“It’s an old dream that eats me slowly every night at this time it begins and there’s nothing anyone without love can do. ”

“You can try to change New York, but it’s like Jay-Z says: “Concrete bunghole where dreams are made up. There’s nothing you can do.”

“(Love is the puzzle that) can’t be solved. Catlike, it follows no rules but its own, and only it knows what they are. Also it can change the rules any time it wants, in any way it wants, and there’s nothing anyone can do about it.”

“Everybody dies. There’s nothing you can do about it. Whether or not you eat six almonds a day. Whether or not you believe in God. (Although there’s no question a belief in God would come in handy. It would be great to think there’s a plan, and that everything happens for a reason. I don’t happen to believe that. And every time one of my friends says to me, “Everything happens for a reason,” I would like to smack her.)”

“You mustn’t blame yourself for the way the boy’s turned out, Vernon. If there’s something rotten on the inside, there’s nothing anyone can do about it.”

“2.Stop obsessing about the size of my nose. Yes, it’s freakishly large, but since there’s nothing I can do about that, it’s time I came to terms with it;3. Avoid mirrors, so as not to be reminded of my nose;”