Playing Quotations

Why would you want to stand there waving a stick when you could be playing an instrument?

When it's deep into the season and you're not playing well, it's frustrating. This is when it's time to revisit some basics.

It's the nature of the beast, playing sports on the ski team and how competitive all of us are. I want to beat everybody's time.

If someone asked what kind of music I play, I wouldn't say I'm a folk singer; however, if folk music means music for the people, and playing music to entertain them and share different messages, then sure, I'd like to think that I'm part folk singer.

Being on a major network television show is like long-distance running: You have to pace yourself and maintain your energy level and your morale. There's the role you're playing on the show, and there's also your behind-the-scenes responsibility to the crew, the guest actors and the fans - not to mention your own life as a mom.

It's great, the number of people that I'm reaching through the Internet - I've done some wonderful interviews - but I miss touching the bodies. I miss shaking hands, looking into people's faces and saying, 'Hello, how are you doing? Thank you for playing my music.'

I love playing video games. I love listening to music. Just surfing the web. Facebook, Twitter, keeping in touch with people from home.

Polo is like playing golf with a saddle, and there are a lot of moving parts.

Canada has always been a strong supporter of China's accession to the WTO... We look forward to playing a constructive role in helping complete China's accession.

I like playing make-believe. And my brothers do it with me, so it's fun. It's almost better than chocolate ice cream.

I give everything I have every time I take the ball. With that, I also know that there will always be a risk of injury when playing this game that I love.

People are constantly not feeling, but numbing themselves, either through medication or playing on their phones. If you start feeling bad, it's like, 'Distract! Distract! Put on Storage Wars!' And I know because I'm guilty of it, too.

Sometimes you'll see people give performances in comedy with an ironic detachment where they'll sort of be remarking on the character from outside of it. They're sort of commenting as they're playing the character. I think it's hard not to do that. I've certainly done that.

Playing golf is like learning a foreign language.

I think what's most fun is playing someone who's sort of selfish and in a lot of ways unlikeable, but there's this really big heart underneath it that you get little glimpses of.

Because in classical music cello is not regarded as a popular choice, it's always playing the long, boring notes.

I know that, as a bisexual, sometimes people who are gay or lesbian look down upon the bisexual community as well and assume that people who are bisexual just don't know what they want or are just playing both sides of the fence, and that's not the case, either.

It's Toby Jones playing Alfred Hitchcock, not Alfred Hitchcock. We all felt that his silhouette was crucial, so his nose and lips were crucial as well. We had to build it out a bit to get the silhouette. But, with my nose being so small within the proportion of my face, the first nose was too big. I felt like a nose on parade.

Having drive is a big part of success, along with integrity. You need to have a clear vision of what you want and take the steps to achieve it, even if that sometimes means playing gigs in tiny clubs.

The short hair fits my personality more. I think maybe, with long hair, it was a role - I was playing dress-up a bit.

I always get cast as the girl who's dying or the girl who's killing or the girl who's suicidal - all these heavy roles. But I like playing them.

I was always in love with film and becoming a character and playing something else, and nobody ever told me no, so I just followed it, and here I am, having a ton of fun.

When I play a good guy, I try to explore them and figure out what shapes them and makes them interesting. When I'm playing a bad guy, I try to explore everything that makes them good. No one ever really thinks that they're a bad guy.

There is nothing like Ruth ever existed in this game of baseball. I remember we were playing the White Sox in Boston in 1919, and he hit a home run off Lefty Williams over the left-field fence in the ninth inning and won the game. It was majestic. It soared.

I tried singing. I tried playing a musical instrument. I really wanted to be a musician, but I never could quite pull that off. I liked entertaining, but I was always drawn to some kind of technical work - some kind of honest labor.

Foreign languages was the only thing that interested me when I was at school, so playing in another language... it is quite demanding because if it is not your mother tongue, you are missing some connotations and some emotional depth of certain things.

Nothing impresses the ladies like a clean, pressed pair of khakis and a large pattern shirt featuring either classic cars, mojitos or men playing golf.

I've never liked playing golf. I prefer to be on the treadmill to keep in shape.

The thing I always liked best about touring abroad was constantly running into different people, different cultures, different foods. It really pumped up my batteries... I'm constantly playing to a demographically diverse audience... one generation is driven by nostalgia, the next by curiosity. And that's why I have no plans to retire.

I came from the theater playing leading roles, and when I started doing film and television, I felt as if I had to start from the bottom.

I studied the lives of jazz singers who would tour Europe, and... what I learned was life was big ride for them. They'd seen the dark side of humanity... but touring the world playing jazz, it was a truly carefree way of living. A great escapism, if you like.

I could be playing high school until I'm, like, 30 or something, at the rate I'm growing.

I started writing songs when I was real young, when I was 3 years old. The piano spoke to me - I don't remember when I wasn't playing piano. My second grade talent show was the first time I performed my own thing. I dressed up as Dracula and played a song called 'Monster Rock' that I wrote. And I won.

People talk about games and loneliness - it's a lonely activity. I didn't understand that. 'Gears of War' was the first multiplayer game for me that I enjoyed. But I wasn't sad. I liked being alone. I liked playing games by myself. I had lots of companionship at the house.

One of my most vivid memories of the mid-1950s is of crying into a washbasin full of soapy grey baby clothes - there were no washing machines - while my handsome and adored husband was off playing football in the park on Sunday morning with all the delightful young men who had been friends to both of us at Cambridge three years earlier.

The first time I met Ray, I was going to school around the corner from his house. One day, he was playing the piano. I eased up on the porch to listen to him.

As soon as I started writing the first batch, I had a vision. I saw me on stage playing a certain type of music. I want to take these blues melodies over aggressive guitars. I heard the sound I wanted to make. I knew what I wanted to do. It wasn't ever there before.

Illegal killings of elephants are being linked to organized crime and the funding of armed militia groups. Many consumers in Asia do not realize that by buying ivory, they are playing a role in the illegal wildlife trade and its serious consequences.

Sometimes, it just gets mentally tough, but at the end of the day, I'm playing golf for a living. And reaching out to a huge fan base and knowing people are following my progress and looking up to me means the world to me. So if all I have to do is some photo shoots and answer questions, that's nothing to me. That's part of my life.

When I got injured, I think I was starting to sense that there was more to the world than just sports. This dream of playing professional soccer probably wasn't the best track for me.

I personally like to hang out with people; if I'm playing their mom, I'd like to go have lunch with the kid, and I want to try to spend as much time with people that I can while we are working together if we're supposed to have a familiar relationship with them, because I think it reads.

I don't want to coach too far into my 60s. By then, I'll be playing golf four or five times a week.

I've been fortunate to play many different types of characters thus far. However, I really enjoy playing roles that are different than who I am personally. You can have these small fantasy worlds where you can be people you would otherwise never get to be: a doctor, a lawyer, a ruthless business woman.

I love ghost stories but kind of left them alone after my teens and came back to it after playing Heathcliff in 'Wuthering Heights' on the radio.

I remember Simon O'Donnell being struck with cancer during Australia's 1987 World Cup campaign. I know very well what it is like to have a teammate who has been struck with a potentially fatal disease. He fought through: managed to get himself back to 100% fitness and back to playing again.

I really enjoyed playing Freddie Cork. People are always scared to approach me because of the character I played in 'Brotherhood.' The writing was very smart.

I do keep getting these bad girl roles. The funny thing is that, honestly, I don't think I'm believable as these aristocratic mean girls. But I do love playing them.

The only real happiness a ballplayer has is when he is playing a ball game and accomplishes something he didn't think he could do.

Wimbledon 2014 will be my last slam. To be honest, I am already starting to miss professional tennis, having played at the highest level for two decades. It is what has given me my identity, and I will miss every bit of the action. The thought that I will not be playing anymore is daunting.

I saw this DJ playing music and saying things to the kids. They would answer him back, and I say, 'That's a great idea.'

I've always had a healthy disregard for authority - it allows me to do my job as a portrait photographer and not as someone who is playing the power game.

I would also like to thank my father who discouraged me from playing the violin at an early age.

I walk into a scene, and I do the scene. That's my job. I don't have an objective. I have the words, and I have whoever I'm playing with.

I had just left Yes and had done a concert at Crystal Palace, South London, with a choir and orchestra playing my solo album 'Journey To The Centre Of The Earth' when I had my heart attack. That day, I hadn't been to bed for four days. I don't remember much. I felt very numb during the day and airy, which is the best way to describe it.

My family had a business where they worked with gravestones, and I remember growing up and playing in cemeteries like it was a normal playground.

Playing characters who are wonderful and beautiful is hard because you don't feel like that most of the time... well, I don't. It's like this whole heart-throb nonsense. It's flattering, but that's not how I feel in the morning. It's something that goes with the job.

Seeing people ahead of time and getting acquainted with the space you're playing in is important to getting comfortable in that place.

It was fun playing a horrible, snotty kid in 'Harry Potter', and then playing Prince Charming where I was also singing and playing guitar, and then playing a completely different character.

I started drumming around the same time I came across this part of American history. But there seemed to be a way forward playing drums. There didn't seem to be a way forward being fascinated by a piece of history.

I wasn't completely comfortable in the footy culture because I wasn't that comfortable in my own skin, which I am now. I'd fit in better now, but I don't miss the training and the injuries you get playing footy.

With anything you put out there, you're going to offend somebody, but most people get that it's a joke, that I'm playing a character, and that I'm actually making fun of what I'm saying by saying it.

You're always playing the game to reach the ultimate goal.

If we don't start playing better on defense, it's going to be hard. We can't just sit there and win shootouts.

My first real acting gig was probably playing Mamillius in my mother's 'Winter's Tale.' My mom and dad are both in theater, so I grew up acting and being a little theater brat as well.

If you're playing a good guy, you show some darkness. If you're playing a dark guy, you show something different, like humor, that will mix it up and hopefully surpass the audience's expectations. What I'm battling all the time is complacency in the audience. I try to bring a little mystery to what might happen because that engages people more.

Whether it was Little League or playing with your brothers or sisters, that was always a problem. If I would lose - because I very rarely lost - then everything would go crazy.

In Montana, when we did 'Return to Lonesome Dove', we rode on the side of a hill at night in the dark; I was afraid my horse would step on one of the actors playing dead. The director said to leave it to the stunt doubles since they got paid for that.

I loved playing the stuff we did in the Byrds. It was a good band. I was lucky to be in it.

I'm a huge 'Call of Duty' fan, 'Minecraft' and all those kinds of video games. I'm constantly playing video games every day.

I was what they call a pool hustler. That's absolutely true. For long periods of time I got by, barely skimmed by, just playing pool.

Yeah, my drum programming especially is based on my knowledge of playing a drum kit. For the bass too, definitely. It was the first thing that I translated any sort of ideas through. It must have shaped it somehow.

The face of the team are the people who're playing on the cricket field. The team is not about one individual.

My favorite hobby is being alone. I like to be alone. I also like dancing, fishing, playing poker sometimes and vegetable gardening - corn, tomatoes, cucumbers, I have a big garden every year.

The closer a part is to you, the harder it is to play. Anything else is just imitation. If I'm playing a Russian countess, I get the hat, the accent, the outrageousness. Easy. Playing a murderess? Perfect.

Before I'd even started doing music or having opportunities with my own music, I was studying production and business and stuff anyway. I knew there were so many jobs within the music industry - songwriting or session playing or working at a label - and I was really interested in how it all works.

With theatre, we all agree to suspend our disbelief about so many things, but not about race. It's totally OK to have one actor playing five roles - people are willing to believe that. But they won't believe it if there's a black or an Asian kid who has white parents. What does that say about us?

Whether it's a blessing or a curse, I have always played someone like 10 years younger. When I was 23 or 24, I was playing 15 opposite Evan Rachel Wood in a movie called 'Pretty Persuasion.' She was 16 and nobody in a million years would have thought I was that much older than her.

I didn't like to stop playing for a second to bother with eating or going to the bathroom. I was a really skinny kid, and I remember my mother always telling people, 'I don't know how she's alive. I think she gets all of her nutrients from air pollution.'

I wish to clarify that I have absolutely not made a decision regarding my participation in the next Olympics. On a personal level, playing in the Olympics would be a huge honour. However, the Games in Rio are still four years away and I certainly won't be making any decisions with regards to participating any time soon.

I wasn't, you know, Mr. Popular. I was somewhere in the middle ground. I was quite alternative, the things I liked to do. Skateboarding, at the time. Playing in a band as opposed to playing in the rugby team. You know, that kind of thing.

I'm proud to say that I was that guy playing the character of Dr. Burke on 'Grey's Anatomy.'

There's a good argument to be made that companies that are private, where they're run by partnerships, where everybody has true stake in them and they're not playing with other people's money, that by default it's a safer system, because you really have skin in the game. You really own the company.

I decided that playing piano was a little bit too common, you know what I mean?

Usually, when you are an ethnic person or a trans person, in your average, everyday, unsophisticated television show, you are there for that reason. And they clearly justify and overexplain why. You very rarely see a transgender actor playing the part of a grocery-store clerk without having to say, 'Oh, look at that trans person.'

I think any time you lose an Ashes series, especially with the hype and build-up surrounding it and the pride we have as Australians playing against England, that's always hard to take.

Now, one can often get away with playing music by ear when it is not being recorded, but writing is another matter; its mistakes are not forgotten because they are still there to confuse us.

I love to laugh and dance. That's kind of my nature, though I end up always playing these angry, depressing characters.

You go through slumps in this game, and you just have to work through them. You're going to miss putts out on an LPGA tour and have bad rounds. You just have to think to yourself that you always have tomorrow, and you're lucky enough to be out here just playing golf for a living.

I love playing 'Madame Vastra.' Although I do suffer, spending three-and-a-half hours in make-up every morning to have her lizard skin put on. I was so excited the first day when we did the make-up test, but after six hours, I was like, 'Can we finish now?'

I've been a fan of Metallica and friends with those guys for a long time and that was just great - half Alice In Chains and half Metallica playing together.

Arizona was the best place. I like the competition in baseball, and the football program has been great for the past five years. I think I'll be playing as a freshman in both sports, and I think I can play with them.

I'm always nervous! Especially when it comes to a series like 'Disgaea', where you do have such a devoted fan base, the last thing you want to do is disappoint. But I love playing bad guys and just always hope that fans will be forgiving if I miss the mark.

I think my playing has been orchestral throughout the years, and this is another way of expressing that. But I primarily see it as the ultimate accomplishment of a musician. Composing makes me feel like I've finally gotten all the way up the ladder as a musician.

Maybe people don't see me as believable playing a person of today. I guess I'm just more realistic in a corset and funny hairstyles.

I am such a girly girl, and I love not playing it safe. I'm so new to this world, so it's fun to establish myself as a fashionista.

As I was sitting there, the deejay was playing music and talking over the music, and the kids were going crazy. All of a sudden, something said to me, 'Put something like that on a record, and it will be the biggest thing.' I didn't even know you called it rap.

When I was seven we moved to Orpington, and in my new school, I was kept in for extra lessons to learn 'joined-up' writing instead of playing football. I still think that my poor handwriting and lack of soccer skills date from that period.

I was in two episodes playing Christopher Reeve's character's emissary. They wanted to have my character announce Dr Swan's death, which I thought was exploitative.

No player can become accustomed to New York's climate in August in a few days. The playing conditions, the courts in New York and France are very different.

I think that the World Cup is a big factor for this increased interest. I don't believe all of this is a result of just myself but also because of the others who are playing abroad.