People, unless they're paying attention, tend to confuse fanciness with intelligence or authority.

Everybody is identical in their secret unspoken belief that way deep down they are different from everyone else.

Two young salmon are swimming along one day. As they do, they are passed by a wiser, older fish coming the other way. The wiser fish greets the two as he passes, saying, "Morning boys, how's the water?" The other two continue to swim in silence for a little while, until the first one turns to the other and asks, "What the hell is water?"

...Genuine pathological openness is about as seductive as Tourette's Syndrome.

If you've never wept and want to, have a child.

I was trained mainly as a short story writer and that's how I started writing, but I've also become very interested in non-fiction, just because I got a couple of magazine jobs when I was really poor and needed the money and it turned out that non-fiction was much more interesting than I thought it was.

People, unless they're paying attention, tend to confuse fanciness with intelligence or authority.