If Helen Keller had psychic ability, would you say she had a fourth sense? What year did Jesus think it was?

I'll tell you a little secret about the Blues: it's not enough to know which notes to play, you have to know why they need to be played.

The writing is what gives me the joy, especially editing myself for the page, and getting something ready to show to the editors, and then to have a first draft and get it back and work to fix it, I love reworking, I love editing, love love love revision, revision, revision, revision.

The word bipartisan usually means some larger-than-usual deception is being carried out.

I was a class clown, of the classic term for it. I would get the work done easily, and then I would try to deprive other people of their educations. I developed skills for mimicry, and I was a good showoff. I knew how to get attention, and I knew how to do it in a positive funny way.

Where ideas are concerned, America can be counted on to do one of two things: Take a good idea and run it completely into the ground, or take a bad idea and run it completely into the ground.

I'm 63 now. But that's just 17 Celsius.