Word: offhandedly
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...extraordinary, among other things, for what it is not. It is neither bitter nor angry; it wastes no time on past glories or on recriminations. It is a coldly impersonal study of what went wrong in China and what ought to be done now. The book is not offhand reading: it is badly organized and repetitious. But its dry, fact-studded text - every line based on the dogged assumption that Chiang is still in the fight, despite his isolation in Formosa - expresses his unbending will better than could rhetoric or fulmination...
...Wall Street, Boeing Airplane Co. last week supplied a sad example of how jittery the stock market is these days, especially in reaction to offhand remarks of Administration officials. At a press conference, Secretary of Defense Wilson vaguely remarked that production of the B-52 intercontinental bomber might soon "be up for reconsideration," depending on the performance of Convair's newer, supersonic B58 Hustler bomber. Though Wilson's statement did nothing more than reflect the routine Pentagon procedure of constantly reappraising air needs, the Wall Street Journal blew it up into a long scare story headlined: PENTAGON WEIGHS...
...Tensions. "The airplanes ran like sewing machines," Archie Old said on landing. Few others present felt so offhand. Reporters crushed around as LeMay stitched through the line-up of glad SACs and pinned the Distinguished Flying Cross on each man. Families of some of the crewmen swarmed in to greet them. Newsmen herded one and all into a briefing room. Did Russia know of the mission? "Certainly, Russia knew about it," replied the general. Were the bombers armed? "This was an unarmed mission," i.e., no bombs aboard, but radar-controlled tail guns carried ammunition...
Niarchos put up $250,000 to keep it intact for the Louvre. On his visits to Greece, Niarchos hands out gold sovereigns on the streets of Athens like a rich man's John D. Rockefeller. Some of his more offhand gestures have included chartering a steamship for a royalty-only romp in 1954 chaperoned by Greece's Queen Frederika. Niarchos obligingly provided another steamer last summer so that Elsa Maxwell could take an all-star supporting cast (Olivia de Havilland, Aly Khan, the Duke and Duchess of Argyll) on a Mediterranean junket while Niarchos cruised the other...
...yield to a woman's tears. "Give her an opportunity to regain self-control. Let her know you're available to discuss anything she wants to bring up. Explain the situation in detail. Above all, don't dismiss a tearful girl with an offhand: 'Go wash your face; you'll feel better.' Reconcile yourself to the fact that in most cases the cause of a woman's tears are beyond your control...