Jess: And she keeps pushing me for an answer, and I keep putting her off. I say, "Thank you very much. I'm very flattered, but I already have a job. Me teacher." That's a grammar joke. You get it.

Jess: Guys, Candace is calling at 6:00 to find out my final answer!
Nick: Whoa!
Winston: What?
Coach: I'm sorry you're in such a pickle. But I'm not sorry that I get to time something! [pulls out stopwatch] 19 minutes people!
Jess: All right.
Coach: Just to be clear, 19 minutes until 6:00.
Nick: I'm not sure this is helping.
Schmidt: This brings a whole new level of tension to the whole situation.
Winston: Yeah, because you're being timed now. You time a lot of stuff, Coach.
Jess: This is a life-changing decision, that's it.
Coach: 46 seconds.

Winston: Guys, as you all know, I am the expert at changing career paths.
Schmidt: Is this something we're now bragging about?
Winston: No, Schmidt, I'm referring to my decision to quit playing the game of basketball. Jess, I will tell you this, it was not easy. It all began back...
[flashback to Winston as a baby in the hospital]
Jess: [v.o.] Come on, Winston move it along.
[present:]
Winston: Okay, Jess, fine, but don't blame me if you get lost in the nooks and crannies of this crazy English muffin we call Winston's life.

Schmidt: It all began back-
[flashback to a black newborn being handed a basketball in the hospital]
Jess: Come on, Schmidt!
Schmidt: What? Only one story in the whole wide world can begin in a hospital? I volunteered a lot in college. But I shone brightest as a candy striper.
[flashback to Schmidt handing basketballs to babies in the hospital; v.o.:]
Winston: Sick people wanted me. Dying people wanted to be me. I was the total candy-striping package. And yet I remained invisible to the one whose gaze I desired the most.
Schmidt: Invisible? You were like a 300-pound wall of peppermint bark.
Schmidt: Her badge said "RN" for registered nurse, but as far as I was concerned, it said "NILTH," "Nurse I'd Like To Hug." Not even the baggiest of scrubs could hide her splendid form.

Winston: All of my decision's have been made for me. I'm only in sports radio because I played professional basketball. I played professional basketball because somebody put a ball in my crib as a baby. What if somebody gave Baby Winston a flower? Then what would I be?
Nick: Beekeeper!
Coach: Hummingbird farmer.
Nick: Oh, does water shoot out of the flower? If so, you'd be a hilarious comedian.

Coach: I think you see what I mean.
Jess: No, I do I really don't.
Coach: My point is don't overthink it, Jess. The call's coming from inside the house.
Jess: What?
Coach: Be who you are. And do what you do.
Jess: What if I don't know who I am? And you know, I'm capable of doing a lot of different things.
Coach: Then you are on your own.

Jess: [v.o.] The first day I ever taught. Portland Country Day. Five-team Pacific Northwest squash champions. Go, Rhododendrons!
[flashback:]
Jess: Now, if I was chalk, where would I be? If I were chalk, where would I be? Slip up like that in front of the kids, Day, and they'll eat you alive.

Jess: Cece, bring it fast, and bring it hard. You have 53 seconds.
[flashback to Young Jess approaching Young Cece in the school library:]
Young Jess: You okay?
Young Cece: Yes. No. I think I need glasses unless crying makes your eyes not work. I can't read this, but even when I can, I don't understand it.
Young Jess: Crying makes your eyes work better. After I finished Sophie's Choice, I could see in the dark for a week. Here's what I do when I lose mine. [leans in close to the textbook] Ooh, this is interesting. Get in here, we'll learn it together.
Young Cece: But everyone'll laugh at us.
Young Jess: They can drive it or milk it as far as I'm concerned. I don't know what that means. I heard my dad say it.
Young Cece: My dad just died.
Young Jess: Well, if you want to come over, and listen to mine say "They can drive it or milk it" you can. He's also got one about the turds in City Hall.
Young Cece: Thanks. I'm Cece.
Young Jess: Jess.
[present:]
Cece: I was your first student.

Nick: You made the right call, Jess. What's wrong?
Jess: I think you're right. I made the right decision.
Nick: Look, I know it's hard, but the hard is what makes it good.
Cece: Um, is that from A League of Their Own.
Jess: A League of Their Own
Nick: Yes, of course. All of my quotes are from a sports movie. You guys don't know them, and so they seem original.
Jess: A League of Their Own is not a sports movie.
Nick: It's a sports movie, first and foremost.
Jess: It's about sisterhood and the war.
Cece: Yeah, absolutely.
Nick: It's about a baseball team grinding it up.

Nick: [to Kevin-97] Coming right up. His sister really worries about his drinking, so what I do is I come in early, and I soak a teabag until the water turns brown and looks like booze. I call it tea-water.
Jess: So tea.