Where are you from, Mr. Pendergast? Can't quite place the accent.” “New Orleans.” “What a coincidence! I went there for Mardi Gras once." “How nice for you. I myself have never attended.” Ludwig paused, the smile frozen on his face, wondering how to steer the conversation onto a more pertinent topic.

My first job was washing dishes in the basement of a nursing home for $2.10 an hour, and I learned as much about the value of hard work there as I ever did later.

The mandalas were meant to be objects of contemplation, aids to meditation, their proportions magically balanced to purify and calm the mind. To stare at a mandala was to experience, if only briefly, the nothingness that is at the heart of enlightenment.

I need to write in a small room - the smaller the better. I can't write in a big room where someone might sneak up behind my back.

There are so many journalists out there, I hate to say it, who are lazy and don't do their research - and it shows.

Once again, we shall have to operate not only outside the box, but outside the room containing the box.

It's a very bad habit, but one I find hard to break.