I don't smoke because I like to do so, but because it makes me pay cigarette taxes, which helps build roads and water supplies.

Think about all the selfish non-smokers out there, driving around on asphalt, drinking water out of the tap, not even thinking about how smokers' taxes help pay for it all.

Don't try to outguess what's going on in publishing, and write what you want to write.

You do not have to explain every single drop of water contained in a rain barrel. You have to explain one drop-H2O. The reader will get it.

Gilles Deleuze believed that every society needed a madman so we could feel better about ourselves. I do my best to fill that role.

There's a ton of truth in Flannery O'Connor's notion that "Anybody who has survived his childhood has enough information about life to last him the rest of his days."

I have to deal with seven ex-stray dogs, and one ex-stray cat. One dog is nearing nineteen years old. Before I go to teach, he likes for me to tell him bedtime stories.