Citations:take a licking and keep on ticking

Phrase

 * 1) To be tough; to have endurance, to have the capacity to absorb stress or damage, but still be able to function.
 * 2) * 2008, George R. R. Martin et al., Inside Straight, p. 124
 * How am I supposed to knock these other guys off. My wild card is nothing but defensive. I take a licking and keep on ticking. Big whoop.
 * 1) * 2006, Anthony Mancuso, LLC Or Corporation?: How to Choose the Right Form for Your Business, p. 47:
 * Insurance allows your business to take a licking and keep on ticking.
 * 1) * 2005, Ted Bell, Pirate: A Novel, p. 3:
 * Harry Brock, creeping up on forty, could still take a licking and keep on ticking. So far, anyway.
 * 1) * 2002, Lawrence Block, Hope to Die: A Matthew Scudder Crime Novel, p. 374:
 * You were scarred, like the heart, you took a licking and kept on ticking, and you healed.
 * 1) * 1997 Ira Livingston, Arrow of Chaos: Romanticism and Postmodernity, section 2.3:
 * The persistence-through-change of Romantic ideologemes — the way they've taken a licking and kept on ticking — is explicable by their extension and saturation — their participation — in ongoing formations of capitalism and disciplinarity.
 * 1) * 1996, Fred Van Dyke et al., Redeeming Creation: The Biblical Basis for Environmental Stewardship, p. 33:
 * There is no hint of the deistic, Enlightenment concept of God as the great watchmaker who winds up the universe and then leaves it to take a licking and keep on ticking.
 * 1) * 1995, Daniel T. Bobola, The Complete Idiot's Guide to Networking, p. 39:
 * Your file server and its network operating system can take a licking and keep on ticking.
 * 1) * 1994, Pinckney Benedict, Dogs of God, p. 204:
 * "That," the first said, "was one hardy son of a bitch. Took a licking but went on ticking. I heard he made it all the way down off the mountain before he snuffed it."
 * 1) * 1989, Frederick S. Clarke, Cinefantastique, p. 36:
 * I feel that movies Schwarzenegger's Quaid, takes a licking but keeps on ticking, not believable at the film's put upon hero per O'Bannon.
 * 1) * 1986, David Morrell, The Fraternity of the Stone, p. 177:
 * But the car amazed him. It kept going. And that too struck him as funny. Takes a licking, keeps on ticking.