That's basically what the drive is: "I want to be famous, I want to be noticed, and I want to be approved of." That's basically what you're after. "Give me attention, give me applause, give me an audience. A. A. A. Straight As." That's all you're looking for.

Besides the drugs and counterculture, I started talking about myself, which is the first thing you do when you are a writer.

In some hotels they give you a little sewing kit. You know what I do? I sew the towels together. One time I sewed a button on a lampshade. I like to leave a mark.

It's never just a game when you're winning.

That's why they call it the American Dream, because you have to be asleep to believe it.

In my fifth-grade yearbook - it's right up there on the top shell - the last page says, "What about your future?" and under my name, it says, "When I grow up, I would like to be either an actor, a radio announcer, an impersonator or a comedian."

Humor is based on surprise, and surprise is a milder way of saying shock. It's surprise that makes the joke.