"We are not trying to do live priests out of business. However, the robot never forgets an anniversary." — Japanese curator of a cemetery and chapel staffed by a robot priest which says prayers of the appropriate religion for those buried in the cemetery.
Scholarship
"China's best known securities trader has been made a university professor so that he can teach people how to get rich by playing the stockmarket." — Sydney Morning Herald, May 4.
Whoops!
"New right to die with dignity" — Ambiguous headline in the May 6 Sydney Morning Herald which momentarily roused hopes on the left.
Accepted wisdom
"Where it is now is unacceptable; where it is going is even more unacceptable." — Employment minister Kim Beazley on the figure for long-term unemployed.
Let's do it anyway
"There is nothing ... I have said which indicates that I am going to sort of shoot myself if we become a republic." — Liberal frontbencher John Howard.
Second thoughts
"I don't think that's a good initiation. I think a hug would be better." — Member of a US group, Mountain Men Anonymous, shot in the eye with an arrow during an initiation ceremony.
Left it where?
"I think perhaps we have lost touch with the community and lost the middle ground. We may have inadvertently left the community behind." — Kathryn Greiner, addressing a Young Liberals conference in Sydney.
Wary of passion
"I don't say specifically what my own view of this is, for one specific reason: it is an issue about which a number of people in the Liberal Party feel very passionately. I might have felt passionate about it once, but I no longer do." — Ex-PM Malcolm Fraser, refusing to take a stand on the republic question.