Rose: Wait a minute. If you didn't sleep with any of the men in these journals, then how come it says "Bed" on the cover?
Blanche: [laughs] Oh, that doesn't say "Bed".
Rose: Right there, it does.
Blanche: Oh, silly, those are my initials. Blanche Elizabeth Devereaux.
Dorothy: Your initials spell "Bed"?

Rose: I don't drink before bedtime. I stop all liquids at noon and I still wake up.
Sophia: I never have that problem. Never. I sleep like a log. I never get up in the middle of the night to go to the bathroom. I go in the morning. Every morning like clockwork, at 7 am I pee. Unfortunately, I don't wake up till 8.

Blanche: Wish me luck.
Dorothy: Wait. Blanche, why should you do it?
Blanche: Because we'll have a better chance. I happen to be a wonderful orator. And two of the commissioners can verify that.
Dorothy: Blanche, "orator" means "speaker".
Blanche: Really? Oh. Well, somebody else do the talking.

Dorothy: Blanche, have you ever met a man you didn't think was giving you the eye?
Blanche: Once, in 1976. But it was only two days later that Mr. President Jimmy Carter announced to the American people that he had secretly lusted in his heart.

Dorothy: I never had a mind for money matters. I always used to let Stanley handle all our investments.
Rose: Did he have a head for numbers, Stanley?
Dorothy: The man used to have to get naked to count to 21.

Rose: I remember when I was a little girl back in St. Olaf. There was this old lady who lived up the street. She never smiled. I mean, she always looked angry. The kids said she'd kill anyone who even stepped on her property. We called her Mean Old Lady Higgenlooper.
Blanche: Yeah, kids can be pretty cruel.
Rose: No. That was her name. Mean Old Lady Higgenlooper. She had it changed legally 'cause everybody called her that anyway.
Blanche: Then how come your name isn't Big Dummy?
Rose: Well, there were already three other people in town with that name. But that's beside the point. One day I got up the courage to go up to Mean Old Lady Higgenlooper and ask her why she always frowned. Well, she had been born with no smiling muscles. I pointed out that a frown is just a smile turned upside down. So from then on, whenever I'd go by, she'd stand on her head and wave.

Dorothy: Honey, lean over a mirror some time and take a look at yourself.
Blanche: Where's a mirror?
Sophia: There's one in the tool drawer.
Dorothy: I think you'd better take a sedative before you look.
Blanche: Don't be silly. I look at my face all the time. How different could it be leaning over? Oh, my God! Oh, my God, Dorothy, why didn't you tell me about this before?
Dorothy: Only on your back, Blanche. That way everything slides back and you look like you just had a face lift.
Blanche: Oh, you're right. I'm gorgeous. I'm gonna have to meet men lying down.
Sophia: I thought you did.
Dorothy: Of course that way, not only does your face fall back, but your chest does too. Unfortunately, it falls back and off to the side.

Blanche: This is horrible. As Big Daddy used to say, "I'm feeling lower than the rent on a burnin' building."
Rose: That's funny. I used to live in a burning building. And it was cheap. It was Charlie's and my first house. Well, scoff if you must, but it was warm and toasty. I'll never forget Charlie throwing me over his shoulder and dashing across the threshold. Oh, it was a beautiful place. Three bedrooms, two baths. Then two bedrooms and one bath. Eventually, we outgrew the place.

Clayton: Blanche, we don't have to worry about what the world thinks about our relationship. It just doesn't matter, because we're there for each other. I'd do anything for Doug, and he'd bend over backwards for me.
Dorothy: [covers Sophia's mouth and pulls her close] Sometimes I just love to hug my mommy.

Dorothy: Dr. Budd, I came to you sick. Sick and scared. And you dismissed me. You didn't have the answer. And instead of saying, "I'm sorry. I don't know what's wrong with you," you made me feel crazy, like I had made it all up. You dismissed me. You made me feel like a child, a fool, a neurotic who was wasting your precious time. Is that- Is that your caring profession? Is that healing? No one deserves that kind of treatment, Dr. Budd, no one. I suspect, had I been a man, I might have been taken a little bit more seriously and not told to go to a hairdresser.
Dr. Budd: Look, I am not going to sit here anymore-
Helen Budd: Shut up, Lewis.
Dorothy: I don't know where you doctors lose your humanity, but you lose it. You know, if all of you at the beginning of your careers could get very sick and scared for a while, you'd probably learn more from that than anything else. You'd better start listening to your patients. They need to be heard. They need caring, they need compassion. They need attending to. You know, someday, Dr. Budd, you're gonna be on the other side of the table, and as angry as I am, and as angry as I always will be, I still wish you a better doctor than you were to me.