While my friends were discussing Pearl Harbor as the country's problem, I took it personally. It dawned on me that the Japanese attack could be my ticket out of high school.

I always wanted to get into politics, but I was never light enough to make the team.

I didn't go on dialysis because I was 81 years old and I'd done everything I wanted, or so I thought.

Whether it's the best of times or the worst of times, it's the only time we've got.

Human beings thrive on action. Stagnation does not wear well with us. We are said to have our origins as hunter-gatherers. We run and we chase. We are problem-solvers. We must be continuously tested and we continuously test ourselves. And it will not end until our lives end because of life itself.

A bad liver is to a Frenchman what a nervous breakdown is to an American. Everyone has had one and everyone wants to talk about it.

I don't mind 800 million Chinese drinking a bottle [of Coca-Cola] a day, but I don't want them to bring back the empties.