“Fishing in a bucket. The total hopelessness of the activity was very soothing. It was the perfect sport. Without the emotional stresses of success and failure, she was entirely free to enjoy the pleasures of the moment... It was a good hobby, and cheap, and if more people did it more often”

“You can't be disgusting to people just because they annoy you!" she exclaimed very crossly. "Thousands of people annoy me! Millions of people annoy millions of people all the time! . . . You have to put up with them.”

“Rose had the sort of eyes that manage perfectly well with things close by, but entirely blur out things far away. Because of this even the brightest stars had only appeared as silvery smudges in the darkness. In all her life, Rose had never properly seen a star.Tonight there was a sky full.Rose looked up, and it was like walking into a dark room and someone switching on the universe.”

“I love people who play guitars on roofs!" said Rose, hopping along the pavement in one of her sudden happy moods. "Don't you?""Never knew anyone else who did it!""Don't you like Tom?""Of course I do. But I don't know about all the other guitar-on-roof players! They might be really awful people, with just that one good thing about them. Playing guitars on roofs... or bagpipes... Or drums... Sarah would like that, and Saffy could have the bagpipes! Caddy could have a harp.... What about Mum?""One of those gourds filled with beans!" said Rose at once. "And Daddy could have a grand piano. On a flat roof. With a balcony and pink flowers in pots around the edge! And I'll have a very loud trumpet! What about you?""I'll just listen," said Indigo.”

“On the board was a list of words and phrases which her mother considered not suitable for use in college T-shirt design. She had been asked about them so often that in the end she had started a blacklist of banned words to which everyone could refer. Every time someone thought of a new one, she unflinchingly wrote it down...Rose read through the list, and turned back to her letter.These are the words I learned to spell in Mummy's art class today, she wrote, and sighed a little as she began the tedious job of copying from the board.”

“Darling Daddy,Poor Saffy. She had a big fight in the boys toilets on Monday, did you know? A very big fight and Sarah helped and it was terrifying. Said a boy in my class who has a brother who was there.Saffy washed her hands and said Never Ever Never Dare You Touch My Brother. (Indigo). And the plug holes were blocked with hair.Love from Rose.-Sarah's mother has given us soup. Soup soup soup and then it was all gone.L.F.R.”

“Even Dad likes it," said Caddy, and her father agreed that he did. In a way. Being a broad-minded, tolerant, artistic sort of person. Or so people told him..."Oh, yes?" said Saffron, rolling her eyes."Yes," said Bill, sounding a little bit peeved. "So you thank your lucky stars, my girl, because in some families you would have come home to very big trouble! A nose stud! At your age! If you come down with blood poisoning, don't blame me!”