Elayne Boosler quotes:

When I played the Sahara Hotel in Las Vegas on New Year's Eve, I got to bring Wiley, my 85-pound black lab. He's responsible for my favorite New Year's memory of all: At the end of the show, he ran onstage and then out across all the tables in the showroom, sending champagne glasses and gamblers flying.

I love being down at Occupy Wall Street. The sincerity, the youth involvement, the desire for better, is palpable and moving. There is true caring, sharing, and refreshingly naive hope.

I never minded flying cheap. I always said to myself, 'Taking this flight saves enough money to rescue four dogs, or six cats, or will let me make a difference to the one woman saving chimps in Cameroon.'

As a standup comedian, I've worked almost every New Year's Eve of my adult life. It's the best-paying night of the year.

Calgary wins for my coldest New Year's Eve gig. That's when I learned Fahrenheit and Celsius cross at 40 below. I could see callers' breath coming out of my phone.

A study last year showed that the page you turn to first in the newspaper can be a predictor of how long you will live. No surprise, turning first to the Comics Pages prolongs your life.

I am thankful the most important key in history was invented. It's not the key to your house, your car, your boat, your safety deposit box, your bike lock or your private community. It's the key to order, sanity, and peace of mind. The key is 'Delete.'

San Francisco is really fun and liberal, and it's my kind of politics. It's like being Jewish in front of Jewish people.

When women are depressed, they eat or go shopping. Men invade another country. It's a whole different way of thinking.

I'm just a person trapped inside a woman's body.

I personally cannot tell you how many times we rescuers put our names on animals to come to us as soon as they are eligible for release, only to find they have been senselessly killed by overzealous pound workers.

I have always put my own money into Tails of Joy. For years, every time a dog walked by, my husband would say, 'There goes our beach house.'

I know what men want. Men want to be really, really close to someone who will leave them alone.

When I was growing up in comedy, there were maybe 10 comics in the whole country. Everyone had a day job. You worked free for years in little clubs, then you got your big break and became a star.

I guess in general, people tend to not eat the cute animals.

We've seen the uproars around the world concerning cartoons depicting the prophet Mohammad. Anyone who does not think comic strips are relevant never had a fatwa put on him/her for drawing a picture.

My ancestors wandered lost in the wilderness for forty years because even in biblical times, men would not stop to ask for directions.

My breakup with AT&T is final, and I'm done with Skype as the rebound guy.

I have no complaints about losing money I put in high-risk investments. I did some of that when I had real money; my informed choice, my measured gamble.

I wasn't funny as a kid. I remember enjoying comedians, but I never understood it was a job choice or a profession.

Why isn't the movie industry forced to open its shooting locations to an organization that is there to advocate for animal actors? The industry isn't allowed to pick and choose which movies using young children it will or won't allow to be monitored. The vulnerable should be protected.

My fashion philosophy is, if you're not covered in dog hair, your life is empty.

I am thankful that geniuses and artists and good people, no matter how hard it is, will eventually be recognized. I am doubly thankful that also goes for idiots.

I am thankful that all the people in the world who absolutely, positively, know what God wants, usually kill mostly each other.

Guys wake up at your place and they expect breakfast. They don't eat bagels and M&M's in the morning. They want things like toast. I say, 'I don't have these recipes.'

Wouldn't it be great if you could only get AIDS by giving money to television preachers?

I've thought for the last decade or so, the only actual place raw truth was seeping through in newspapers was on the Comics Pages. They were able to pull off intelligent social comment, pure truths not found elsewhere in the news pages, and had the ability to make it all funny, entertaining, and pertinent.

We have wild animals in zoos, yet people rarely meet their 'food' face to face.

I deliver very traditionally, and people aren't threatened. I think if I cursed or seemed wilder, I couldn't get away with the amount of very opinionated politics I get away with.

Stand-up is like a movie every night. You write it, direct it, produce it, the audience votes, and you go home. There's nothing more satisfying.

You know, if you need 100 rounds to kill a deer, maybe hunting isn't your sport.

When the sun comes up, I have morals again.

Now that the Court has declared money to be speech, I say we replace the current Court with some Ben Franklins, Thomas Jeffersons, George Washingtons, a couple of Susan B. Anthony's, Roosevelts, Hamiltons, a Sacajawea or two, and an Abe Lincoln to cover Scalia in full.

President Bush said he didn't want to renew the Assault Weapons Ban because it might 'infringe on hunters' rights'. Who needs an AK-47 machine gun to go hunting? Let me tell you guys something... If it takes you 500 rounds to bring down a deer, I don't want you going to the bathroom in MY house!

Comedy is a blood sport. It flays the truth and spurts twisted logic. In America, people become comics because we don't have bullfighting.

I am thankful I was born in America, although if I gain any more weight the burqa thing may start to seem like a good idea to me. See? Another plus about America, you can always find some food.

It doesn't bother me that I'm not a household word on the East Coast. Baton Rouge, Raleigh, Minneapolis - I'm so popular in these cities where you've never imagined an East Coast comedian working.

I've never been married, but I tell people I'm divorced so they won't think something is wrong with me.

Ever notice that Soup for One is eight aisles away from Party Mix?

I always had a running commentary in my head that was extremely funny and off-center, but I never said it to anyone.

People are giving birth underwater now. They say it's less traumatic for the baby because it's under water. But it's certainly more traumatic for the other people in the pool.

Have you noticed that if you leave the laundry in the hamper long enough, it's ready to wear again?

Horse racing is waning in popularity.

I love my parents and they're wonderful people, but they were strict, and I still look for ways to get even. When I got my own apartment for the very first time and they came to stay with me for the weekend, I made them stay in separate bedrooms.

I have six locks on my door all in a row. When I go out, I lock every other one. I figure no matter how long somebody stands there picking the locks, they are always locking three.

We have women in the military, but they don't put us in the front lines. They don't know if we can fight, if we can kill. I think we can. All the general has to do is walk over to the women and say, 'You see the enemy over there? They say you look fat in those uniforms.'

My family was totally non-religious. There was no question we were Jewish, but we were not observant.

Here is what is needed for Occupy Wall Street to become a force for change: a clear, and clearly expressed, objective. Or two.

I just get the feeling that if Jesse Helms was in charge of art in America, you'd go into a museum and see nothing but prints of dogs playing cards.

My ancestors wandered lost in the wilderness for forty years because even in biblical times, men would not stop to ask for directions

The Vatican is against surrogate mothers. Good thing they didn't have that rule when Jesus was born.

My belief is that guns are too easy to get in America. My belief is that the NRA has bought much of our congress, to the point that guns are actually the only unregulated consumer product in America. Think about that. It's stunning.

When women are depressed, they eat or go shopping.

For a single woman, preparing for company means wiping the lipstick off the milk carton.

Men put all kinds of expectations on you. They want you to scream 'You're the best' while swearing you've never done this with anyone before.

Turkeys know their names, come when you call, and are totally affectionate. They're better than teenagers.

There are many comedians who are afraid to work outside the coasts and the casinos because they're afraid they'll bomb.

I don't categorize myself. I don't think I'm perceived as a female act by my audience. My fans include just as many men as women.

I'd much rather see Richard Pryor or Jackie Mason in a theater than in a club.

Incredibly, almost every hotel I ever played in Vegas was blown up shortly afterward: The Dunes, The Sands, The Landmark, The Aladdin, The Frontier, The Hacienda, The Stardust - all were imploded.

While editors and newspaper owners currently fret over shrinking readership and lost profits, they do the one thing that insures cutting their own throats; they keep reducing space for the one feature that attracts new young readers in the first place; the comic strips.

Wouldn't it be great to see a line in all movie credits that truthfully says, 'Nobody was harmed in the making of this film, and at the cast party, all animals got a belly belly belly rub.'

The message of great art is to disturb.

I run everywhere and eavesdrop. It's the best way to see a city.

I'm pretty equal opportunity when it comes to issues to joke about.

I can't get married. I can't fake sleep for 30 years.

Pigs are smarter than dogs, and both are smarter than Congress.

I've never been able to write for stand-up.

To listen to your own silence is the key to comedy.

I pray if I ever find out I have only about three minutes to live it's during a basketball game, because then I'll have, what, 10, 12 years to live?

My brother is gay and my parents don't care, as long as he marries a doctor.

There's only one difference between Jews and Catholics. Jews are born with guilt, and Catholics have to go to school to learn it.

My mother always said you could eat off her floor; you could eat of my floor too, there's so much food down there.

A man who was loved by 300 woman singled me out to live with him. Why? I was the only one without a cat.

You never see a man walking down the street with a woman who has a little potbelly and a bald spot.

For me, comedy is a day-to-day report on the human condition. It's what's happening right now. I get maybe 20 minutes of my act straight from the newspaper.

You know you are in love when you are willing to share your cash-machine number.

Sometimes, if you really don't know how you feel about a topic, reading how both sides argue it can help.

You know you're getting fat when you step on the dog's tail and he dies.

What do hookers do on their nights off, type?

The thing about breaking up when you get older, you just don't have the steam anymore. "Oh, that's it. I can't start shaving my legs above the knee again."

Laundry's easier when you live alone. Fifteen minutes before a date, put 'em on, dry 'em with a hair blower.

President Reagan is a lot like E.T. He's cute, he's lovable, and he knows nothing about how Americans live.

People want sex education out of the schools. They believe sex education causes promiscuity. Hey, I took algebra, but I never do math.

Men in power always seem to get involved in sex scandals, but women don't even have a word for 'male bimbo.' Except maybe 'senator.

Real comedy can't be learned; it comes from a need for justice. The best who stand up, stand up for something.

I read books that say if you want to keep sex hot you tell a person what you want. How do you tell 'em you want somebody else?

I think about death. I don't want to die with clothes in the cleaners.

I can tell by your eye shadow, you're from Brooklyn, right? . . . Me too. My mother has plastic covers on all the furniture. Even the poodle. Looked like a barking hassock walking down the street.

Designers don't put out the same sweater every year. They just keep creating.

As for being a voice in politics, I feel whether you are famous or not, busy or not, it's incumbent upon every citizen to participate in this government in any way we can.

Every time we help an animal, we are healing ourselves, over and over.

I didn't get a high school diploma. I really didn't have much of an education, which left me open to educating myself throughout my life, without the limitations on intellectual curiosity a formal education can impose. I followed what interested me.

Many animal rescue organizations hit with a hard-core, heartbreaking message. Their videos and stories can become difficult for average people to watch. By taking a more positive, heartwarming approach to animal rescue, I've been able to engage people and keep them engaged for years. Instead of selling the agony and misery - and sadly, there is no shortage of that - I start with the happy endings. I work backwards so the first message they get is joy and success due to their involvement. Opening the mind with humor and joy gets the rescue message in that much deeper.

Most people love animals, and most people love to laugh. Combining the two makes both resonate deeper.

Citizens are all equal in politics: we each have one vote.