If I give a
pat answer of "It's all going well" or something, then I am doing them the disservice of dishonesty.
When she asked the boy why, he gave her a
pat answer: "Ma'am, because you are fasting."
Perhaps, the most common question is: 'How much sleep do I need each night?' Well, no one can provide a
pat answer as each person differs in needs.
We come to realize this last element is entirely appropriate precisely because there is no
pat answer, no comfortable place, no way to tie up loose ends for the protagonists of these tales who, as the title notes, are missing an important woman.
Asked about decisions the chief lawmakers made regarding the fight against terrorism, he said "there is no
pat answer to the question of terrorism except that it must be confronted.
There's no
pat answer, because no two stand sites, or trees, are alike.
But, and this is what makes the book truly successful, Perry avoids giving a
pat answer, often leaving the reader with food for thought.
"I will give you my
pat answer: 'Commerce, culture and trade,' that is all I can say at this time," Trevino said, then added that his Judo friend, and some other friends from Mongolia who are also here, have been to the Falls repeatedly.
My
pat answer is "HAPPI, which is an acronym for Household and Personal Products Industry/That response is usually enough to kill the conversation--but I'm never sure if the silence is because my acquaintance doesn't know what an acronym is or if he finds laundry and shampoos deadly dull.
There are so many variables I can't give a
pat answer: range, speed of target, angle, reaction time, speed of swing.
A decade ago I had a
pat answer when asked to recommend a Thanksgiving wine.
The
pat answer is that leadership is situational--based on time and circumstance.
But instead of coining a cute phrase or
pat answer editors Peters and Hinson-Hasty begin this book by asking "What does it mean to be faithful in times of crisis?" How can communities understand and do something about the problems we're now facing?
This
pat answer, as well as the simplistic response "The dinosaurs just did not die in the right place" each have a flavor of what I call "pseudoscience".
As reported in your editorial column: The usual
pat answer by senior ambulance officers talked of "incidents caused by a catalogue of unforeseen circumstances".