Herb Caen famous quotes

A man begins cutting his wisdom teeth the first time he bites off more than he can chew.
-- Herb Caen

#Wisdom #Cutting #Men

Isn't it nice that people who prefer Los Angeles to San Francisco live there?
-- Herb Caen

#Nice #San Francisco #People

A city is not gauged by its length and width, but by the broadness of its vision and the height of its dreams.
-- Herb Caen

#Dream #Cities #Vision

There are a thousand viewpoints in the viewtiful city.
-- Herb Caen

#Cities #San Francisco #Viewpoints

Cockroaches and socialites are the only things that can stay up all night and eat anything.
-- Herb Caen

#Stay Strong #Anger #Night

Baffling late-life discovery: Golfers wear those awful clothes on purpose.
-- Herb Caen

#Golf #Discovery #Clothes

The only thing wrong with immortality is that it tends to go on forever.
-- Herb Caen

#Forever #Goes On #Immortality

I tend to live in the past because most of my life is there.
-- Herb Caen

#Life #Past #Life Is

The trouble with born-again Christians is that they are an even bigger pain the second time around.
-- Herb Caen

#Christian #Pain #Trouble

I hope I go to Heaven, and when I do, I'm going to do what every San Franciscan does when he gets there. He looks around and says, 'It ain't bad, but it ain't San Francisco.'
-- Herb Caen

#San Francisco #Heaven #Doe

Satire of satire tends to be self-canceling, and deliberate shock tactics soon lose their ability to shock, especially when they're too deliberate.
-- Herb Caen

#Self #Tactics #Satire

I have a memory like an elephant. I remember every elephant I've ever met.
-- Herb Caen

#Memories #Elephants #Remember

When a place advertises itself as 'World Famous,' you may be sure it isn't.
-- Herb Caen

#World #May #World Famous

The waterfront without the Ferry Tower would be like a birthday cake without a candle.
-- Herb Caen

#Cake #Would Be #Towers

Logic is no answer to passion.
-- Herb Caen

#Passion #Answers #Logic

A city is a state - of mind, of taste, of opportunity. A city is a marketplace - where ideas are traded, opinions clash and eternal conflict may produce eternal truths.
-- Herb Caen

#Opportunity #Cities #Ideas

Just two days in Manhattan and you find yourself looking for a place to wash your handkerchief after you wipe your forehead and it comes away black. Is there a dirtier or more fascinating city anywhere in the land? The answer to both parts of the question has to be positively negative.
-- Herb Caen

#Land #Cities #Two

The world of Manhattan is small and tightly knit, and the man on top retains a certain humility. He knows how far and fast he can fall by looking at the guy across the street. The view from the $250,000 apartment covers a lot of ground, most of it condemned.
-- Herb Caen

#Fall #Humility #Men

Old San Francisco - the one so many nostalgics yearn for - had buildings that related well to each other.
-- Herb Caen

#San Francisco #Building #Wells

God! I loove this city!
-- Herb Caen

#Cities #San Francisco

Americans are pragmatic, relatively uncomplicated, hearty and given to broad humor.
-- Herb Caen

#Broads #Given #Uncomplicated

San Francisco isn't what it used to be, and it never was.
-- Herb Caen

#Humorous #San Francisco #Used

All American cars are basically Chevrolets.
-- Herb Caen

#Car #Chevrolet

I sometimes worry about my short attention span, but not for long...
-- Herb Caen

#Long #Worry #Attention

You cover Q-tips with sandpaper and ram them up your nostrils as far as they will go. Then you sniff talcum powder while shredding hundred dollar bills.
-- Herb Caen

#Rams #Dollar Bills #Dollars

We are reorganizing in order to eliminate duplication and redundancy.
-- Herb Caen

#Order #Interesting #Redundancy

We (San Francisco) have football weather during baseball season, and baseball weather during football season.
-- Herb Caen

#Baseball #Football #San Francisco

One day if I do go to heaven...I'll look around and say, 'It ain't bad, but it ain't San Francisco.
-- Herb Caen

#San Francisco #Heaven #One Day

San Franciscans have a bond of self-satisfaction bordering on smugness.
-- Herb Caen

#Self #Smugness #Satisfaction

A city is where you can sign a petition, boo the chief justice, fish off a pier, gaze at a hippopotamus, buy a flower at the corner, or get a good hamburger or a bad girl at 4 A.M. A city is where sirens make white streaks of sound in the sky and foghorns speak in dark grays. San Francisco is such a city.
-- Herb Caen

#Girl #Flower #Dark

New Yorkers are stuck in a gloomy mucilage of mutual commiseration.
-- Herb Caen

#Stuck #Gloomy #Mutual

A city is a crazy concrete jungle whose people at the end of each day somehow make a small step ahead against terrible odds.
-- Herb Caen

#Crazy #Cities #Odds

The clock doesn?t matter in baseball.
-- Herb Caen

#Baseball #Matter #Clock

Philosophically, I don't like doing commercials.
-- Herb Caen

A good column is one that sells paper. It doesn't matter how beautifully it is written and how much you admire the author... if it doesn't sell any papers, it's not a good column. It's a terrible yardstick to use, but in the newspaper business, that's the whole thing.
-- Herb Caen

#Matter #Yardsticks #Use

The precise location of heaven on earth has never been established but it may very well be right here
-- Herb Caen

#Heaven #Earth #May