# Your favorite/most useful aphorisms
**URL:** https://boards.straightdope.com/t/your-favorite-most-useful-aphorisms/756322
**Category:** In My Humble Opinion
**Created:** [June 2, 2016, 4:18pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/your-favorite-most-useful-aphorisms/756322 "2016-06-02T16:18:48Z")
**Posts on this page:** 20
**Page:** 1
### Author:  [@Soul\_Brother\_Number\_Two](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Soul_Brother_Number_Two)
#### Post date: [June 2, 2016, 4:18pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/your-favorite-most-useful-aphorisms/756322/1 "2016-06-02T16:18:48Z")
Mine is “Never try to teach a pig to sing. It wastes your time and annoys the pig.” I use it often; it has become past of my personal philosophy. I’ve said it enough times at work that my cow orkers have taken it on: one or another will comment that we have entered singing pig territory, and others will make eye contact and simply say “pig.”
What are some of yours? PS I got curious while writing this, thinking that this sounded like Will Rogers, so I looked it up and it’s from Time Enough for Love. Makes the sense, it does.
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### Author:  [@MoonMoon](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MoonMoon)
#### Post date: [June 2, 2016, 4:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/your-favorite-most-useful-aphorisms/756322/2 "2016-06-02T16:22:32Z")
Not my circus, not my monkeys.
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### Author:  [@jtur88](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/jtur88)
#### Post date: [June 2, 2016, 4:59pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/your-favorite-most-useful-aphorisms/756322/3 "2016-06-02T16:59:44Z")
I dislike them so much, I’d rather list the ones that make me the stabbiest.
Start with “Apples and Oranges”.
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### Author:  [@Dung\_Beetle](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dung_Beetle)
#### Post date: [June 2, 2016, 5:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/your-favorite-most-useful-aphorisms/756322/4 "2016-06-02T17:28:40Z")
Hanlon’s Razor: Never attribute to malice that which is adequately explained by stupidity.
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### Author:  [@stillownedbysetters](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/stillownedbysetters)
#### Post date: [June 2, 2016, 5:48pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/your-favorite-most-useful-aphorisms/756322/5 "2016-06-02T17:48:30Z")
If you can’t dazzle them with brilliance, baffle them with bullshit.
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### Author:  [@Karen\_Lingel](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Karen_Lingel)
#### Post date: [June 2, 2016, 5:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/your-favorite-most-useful-aphorisms/756322/6 "2016-06-02T17:52:59Z")
“There’s no downside to being an asshole”
(I assume this is the why people become assholes.)
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### Author:  [@Gatopescado](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Gatopescado)
#### Post date: [June 2, 2016, 6:14pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/your-favorite-most-useful-aphorisms/756322/7 "2016-06-02T18:14:17Z")
“It can _always_ get worse”.
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### Author:  [@TreacherousCretin](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/TreacherousCretin)
#### Post date: [June 2, 2016, 6:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/your-favorite-most-useful-aphorisms/756322/8 "2016-06-02T18:46:47Z")
“If it ain’t broken, fix it 'til it is.”
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### Author:  [@Blue\_Blistering\_Barnacle](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Blue_Blistering_Barnacle)
#### Post date: [June 2, 2016, 6:56pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/your-favorite-most-useful-aphorisms/756322/9 "2016-06-02T18:56:16Z")
“The longer you stay, the longer you stay.”
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### Author:  [@Inner\_Stickler](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Inner_Stickler)
#### Post date: [June 2, 2016, 7:05pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/your-favorite-most-useful-aphorisms/756322/10 "2016-06-02T19:05:21Z")
“Where you tend a rose, my lad, a thistle cannot grow”.
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### Author:  [@silenus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/silenus)
#### Post date: [June 2, 2016, 7:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/your-favorite-most-useful-aphorisms/756322/11 "2016-06-02T19:07:47Z")
“Wherever you go, there you are.”
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### Author:  [@ivylass](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ivylass)
#### Post date: [June 2, 2016, 7:08pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/your-favorite-most-useful-aphorisms/756322/12 "2016-06-02T19:08:29Z")
One stumble does not a failure make.
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### Author:  [@Blue\_Blistering\_Barnacle](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Blue_Blistering_Barnacle)
#### Post date: [June 2, 2016, 7:18pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/your-favorite-most-useful-aphorisms/756322/13 "2016-06-02T19:18:04Z")
> [@Gatopescado](#):
>
> “It can _always_ get worse”.
“They can always hurt you more.”
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### Author:  [@QuickSilver](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/QuickSilver)
#### Post date: [June 2, 2016, 7:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/your-favorite-most-useful-aphorisms/756322/14 "2016-06-02T19:28:20Z")
“Life being what it is, one begins plotting revenge.”
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### Author:  [@BrassyPhrase](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BrassyPhrase)
#### Post date: [June 2, 2016, 7:29pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/your-favorite-most-useful-aphorisms/756322/15 "2016-06-02T19:29:23Z")
> [@Soul\_Brother\_Number\_Two](#):
>
> Mine is “Never try to teach a pig to sing. It wastes your time and annoys the pig.” I use it often; it has become past of my personal philosophy. I’ve said it enough times at work that my cow orkers have taken it on: one or another will comment that we have entered singing pig territory, and others will make eye contact and simply say “pig.”
>
> What are some of yours? PS I got curious while writing this, thinking that this sounded like Will Rogers, so I looked it up and it’s from Time Enough for Love. Makes the sense, it does.
I heard it from my uncle ‘Never wrestle a pig. You’ll get dirty, and the pig likes it.’
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### Author:  [@CCitizen](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/CCitizen)
#### Post date: [June 2, 2016, 7:29pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/your-favorite-most-useful-aphorisms/756322/16 "2016-06-02T19:29:48Z")
“I do not want to be a clown in the World which is not a circus.”
“Do onto others as they have done to you”
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### Author:  [@Dung\_Beetle](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dung_Beetle)
#### Post date: [June 2, 2016, 7:34pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/your-favorite-most-useful-aphorisms/756322/17 "2016-06-02T19:34:55Z")
“Lord loves a workin’ man, don’t trust whitey, see a doctor and get rid of it.”
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### Author:  [@Colibri](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Colibri)
#### Post date: [June 2, 2016, 7:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/your-favorite-most-useful-aphorisms/756322/18 "2016-06-02T19:39:36Z")
Necessity is the mother of strange bedfellows.
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### Author:  [@Paintcharge](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Paintcharge)
#### Post date: [June 2, 2016, 7:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/your-favorite-most-useful-aphorisms/756322/19 "2016-06-02T19:44:50Z")
We’ll burn that bridge when we get to it.
Never argue with an idiot. He’ll drag you down to his level and beat you with experience.
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### Author:  [@Qadgop\_the\_Mercotan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Qadgop_the_Mercotan)
#### Post date: [June 2, 2016, 7:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/your-favorite-most-useful-aphorisms/756322/20 "2016-06-02T19:52:58Z")
“That which does not kill me only makes me more irritable.”
“Give a little whimper.”
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