Quotes and observations from Samuel Alito's Supreme Court nomination hearings:

• Sen. Joe Biden, D-Del., pulled out a Princeton hat during his questioning session Wednesday, trying to save face for comments made during Tuesday's session when he said, "I didn't even like Princeton" and "I wasn't a big Princeton fan."

• Sen. Orrin Hatch, R-Utah, signed autographs for some extremely excited "Clerks for Alito" in the back of the hearing room on Tuesday. They handed him their passes and thanked him for his work.

• Sen. Richard Durbin, D-Ill., could not help but reference another famous New Jersey resident, although not one involved in politics. Durbin asked Alito if he was a Bruce Springsteen fan.

"I am to some degree, yes," Alito said.

Durbin used The Boss as an odd transition into question on Alito's case record.

"They once asked him," Durbin said of Springsteen, " 'How do you come up with the songs that you write and the characters that are in them?' And he said, 'I have a familiarity with the crushing hand of fate.' It's a great line. I want to ask you about the crushing hand of fate in several of your decisions. Riley v. Taylor: It was the murder conviction of an African-American defendant."

• Later in the day, as Durbin and other Democrats were waiting their turn at the press staging area just outside the hearing room, "This is like a hotel where none of the beds get cold," he said.