Washington Hogwallop: Mrs. Hogwallop up and R-U-N-N-O-F-T.
Ulysses Everett McGill: What'd the devil give you for your soul, Tommy?
Tommy Johnson: Well, he taught me to play this here guitar real good.
Delmar O'Donnell: Oh son, for that you sold your everlasting soul?
Tommy Johnson: Well, I wasn't usin' it.
Pappy O'Daniel: I'll press your flesh, you dimwitted sumbitch! You don't tell your pappy how to court the electorate. We ain't one-at-a-timin' here. We're mass communicating.
Ulysses Everett McGill: I'm not sure that's Pete.
Delmar O'Donnell: Of course it's Pete! Look at him... We gotta find some kind of wizard to change him back.
Ulysses Everett McGill: I don't get it, Big Dan.
Delmar O'Donnell: They... left... his... heart.
Ulysses Everett McGill: I was not hit by a train. Damnit, I am the paterfamilias.
Ulysses Everett McGill: I am the only daddy you got! I'm the damn paterfamilias.
Wharvey Gal: But you ain't bona fide.
Homer Stokes: Those boys desecrated a burning cross.
George Nelson: Jesus saves, George Nelson withdraws.
Interrogator: Talk, you un-Reconstructed whelp of a whore.
Pappy's Staff: The reason he's pullin' our pants down.
Pappy's Staff: Gonna paddle a little behind.
Pappy's Staff: Ain't gonna paddle it - gonna kick it, real hard.
Pappy's Staff: No, I believe he's gonna paddle it.
Pappy's Staff: I don't believe that's a proper characterization.
Pappy's Staff: Well, that's how I'd characterize it.
Pappy's Staff: I believe it's more of a kickin' sitcheyation.
Ulysses Everett McGill: Tommy, what you ridin' there?
Tommy Johnson: Uh... Roll top desk.
Ulysses Everett McGill: Ain't you gonna introduce us, Pete?
Pete: I don't know their names. I seen 'em first.
Big Dan Teague: Thank you for the conversational hiatus. I generally refrain from speech durin' gustation. I find it course and vulgar. Where were we?
Delmar O'Donnell: Makin' money in the service of the Lord.
Big Dan Teague: Heh, you don't say much, friend, but when you do, it's to the point and I salute you for it.
Pete: Well hell, it ain't square one! Ain't nobody gonna pick up three filthy, unshaved hitch-hikers, and one of them a know-it-all that can't keep his trap shut.
Ulysses Everett McGill: Pete, the personal rancor reflected in that remark I don't intend to dignify with comment. But I would like to address your general attitude of hopeless negativism. Consider the lilies of the goddamn field or... hell! Take at look at Delmar here as your paradigm of hope.
Delmar O'Donnell: Yeah, look at me.
Big Dan Teague: Thank you boys for throwin' in that fricassee. I'm a man of large appetite, and even with lunch under my belt, I was feelin' a mite peckish.
Ulysses Everett McGill: It's our pleasure, Big Dan.
Ulysses Everett McGill: I'll tell you what I am - I'm the damn paterfamilias! You can't marry him.
Delmar O'Donnell: I'm gonna visit those foreclosing son-of-a-guns at the Indianola Savings and Loan, slap that money on the barrelhead and buy back the family farm. You ain't no kind of man if you ain't got land.
Ulysses Everett McGill: Well, you lying... unconstant... succubus.
Vernon T. Waldrip: Whoa, whoa, whoa! You can't swear at my fiancé.
Ulysses Everett McGill: Oh, yeah? Well, you can't marry my wife.
Answer: Probably they have dismantled the coffer dam that was used while constructing the main dam. Hence, the flooding.
Good and reasonable last resort explanation - have the Coens ever addressed it?