Top 46 Quotes & Sayings by Mary Nightingale

There is a choice you can make. You can want to be a firework and are comfortable with fame. You love it and you want to wear nice dresses and do all that stuff. I don't want to do things like that.

First off, it's a bit of a tired old chestnut that if a woman is pretty than she can't be bright. God what are we in, the 19th century?

Young men and women start out with equal opportunities and ambition but so often that equality fractures as they reach their 30s and start reproducing. Is there really no way to make it work for those who want to have journalistic careers as well as children?

I am 47; I think I must be one of the oldest female newscasters on telly. There's not many of us who still get to work regularly for this long.

It's not your job to be warm on the news; you can be empathetic, but you can't emote. That can be difficult sometimes - but it is my job not to cry.

I've always wanted to ride through the Pampas, and explore right down to the tip of Patagonia.

I was a decent cook - competent enough to turn out the standard Eighties chalet fare: beef Wellington, banoffee pie, Delia's chocolate bread-and-butter pudding - but it wasn't haute cuisine.

I don't think there is an era of autocuties. I think if there is such a thing as an autocutie they weed themselves out because they can't hack it.

Look at Julie Etchingham and Katie Derham, none of us are spring chickens frankly, I don't think people want to watch someone who's wet behind the ears, you have to look like you understand what you are reading about.

Newsrooms are still highly competitive, demanding environments. You have to be robust to hold your own amidst the alpha males and females.

Life really is short, and you just have to go for it.

I was offered a screen test for a business show on Japanese TV. I did it for a laugh, really, and I got the job. It turned out to be a pretty brave yet brilliant decision.

The challenge of election broadcasting is to stick to the story and line.

If you want to be famous, you can be. You can go to all the things you are invited to. But I don't take to that kind of nonsense.

Hyams Beach is said to be the whitest in the world; walking on it is like wading through warm powdery snow - so clean it squeaks beneath your bare toes.

I didn't come from the sort of family where Daddy would provide - so I had to work.

I think the knowledge and education of young women is incredibly important.

For me, weekends are more for unwinding than going out on the town.

It's taking a while for older women to be the norm on TV.

On screen you have to look elegant, understated and appropriate, and I used to spend masses on designer stuff, but now I get everything in Zara.

It doesn't matter what you look like. If you can't do the job you will soon be found out.

Gradually, we fell in love with camper-vanning. It's a strange business to begin with - rather like driving a large, rather flimsy cardboard box. It's ugly, the suspension's appalling, you rattle around like pebbles in a tin, and you can't hear yourself speak above the engine.

I was always anxious about whether I'd find a career I loved or be able to afford to buy a house.

I've always got loads on my plate, so I should concentrate on fewer things. I take multitasking to a ridiculous degree.

There's not a pie that I don't like.

We're never home later than 9:30 P. M. and once the children are in bed, Paul and I have some wine and watch a box-set such as Breaking Bad.'

When I entered my first newsroom in the late 80s it was packed with young people, a fairly balanced ratio of men and women, working as fixers, sub-editors, presenters and producers. Everyone was committed to the job, and equally ambitious.

Once you have children, the years slide by so quickly.

We spent our honeymoon at a fabulous place called the Grapevine Canyon Ranch near Tucson, Arizona, and totally fell for the City Slickers fantasy, so it would be wonderful to take the children there now that they are old enough to appreciate the thrill of cattle herding on horseback and sleeping out in the desert.

The modern world is about knowledge and it's our job as mums to help our daughters.

It is with enormous regret that I have decided to leave Wish You Were Here?' after two very happy years as its presenter. It was always my intention to do two years on this wonderful program and now it is time for me to move on to other things.

It's still acceptable for male presenters to appear elderly but not their female counterparts. You will never find an old woman and a young man presenting combo.

On Sunday morning, I'll read the papers and listen to The Archers' omnibus - I love radio at the weekend especially Any Questions?' and the Woman's Hour' omnibus.

'Rebecca' by Daphne du Maurier was the first grown-up book I read, when I was aged about 12.

It was a deliberate policy not to invite Hello!' into my home. I could have done that stuff and made a lot of money, but I've never regretted not doing it.

I think in terms of being a good presenter, it's not as simple as having been out in a war zone. Actually the news is far broader than that.

I think you should keep your head down and do your job and shut up It's the news, it's not about me.

Modern girls are much more informed than we were. Modern girls seem to know more and there is openness.

I'm a good dressmaker. When I was a student I made all my own clothes, and earned good money making ball gowns and wedding dresses for my friends.

The four rings on my wedding finger are all very significant - my wedding ring, my mum's wedding ring and the engagement rings of my granny and mother-in-law.

I have never had a problem with not being able to do anything just because I am on telly every day.

I took a while to fall in love with Val d'Isere. It was November 1985 and, keen to delay getting a 'serious job' after university, I had signed up for a season as a chalet girl. What struck me first back then, as I rolled into town on the Bladon Lines bus, was the sheer ugliness of the place.

My miscarriage made me realize that many modern career women take on too much.

I became a chalet girl for one simple reason: I couldn't afford to go skiing. I had got the bug when I worked as an au pair in the Alps, before university.

We'll just unwind in the evening by going out as a family for a pizza where we'll meet up with other families we know from the children's school.

Stats are stats but if you want to be sure you're going to have, say, three children with no problems, you should start at around 23.