“…I’d let those entering (grad) students in on my secret—higher education is all about perseverance. It has nothing to do with smarts or creativity or anything else. It’s about cultivating the willingness and stamina for hoop jumping. Jump through the hoops, I’d say. Do it well. Do it relentlessly. And in a few years you can join the elite of the American education system secure in the knowledge that you too can endure with the best of them.”

“Passion and drive are not the same at all. Passion pulls you toward something you cannot resist. Drive pushes you toward something you feel compelled or obligated to do. If you know nothing about yourself, you can't tell the difference. Once you gain a modicum of self-knowledge, you can express your passion.....It's not about jumping through someone else's hoops. That's drive.”

“What is it with that argument? Why is it that you have to jump through hoops of fire to find out that someone's decent? The fact that someone is a bitch on the surface says heaps about them.”

“there can never be more beautiful you shine the light disguises and hoops that make you jump through because there can never be a more beautiful you!”

“This made him a grad student, and grad students existed not to learn things but to relieve the tenured faculty members of tiresome burdens such as educating people and doing research.”

“Face it, Nat, this is one tiger who will never be jumping through your flaming hoop--”