Their house had real hardcover books in it, and you often saw them lying open on the sofa, the words still warm from being read.

The drama bug strikes hardest with Jews, homosexuals and plump women who wear their hair in bangs. These are people who, for one reason or another, desperately crave attention

What's strange is, the people who want to be in the position are never asked to be in the position. Like, if you don't want to do something, then people really want you to do it. And the more you say, "No, really, I'm sorry, it's really not for me," the more they want to convince you that it is, in fact, for you, and that you'd be absolutely perfect.

I was first published in the newspaper put out by School of The Art Institute of Chicago, where I was a student. I wince to read that story nowadays, but I published it with an odd photo I'd found in a junk shop, and at least I still like the picture. I had a few things in the school paper, and then I got published in a small literary magazine. I hoped I would one day get published in The New Yorker, but I never allowed myself to actually believe it. Getting published is one of those things that feels just as good as you'd hoped it would.

In the Netherlands now, I imagine it's legal to marry your own children. Get them pregnant, and you can abort your unborn grandbabies in a free clinic that used to be a church.

In Paris you're always surrounded by French people.

I won't put in a load of laundry, because the machine is too loud and would drown out other, more significant noises - namely, the shuffling footsteps of the living dead.