Andy Rooney Quotes

#1. Christians talk as though goodness was their idea but good behavior doesn't have any religious origin. Our prisons are filled with the devout.

Andy Rooney

#2. Let's face it, though, anything that's apt to happen to an appliance like a blender isn't covered by the warranty anyway, so I never send them in. If it breaks, I'll buy a new one. That's the American way.

Andy Rooney

#3. One of the most glorious messes in the world is the mess created in the living room on Christmas day. Don't clean it up too quickly."
~ (1919-), American writer, producer, humorist.

Andy Rooney

#4. I'd like to take some calculus, too. I have absolutely no ability in that direction and not much interest, either, but there's something going on in mathematics that I don't understand, and I'd like to find out what it is.

Andy Rooney

#5. I did not believe in the war. I thought it was wrong to go into any war. And I got to the war, and saw the Germans, and I changed my mind. I decided we were right going into World War II.

Andy Rooney

#6. It's not so much that I write well, I just don't write badly very often and that passes for good on television.

Andy Rooney

#7. A writer's job is to tell the truth.

Andy Rooney

#8. There are sixteen cans of coffee here; together they hold a total of thirteen and a half pounds of coffee. Doesn't that seem like cheating?

Andy Rooney

#9. I'm in a position of feeling secure enough so that I can say what I think is right and if so many people think it's wrong that I get fired, well, I've got enough to eat.

Andy Rooney

#10. Small daily happenings make life spectacular ... start enjoying the small things in life!

Andy Rooney

#11. In the futile attempts we all make to tidy up our lives and our surroundings, nothing is more difficult than throwing out a book.

Andy Rooney

#12. It is possible to be dumb and be a college president.

Andy Rooney

#13. The 50-50-90 rule: anytime you have a 50-50 chance of getting something right, there's a 90% probability you'll get it wrong.

Andy Rooney

#14. When it comes to educating all of us about the most basic things in life, it seems to me we need more kindergartens and fewer graduate schools.

Andy Rooney

#15. I mean, the notion that we must love everything in this country or get out and go someplace else is ridiculous. I mean, if you
the best thing a patriotic American can do is to look and be critical and find out what's wrong and try to make it better. That's what a patriotic American does.

Andy Rooney

#16. I've learned ... That having a child fall asleep in your arms is one of the most peaceful feelings in the world.

Andy Rooney

#17. I've learned ... That it's those small daily happenings that make life so spectacular.

Andy Rooney

#18. Art is a by-product of an honest and successful attempt to do something well.

Andy Rooney

#19. Don't take a butcher's advice on how to cook meat. If he knew, he'd be a chef.

Andy Rooney

#20. I'd be more willing to accept religion, even if I didn't believe it, if I thought it made people nicer to each other but I don't think it does.

Andy Rooney

#21. Everyone wants to live on top of the mountain, but all the happiness and growth occurs while you're climbing it.

Andy Rooney

#22. I hope all of you are going to fill out your census form when it comes in the mail next month. If you don't return the form the area you live in might get less government money and you wouldn't want that to happen, would you.

Andy Rooney

#23. I just wish this social institution [religion] wasn't based on what appears to me to be a monumental hoax built on an accumulation of customs and myths directed toward proving something that isn't true.

Andy Rooney

#24. Person-to-person, most people are honest.

Andy Rooney

#25. I'm an admirer of everything Dr. Martin Luther King stood for, but I don't think he would have stood for this

Andy Rooney

#26. There are more beauty parlors than there are beauties.

Andy Rooney

#27. I've learned that under everyone's hard shell is someone who wants to be appreciated and loved.

Andy Rooney

#28. My mother always called me 'sturdy' and said I have big bones. A little fat is what I am.

Andy Rooney

#29. I dislike loud-mouthed patriots who think they like our country more than I do. Some people's idea of patriotism is hating other countries.

Andy Rooney

#30. I hate to say it, but I had a great time in World War II.

Andy Rooney

#31. Sooner or later the world will have to return to the good old days when we fought wars and killed people the old-fashioned way, one at a time.

Andy Rooney

#32. In spite of some bad experiences, I'm a firm believer in the trial and error method of learning.

Andy Rooney

#33. No matter what any of the grammar teachers say, punctuation is an arbitrary matter. It should be used to make sentences clear.

Andy Rooney

#34. Great teachers are usually a little crazy.

Andy Rooney

#35. I obviously have a knack for getting on paper what a lot of people have thought and didn't realize they thought. And they say, 'Hey, yeah!' And they like that.

Andy Rooney

#36. I know a lot of you believe that most people in the news business are liberal. Let me tell you, I know a lot of them, and they were almost evenly divided this time. Half of them liked Senator Kerry; the other half hated President Bush.

Andy Rooney

#37. The fastest thing computers do is go obsolete.

Andy Rooney

#38. Milk without fat is like nonalcoholic Scotch.

Andy Rooney

#39. You can't be a good writer without being a good thinker.

Andy Rooney

#40. Taxes are important. President Bush's tax proposals leave no rich person behind. Voters approve of President Bush helping the kind of people they wish they were one of.

Andy Rooney

#41. Conservatives are more religious than liberals
although there is no evidence that they're nicer people because of it.

Andy Rooney

#42. I've learned ... That the easiest way for me to grow as a person is to surround myself with people smarter than I am.

Andy Rooney

#43. Creativity is a by-product of hard work. If I never have another really new idea, it won't matter.

Andy Rooney

#44. I don't differentiate much, except in degree, between people who believe in religion from those who believe in astrology, magic or the supernatural.

Andy Rooney

#45. One day about 10 years ago the door to my office opened and who walked in but Bill Gates ... Seemed like a nice guy and has done more with his money than most billionaires. But that's as far as I want to go being kind to Bill Gates.

Andy Rooney

#46. I didn't get old on purpose, it just happened. If you're lucky, it could happen to you.

Andy Rooney

#47. We should change our attitude toward the United Nations. There has to be some power in the world superior to our own. We should not have attacked Iraq without the okay of the United Nations. Now we have to live with that mistake. We're living with it, and too many of our guys are dying with it.

Andy Rooney

#48. You're almost always better off keeping your mouth shut, but don't let that stop you from popping off.

Andy Rooney

#49. The only people who say worse things about politicians that reporters do are other politicians.

Andy Rooney

#50. We need people who can actually do things. We have too many bosses and too few workers.

Andy Rooney

#51. The world must be filled with unsuccessful musical careers like mine, and it's probably a good thing. We don't need a lot of bad musicians filling the air with unnecessary sounds. Some of the professionals are bad enough.

Andy Rooney

#52. Most of us aren't that interested in getting rich- we just don't want to get poor.

Andy Rooney

#53. No one ever writes a book in which he is the bad guy.

Andy Rooney

#54. One of the sweetest things in life: a letter from a friend.

Andy Rooney

#55. When there are starving people in the world, it seems wrong that so many of us Americans eat as much for entertainment as for nourishment.

Andy Rooney

#56. It's just amazing how long this country has been going to hell without ever having got there.

Andy Rooney

#57. I've learned ... That love, not time, heals all wounds.

Andy Rooney

#58. I've learned ... That I wish I could have told my Mom that I love her one more time before she passed away.

Andy Rooney

#59. I don't like food that's too carefully arranged; it makes me think that the chef is spending too much time arranging and not enough time cooking. If I wanted a picture I'd buy a painting.

Andy Rooney

#60. Guns do not make you a killer. I think killing makes you a killer. You can kill someone with a baseball bat or a car, but no one is trying to ban you from driving to the ball game.

Andy Rooney

#61. The two biggest sellers in any bookstore are the cookbooks and the diet books. The cookbooks tell you how to prepare the food, and the diet books tell you how not to eat any of it!

Andy Rooney

#62. There is obviously a great human need for religion because life seems to be such a mystery.

Andy Rooney

#63. Familiar things are a comfort to us all.

Andy Rooney

#64. I don't think the government is out to get me or help someone else get me but it wouldn't surprise me if they were out to sell me something or help someone else sell me something. I mean, why else would the Census Bureau want to know my telephone number?

Andy Rooney

#65. Go to bed. Whatever you're staying up late for isn't worth it.

Andy Rooney

#66. Anyone who watches golf on television would enjoy watching the grass grow on the greens.

Andy Rooney

#67. New ideas are one of the most overrated concepts of our time. Most of the important ideas that we live with aren't new at all.

Andy Rooney

#68. The best thing about a vacation is planning it.

Andy Rooney

#69. I've learned ... That when you're in love, it shows.

Andy Rooney

#70. A cat's idea of a 'good time' is to kill something.

Andy Rooney

#71. The trouble with dictionaries is, they tell you more about words than you want to know without answering the question you have.

Andy Rooney

#72. Soap, like people, shouldn't smell like anything.

Andy Rooney

#73. A little-recognized value of listening and inquiring relates to the realization that in human relationships, it is frequently not what the I've learned ... that it is best to give advice in only two circumstances: when it is requested and when it is a life-threatening situation.

Andy Rooney

#74. I've learned that no matter how serious your life requires you to be, everyone needs a friend to act goofy with.

Andy Rooney

#75. I just wish we knew a little less about his urethra and a little more about his arms sales to Iran.

Andy Rooney

#76. My own time is passing fast enough without some national game to help it along.

Andy Rooney

#77. I've learned ... That opportunities are never lost; someone will take the ones you miss.

Andy Rooney

#78. Not many people in this world are as lucky as I've been ... All this time I've been paid to say what is on my mind on television. You don't get any luckier in life than that.

Andy Rooney

#79. I've learned ... That when you plan to get even with someone, you are only letting that person continue to hurt you ... More

Andy Rooney

#80. My advice is not to wait to be struck by an idea. If you're a writer, you sit down and damn well decide to have an idea.

Andy Rooney

#81. Numbers tend to give the impression that there's more order in the world than there is.

Andy Rooney

#82. I'd like to be rich enough so I could throw soap away after the letters are worn off

Andy Rooney

#83. The teacher who knows the most about a subject isn't necessarily the one who can teach it best.

Andy Rooney

#84. Most of the people in the world are good and decent if you give them a chance to be ...

Andy Rooney

#85. Bacon is clearly a food made by the Nazis to fatten up Americans. It has no nutritional value, is full of fat, sodium, and nitrates, and is a pathetic type of consumable made from the noblest of creatures.

Andy Rooney

#86. Did you ever notice that people who are good with a computer don't use it for much of anything except being good with a computer? They know all about information technology, but they don't have much interest in the information. I'm the opposite.

Andy Rooney

#87. I don't pick subjects as much as they pick me.

Andy Rooney

#88. I never understood retirement. What is the attraction of retirement? I go down there to Florida and look around and I said, my God, who wants this? Not me.

Andy Rooney

#89. I've learned ... That when your newly born grandchild holds your little finger in his little fist, that you're hooked for life.

Andy Rooney

#90. Almost all of us have an elevator or two in our lives somewhere. We wait for them, we ride on them. We're annoyed by the wait but pleased with the lift.

Andy Rooney

#91. When I write, I use an Underwood #5 made in 1920. Someone gave me an electric typewriter, but there's no use pretending you can use machinery that thinks faster than you do. An electric typewriter is ready to go before I have anything to say.

Andy Rooney

#92. I've learned ... That when you harbor bitterness, happiness will dock elsewhere.

Andy Rooney

#93. By the time they're ready to be thrown away, most shoes are thoroughly comfortable

Andy Rooney

#94. The federal government has sponsored research that has produced a tomato that is perfect in every respect, except that you can't eat it. We should make every effort to make sure this disease, often referred to as 'progress', doesn't spread.

Andy Rooney

#95. People will generally accept facts as truth only if the facts agree with what they already believe.

Andy Rooney

#96. I've learned ... That money doesn't buy class.

Andy Rooney

#97. All men are not created equal but should be treated as though they were under the law.

Andy Rooney

#98. Most of us end up with no more than five or six people who remember us. Teachers have thousands of people who remember them for the rest of their lives.

Andy Rooney

#99. Those of us who don't have a party affiliation ought to be able to register under the heading Confused.

Andy Rooney

#100. Computers make it easier to do a lot of things, but most of the things they make it easier to do don't need to be done.

Andy Rooney