There are times in life when people must know when not to let go. Balloons are designed to teach small children this. - Terry Pratchett

Whatever happens, they say afterwards, it must have been fate. People are always a little confused about this, as they are in the case of miracles. When someone is saved from certain death by a strange concatenation of circumstances, they say that's a miracle. But of course if someone is killed by a freak chain of events — the oil spilled just there, the safety fence broken just there — that must also be a miracle. Just because it's not nice doesn't mean it's not miraculous.

Just because someone's a member of an ethnic minority doesn't mean they're not a nasty small-minded little jerk.

I was thinking of 'duh?' in the sense of 'a sentence containing several words more than three letters long, and possibly requiring general knowledge or a sense of history that extends past last Tuesday, has been used in my presence.'