Preening Quotes

In a bull market, one must avoid the error of the preening duck that quacks boastfully after a torrential rainstorm, thinking that its paddling skills have caused it to rise in the world. A right-thinking duck would instead compare its position after the downpour to that of the other ducks on the pond. (Warren Buffett)

I think of Nashville as a very natural place. We're easy going, we are ourselves. There isn't a lot of preening or trying to impress. So it's an easy place to just be and that is a good state from which to write.

Ann Patchett

To say that Gannet City was busy would be an understatement. New York in the rush-hour would appear immobile in comparison. There were gannets incubating, feeding chicks, flirting, mating, preening and launching themselves into the air in effortless flight on their six-foot wings. With their creamy- white bodies, wing-tips black as jet and their orange-coloured nape and head they were impressive and immensely handsome.

Gerald Durrell

It tackles a wonderful subject without preening, and brings it off unassertively - so unassertively that the movie is in danger of being overlooked. (Variety has already dismissed it as something "for a very limited audience.") We're getting to the point where the press assumes that movie audiences won't be willing to bring anything to a picture, and warns them off.

Pauline Kael

Washington is a place where people have always been suspect of style and overt sexuality. Too much preening signals that you're not up late studying cap-and-trade agreements.

Maureen Dowd

Women, more often than not, do things which aren't remotely relaxing but are all about preening, which is just another sort of work.

Julie Burchill

All the girls and boys seen preening through school halls, fighting to fit in, games they just can't win, higher education dumbing down a nation, around the square unsure of where we fit in.

Dawud Wharnsby