We all know funny people who can't get it down on the page - even funny writers who can't get it down on the page.

Although I grew up in Kansas City, ... I have always kept more or less au courant of Texas barbecue, like a sports fan who is almost monomaniacally obsessed with basketball but glances over at the N.H.L. standings now and then.

A new regulation for the publishing industry: "The advance for a book must be larger than the check for the lunch at which it was discussed.

I never did very well in math - I could never seem to persuade the teacher that I hadn't meant my answers literally.

If General Haig is so smart, why did he finish 214th (out of 310) in his graduating class at West Point? Does that mean there are 213 generals his age who are smarter than he is?

Do my ears deceive me, or can I actually hear the sounds of worms turning? You say a turning worm makes no sound? But how about a chorus of turning worms?

I actually think of being funny as an odd turn of mind, like a mild disability, some weird way of looking at the world that you can't get rid of.