Chris Rose Quotations

We're pleased that Sen. Fitz-Gerald has recognized that her bill has some serious effects and probably wouldn't pass the state Senate.

He said he has one that has to do with cars.

The most open, joyous, free-wheeling, celebratory city in the country is broken, hurting, down on its knees. Failing. Begging for help. Somebody turn this movie off; I don't want to watch it anymore. I want a slow news day. I want a no news day.

Once we get it out to the lake, we will go over it and see if we can determine what happened,

I have unwittingly and unwillingly become an emotional flashpoint. That's made me an audience for other people's pain.

I'll miss more than anything being a a part of that team. We've accomplished a lot in the last three years.

A New Orleans credo: When life gives you lemons--make daiquiris.

Everybody here has a story. New Orleans was always a place where people talked too much even if they had nothing to say. Now everyone's got something to say.

When I am introduced as someone from New Orleans, people sometimes say: "I'm so sorry." New Orleans. I'm so sorry. That's not the way it was before,not the way it's supposed to be. When people find out you're from New Orleans, they're supposed to tell you about how they got drunk there once, or fell in love there, or first heard the music there that changed their lives. At worst people would say: "I've always wanted to go there." But now, it's just: "I'm sorry." Man, that kills me. That just kills me.

...as bad as it is here, it's better than being somewhere else." -Chris Rose, regarding life in Post-Katrina New Orleans

If you cannot improve upon the silence, do not speak.

Time is running out for the climate

It is impossible to capture the essence, tolerance, and spirit of south Louisiana in words.

Even at the End of Days, there will be lap dancing.

Mardi Gras is the love of life. It is the harmonic convergence of our food, our music, our creativity, our eccentricity, our neighborhoods, and our joy of living. All at once.

Do what you do. This Christmas, Hanukkah, Kwanzaa, New Year's Eve, Twelfth Night, Valentine's Day, Mardi Gras, St. Paddy's Day, and every day henceforth. Just do what you do. Live out your life and your traditions on your own terms. If it offends others, so be it. That's their problem.

To be engaged in some small way in the revival of one of the great cities of the world is to live a meaningful existence by default.

we dance even if there's no radio. we drink at funerals. we talk too much & laugh too loud & live too large, and, frankly, we're suspicious of others who don't.

The longer you live in New Orleans, the more unfit you become to live anywhere else.

I'm not going to lay down in words the lure of this place. Every great writer in the land, from Faulkner to Twain to Rice to Ford, has tried to do it and fallen short. It is impossible to capture the essence, tolerance, and spirit of south Louisiana in words and to try is to roll down a road of clichés, bouncing over beignets and beads and brass bands and it just is what it is. It is home.

Dear America, I suppose we should introduce ourselves: We're South Louisiana...You probably already know that we talk funny and listen to strange music and eat things you'd probably hire an exterminator to get out of your yard. We dance even if there's no radio. We drink at funerals. We talk too much and laugh too loud and live too large and, frankly,we're suspicious of others who don't.

If there was no New Orleans, America would just be a bunch of free people dying of boredom." -Judy Deck in an e-mail sent to Chris Rose