Ben Aaronovitch Quotes
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Bollocks, I thought, or testiculi or possibly testiculos if we were using the accusative.
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So Newton, like all good seventeenth-century intellectuals, wrote in Latin because that was the international language of science, philosophy and, I found out later, upmarket pornography.
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Despite my mum being from a small village in the middle of a forest, I'm not a country person. I don't like my bacon sandwich to be curiously snuffling at my fingers. But sometimes being police means holding your breath and fondling a pig.
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This is a speech we've all heard before. From the con artists who aren't like the burglars, who aren't like the armed robbers, who only ever broke a bone if the victim had it coming and the murderers who made 'one mistake' and are forced to pay for it for the rest of their lives. They want to know what you're doing about the real criminals, the rapists and the paedophiles. Who want to know why you're wasting resources on them when we should be tackling female genital mutilation or political corruption.
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I ended up learning magic because you can’t trust the British to keep to an agreement over the long term.
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There's nothing quite like Latin for disguising the fact that you're making it up as you go along.
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Zach looked at Carey in consternation, obviously wondering if we were using the rare good cop/loony cop interrogation technique.
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Science doesn’t have all the answers, you know. It’s got all the best questions, though.
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Was it better to die in the illusion of sunshine and warmth or face death in a cold darkness of reality? Was it better to die in happy ignorance or terrified knowledge? The answer, if you're a Londoner, is that it's better not to die at all.
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Questions would be asked. Answers would be ignored.
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I’d found a seventeenth-century map of the rivers of London.
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First law of gossip - there's no point knowing something if somebody else doesn't know you know it.
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This is why you have procedure, training and drill, so that you do things when your brain is too shocked to think for itself—ask any soldier.
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Gave us the traditional look of weary outrage that you always get from someone who thinks they don’t have time for this shit.
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I don’t mind getting drunk, but there always comes a moment in the evening when I find myself watching myself bumping into things and thinking—I’m bored of this, can I have full control of my brain back, please?
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There’s nothing like having your girlfriend talk in geological time to make you feel insignificant.
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One thing for certain, Abigail who lived up the road was going on my watch list. In fact I was going to create a watch list just so I could put Abigail at the top of it.
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He said it was wife’s idea to name their daughter after him but I didn’t believe him. Could have been worse, I decided. It could have been Nigella.
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Sometimes I wonder whether, if I’d been the one that went for coffee and not Lesley May, my life would have been much less interesting and certainly much less dangerous. Could it have been anyone, or was it destiny? When I’m considering this I find it helpful to quote the wisdom of my father, who once told me, ‘Who knows why the fuck anything happens?’ Covent
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The main purpose of an administrative meeting is to establish collective guilt for whatever fuck-up arises out of its decisions.
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Most people don’t want to fight, especially when evenly matched. A mob will tear an individual to pieces and a man with a gun and a noble cause is happy to kill ever so many women and children, but risking a fair fight—not so easy. That’s why you see those pissed young men doing the dance of “don’t hold me back” while desperately hoping someone likes them enough to hold them back.
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In home furnishing terms, past a certain point, more money doesn’t get you anything except an increase in insurance premiums.
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THE TROUBLE with the old boy network is you can never be really sure whether it’s switched on or not and whether it’s operating in your interest or some other old boy’s.
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This is where the whole ape-descended thing reveals its worth, I thought madly. Sucks to be you, quadruped. Opposable thumbs - don't leave home without them.