I can't recall a story that played out exactly as I'd expected it to. That's one of the thrills of journalism - being surprised, and learning new stuff, but it also poses the biggest challenge to a writer's character.

The weightlifting competition I saw was the women's 63 kg class. I'm not sure whether this means the actual women weighed 63 kg or the weights they lifted weighed 63 kg. Or possibly the temperature in the weightlifting hall was 63 kg. There's no way to know for sure without finding out what a "kg" is, and my belief, as an American, is that if I have to start understanding the metric system, then the terrorists have won.

Dogs do not grasp the concept of house cleaning.

I actually kind of like Janet Reno. She seems like a nice enough lady. But when you're basically going through the entire phone book trying to find women lawyers who don't have maids to pick the attorney general of the United States, how well can you do?

When your Super Bowl guests arrive, they should find a mound of potato chips large enough to conceal a pony sitting in front of the television. For nutritional balance, you should also put out a bowl of carrot sticks. If you have no carrot sticks, you can use pinecones, or used electrical fuses, because nobody will eat them anyway. This is no time for nutritional balance: This is the Super Bowl, for God's sake.

Like all writers, my greatest inspiration, my ultimate muse, is a deadline.

What I need is a search engine that, no matter what I type in, comes back with GO BACK TO WORK.