It’s eleven o’clock. Do you know where your cliché is?

For Pete’s sake, clichés drive me up the wall. They rattle my cage. At the end of the day, clichés push my buttons.

Lately I have been feeling comfortable in my own skin. I think it’s because whatever doesn’t kill me makes me stronger.

I hear that every week at my AA meeting.

Wayne Gretzky: “You miss one hundred percent of the shots you never take.”

When one door opens, another one closes. Or maybe it’s the other way around.

The way I see it, there’s a light at the end of the tunnel.

Life is too short to get all bent out of shape.

Harry agrees. His bark is bigger than his bite. Like he always says, “Rome wasn’t built in a day.”

After all: time heels all hounds.

Harry and I take it one game at a time. He’s one in a million.

You know what? We’re not laughing with you, we’re laughing at you.

Like Harry always says, “Time flies when you’re having fun.”

Steven Wright: “A fool and his money are soon partying.”

Eddie Murphy: “I wish people would stop making fun of fat people. They have enough on their plates.”

Lightning doesn’t knock twice.

People who live in stone houses shouldn’t throw glasses.

There’s no “i” in ego.

“Yesterday is history, tomorrow a mystery and today is a gift. That’s why we call it the present.”

“Cut twice, measure once.”

When I was doing my homework last night, I was so hungry I could have eaten a course.

We often rely on clichés for two reasons. Either because we’re lazy minded or we’re lazy minded.

You know who uses a lot of them? Motivational speakers.

They will tell you, “Insanity is doing the same thing over and over and expecting different results.”

(So is listening to Aaron Copland.)

Keep your sunny side up. Tomorrow is another day. The early bird get the worm. The second mouse gets the cheese.

Harry is as complicated as an onion. You have to appeal to him one layer at a time.

If we are all in this together, I hope you don’t snore.

If we are all in this together, I hope you won’t expect me to go to “Hamilton” with you.

You’re never fully dressed without a simile.

As Chef Boyardee said in divorce court, “You can’t judge a cook by his lover.”

The best time to plant a tree was ten years ago.

Sometimes the best thing to do is nothing.

When it rains, it pours. The rest is history. Have a nice day. Have a nice night. Hang by your thumbs and write if you get work.

The apple doesn’t fall far from the tree. Life is a bowl of cherries. “Beulah, peel me a grape.”

Jack Handey: “Before you criticize someone, you should walk a mile in their shoes. That way when you criticize them, you will be a mile away and have their shoes.”

William Lyon Phelps, “If at first you don’t succeed find out if the loser gets anything.”

Steven Wright: “If at first you don’t succeed, destroy all evidence that you tried.”

Marcelene Cox: “If at first you don’t succeed, blame your parents.”

Charles de Gaulle: “He who laughs last didn’t get the joke.”

Craig Marshall Smith is an artist, educator and Highlands Ranch resident. He can be reached at craigmarshallsmith@comcast.net.