It's more like you write what comes to you... You try to reflect the mood of the songs. Take 'Rearviewmirror', we start off with the music and it kinds of propels the lyrics. It made me feel like I was in a car, leaving something, a bad situation. There's an emotion there. I remembered all the times I wanted to leave.

Darkness comes in waves...tell me, why invite it to stay?

I don't need drugs. Life is already tragic enough.

I didn't respond to the kind of sarcastic tone. It felt like some of the Sarah Palin speech was written as though it were a Saturday Night Live newscast. Maybe that's because she looks very similar . . . She's got her Tina Fey thing going.

I'm probably never happier than when I'm by myself in the water. What I've worked and sacrificed for is not to be on stage playing music but to surf in some secluded place. It's a grounding element. Waves don't care who you are.

That makes it even more offensive to me that she's interested in our band and she did something for Slaughter.

You know, punk bands now sell with one record - their first or second record - sell 10 times the amount of records than the Ramones did throughout their career with 20-something records. That's why I go over to Johnny Ramone's house and do yard work three times a week, just to absolve some of the guilt.