"All of Paul Hamm's hormones went into building up those enormous shoulder
muscles; nothing was left to help his voice change at puberty." ?Lynn
Gervens, on the gold-medal gymnast's chipmunk-like voice

Voting closes at 5:00 on Friday afternoon.  Tomorrow's email will mark the
grand beginning of Quote of the Week's fourth season, so stay tuned.

-Ben "na na na" Orlin