# Corny aphorisms that you’ve come to live by
**URL:** https://boards.straightdope.com/t/corny-aphorisms-that-you-ve-come-to-live-by/956306
**Category:** In My Humble Opinion
**Created:** [December 19, 2021, 6:22am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/corny-aphorisms-that-you-ve-come-to-live-by/956306 "2021-12-19T06:22:17Z")
**Posts on this page:** 20
**Page:** 4
### Author:  [@Bonum\_Legatum](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bonum_Legatum)
#### Post date: [December 22, 2021, 10:43am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/corny-aphorisms-that-you-ve-come-to-live-by/956306/61 "2021-12-22T10:43:48Z")
Yes, and in the movie the actor mentions that he is quoting an old aphorism.
Anyway, that’s where I first heard it.
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### Author:  [@snowthx](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/snowthx)
#### Post date: [December 22, 2021, 7:17pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/corny-aphorisms-that-you-ve-come-to-live-by/956306/62 "2021-12-22T19:17:32Z")
> [@krisolov](#):
>
> Put in the work, reap the benefits.
Don’t learn the tricks of the trade - learn the trade.
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### Author:  [@AskNott](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/AskNott)
#### Post date: [December 22, 2021, 10:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/corny-aphorisms-that-you-ve-come-to-live-by/956306/63 "2021-12-22T22:58:34Z")
It’s true that cheap tools will cost you money, but sometimes you end up working for one.
If beggars were choosers, then horses could ride.
In autumn, spill beer on your socks, because chiggers can’t be boozers.
Dozens of signs in the factory ended a list of truisms with, “You can’t screw the boss if you’re not here.”
Lysdexia socks.
“It’s always darkest just before the piano falls on you.” --Oliver Faltz
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### Author:  [@ThelmaLou](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ThelmaLou)
#### Post date: [December 22, 2021, 11:29pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/corny-aphorisms-that-you-ve-come-to-live-by/956306/64 "2021-12-22T23:29:34Z")
Kind of lame after that last brilliant volley, but here goes anyway:
Beatings will continue until morale improves.
Bad spellers of the world, untie!
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### Author:  [@lobotomyboy63](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/lobotomyboy63)
#### Post date: [December 22, 2021, 11:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/corny-aphorisms-that-you-ve-come-to-live-by/956306/65 "2021-12-22T23:51:08Z")
> [@ThelmaLou](#):
>
> Beatings will continue until morale improves.
I have the pirate flag for this.
[https://www.amazon.com/Beatings-Continue-Until-Morale-Improves/dp/B07YGVDS45/ref=sr\_1\_1\_sspa?crid=1J9RJJUUT97ZN&keywords=the+beatings+will+continue+until+morale+improves&qid=1640216966&sprefix=beaetings+will%2Caps%2C121&sr=8-1-spons&psc=1&spLa=ZW5jcnlwdGVkUXVhbGlmaWVyPUEzTThGSTdaVTRRRkFSJmVuY3J5cHRlZElkPUEwMzkwNzk4MUJWWDZBSTFSRktDMiZlbmNyeXB0ZWRBZElkPUEwNTA5NzA2MzZMQTZBNzk5SlVVTiZ3aWRnZXROYW1lPXNwX2F0ZiZhY3Rpb249Y2xpY2tSZWRpcmVjdCZkb05vdExvZ0NsaWNrPXRydWU=](https://www.amazon.com/Beatings-Continue-Until-Morale-Improves/dp/B07YGVDS45/ref=sr_1_1_sspa?crid=1J9RJJUUT97ZN&keywords=the+beatings+will+continue+until+morale+improves&qid=1640216966&sprefix=beaetings+will%2Caps%2C121&sr=8-1-spons&psc=1&spLa=ZW5jcnlwdGVkUXVhbGlmaWVyPUEzTThGSTdaVTRRRkFSJmVuY3J5cHRlZElkPUEwMzkwNzk4MUJWWDZBSTFSRktDMiZlbmNyeXB0ZWRBZElkPUEwNTA5NzA2MzZMQTZBNzk5SlVVTiZ3aWRnZXROYW1lPXNwX2F0ZiZhY3Rpb249Y2xpY2tSZWRpcmVjdCZkb05vdExvZ0NsaWNrPXRydWU=)
> [@ThelmaLou](#):
>
> Bad spellers of the world, untie!
We’re having a meeting for dyslexic atheists who don’t believe in Dog.
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### Author:  [@ThelmaLou](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ThelmaLou)
#### Post date: [December 23, 2021, 3:02am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/corny-aphorisms-that-you-ve-come-to-live-by/956306/66 "2021-12-23T03:02:45Z")
> [@lobotomyboy63](#):
>
> I have the pirate flag for this.-
🤣
I just added that to my amazon shopping list. Someone is getting that for a birthday present next year!
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### Author:  [@Bonum\_Legatum](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bonum_Legatum)
#### Post date: [December 23, 2021, 1:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/corny-aphorisms-that-you-ve-come-to-live-by/956306/67 "2021-12-23T13:39:55Z")
> [@ThelmaLou](#):
>
> I just added that to my amazon shopping list. Someone is getting that for a birthday present next year!
You might try a web search on “demotivational posters”.
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### Author:  [@lobotomyboy63](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/lobotomyboy63)
#### Post date: [December 23, 2021, 1:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/corny-aphorisms-that-you-ve-come-to-live-by/956306/68 "2021-12-23T13:43:36Z")
> [@Bonum\_Legatum](#):
>
> You might try a web search on “demotivational posters”
I got my brother a calendar of those.
> **[Build-Your-Own-Calendar](https://despair.com/products/build-your-own-calendar)**
>
> With our completely customizable Print-On-Demand Demotivators® calendars, you can choose which designs you get, what month they land on, and add funny custom dates, too! CALENDAR FEATURES: Each calendar is a whopping 14" x 11" They're each...
On the wall next to his desk at work he has this poster:
> **[Sacrifice](https://despair.com/collections/demotivators/products/sacrifice-temple)**
>
> All we ask here is that you give us your heart. Show up every day, work hard, and don’t complain, and in fifty years you’ll get a nice gold watch. Which will be slipped on your cold, dead wrist. PERFECT FOR: Mixtli-Dark Cloud Tlaloc Kali ma...Kali...
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### Author:  [@ThelmaLou](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ThelmaLou)
#### Post date: [December 23, 2021, 3:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/corny-aphorisms-that-you-ve-come-to-live-by/956306/69 "2021-12-23T15:22:57Z")
Those are hilarious!
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### Author:  [@Johnny\_L.A](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Johnny_L.A)
#### Post date: [December 23, 2021, 3:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/corny-aphorisms-that-you-ve-come-to-live-by/956306/70 "2021-12-23T15:31:34Z")
I used to have T-shirts from the local Marine store that had that on the back, and the company’s logo on the left tit. Wore them out, and they seem to have stopped selling them years ago. (I haven’t looked in a few years.)
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### Author:  [@lobotomyboy63](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/lobotomyboy63)
#### Post date: [December 23, 2021, 3:35pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/corny-aphorisms-that-you-ve-come-to-live-by/956306/71 "2021-12-23T15:35:02Z")
> [@ThelmaLou](#):
>
> Those are hilarious!
You’re in Texas, right? They’re out of Austin, began in1998. Keeping it weird!
[Despair, Inc. - Wikipedia](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Despair,_Inc).
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### Author:  [@pullin](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/pullin)
#### Post date: [December 23, 2021, 4:12pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/corny-aphorisms-that-you-ve-come-to-live-by/956306/72 "2021-12-23T16:12:30Z")
> [@burpo\_the\_wonder\_mutt](#):
>
> You can always cut it shorter.
While redoing a deck –
Wife: “You’re upset, what’s wrong?”
Me: “I need a board-stretcher.”
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### Author:  [@ThelmaLou](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ThelmaLou)
#### Post date: [December 23, 2021, 5:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/corny-aphorisms-that-you-ve-come-to-live-by/956306/73 "2021-12-23T17:22:14Z")
Some irony there…
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### Author:  [@ThelmaLou](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ThelmaLou)
#### Post date: [December 23, 2021, 6:04pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/corny-aphorisms-that-you-ve-come-to-live-by/956306/74 "2021-12-23T18:04:11Z")
“Not my circus, not my monkeys.”
* * *
* * *
From my days as a fund raising consultant: I’d get all geared up over a looming (sometimes arbitrary, sometimes not) deadline and couldn’t get my client off dead center to provide me with what I needed for a proposal, article, report, newsletter, whatever. I always took my mission seriously, even if they didn’t. For my own sanity I came up with:
> “You can’t care more than they do.”
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### Author:  [@a6ka97](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/a6ka97)
#### Post date: [December 23, 2021, 6:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/corny-aphorisms-that-you-ve-come-to-live-by/956306/75 "2021-12-23T18:15:53Z")
“I see” said the blind carpenter, to his deaf wife, as he picked up his hammer and saw.
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### Author:  [@Slithy\_Tove](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Slithy_Tove)
#### Post date: [December 23, 2021, 6:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/corny-aphorisms-that-you-ve-come-to-live-by/956306/76 "2021-12-23T18:37:47Z")
> [@ThelmaLou](#):
>
> > “You can’t care more than they do.”
Years ago in a thread like this, someone expressed this same sentiment as:
“Hey, you’re the one fucking this chicken. I’m just here to hold the wings.”
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### Author:  [@Johnny\_L.A](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Johnny_L.A)
#### Post date: [December 23, 2021, 6:48pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/corny-aphorisms-that-you-ve-come-to-live-by/956306/77 "2021-12-23T18:48:00Z")
> [@Slithy\_Tove](#):
>
> “Hey, you’re the one fucking this chicken. I’m just here to hold the wings.”
My wife sprung her versoin of that on me a few years ago:
I’M screwing this cat! You just hold the tail!
She didn’t want my interference with whatever it was I was helping her with. (I’m pretty sure I posted a thread asking if anyone had heard that expression.)
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### Author:  [@ThelmaLou](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ThelmaLou)
#### Post date: [December 23, 2021, 6:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/corny-aphorisms-that-you-ve-come-to-live-by/956306/78 "2021-12-23T18:52:32Z")
> [@Slithy\_Tove](#):
>
> “Hey, you’re the one fucking this chicken. I’m just here to hold the wings.”
That’s a beaut!
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### Author:  [@Dadtheinhaler](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dadtheinhaler)
#### Post date: [December 24, 2021, 6:48am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/corny-aphorisms-that-you-ve-come-to-live-by/956306/79 "2021-12-24T06:48:35Z")
One of my favorite little quotes (dunno If it’s technically an aphorism) is what used to be in your sig: “I must leave this earth, if only for an hour”
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### Author:  [@alovem](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/alovem)
#### Post date: [December 24, 2021, 10:15am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/corny-aphorisms-that-you-ve-come-to-live-by/956306/80 "2021-12-24T10:15:31Z")
Here are two that I heard from a foolish woman who sometimes said profound things:
About keeping anxiety in check: _There are thoughts and there are facts, and thoughts are nearly always worse._
About tolerating and ultimately forgiving fools: _People don’t do what they want; they do what they can._
And this one, said by someone years ago in the wee hours as we walked home after a night of heavy drinking: _Every step is a challenge, and every challenge is a step!_
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