I didn't realize House would be the central character, more the bitter comic relief appearing occasionally. I relish his wounded nature - the lameness, the scarred Byronic hero.

I have resolved to pick one novel and just read it over and over again for the rest of my life, because I cannot remember anything anymore.

It's a basic truth of the human condition that everybody lies. The only variable is about what.

You hope that your teenage self would like and forgive your 50-year-old self.

Driving a motorcycle is like flying. All your senses are alive. When I ride through Beverly Hills in the early morning, and all the sprinklers have turned off, the scents that wash over me are just heavenly. Being House is like flying, too. You're free of the gravity of what people think.

Death and disaster are at our shoulders every second of our lives, trying to get at us. Missing, a lot of the time. A lot of miles on the motorway without a front wheel blow-out. A lot of viruses that slither through our bodies without snagging. A lot of pianos that fall a minute after we've passed. Or a month, it makes no difference. So unless we're going to get down on our knees and give thanks every time disaster misses, it makes no sense to moan when it strikes.

Now, my mom always said two wrongs don't make a right. But she never said anything about four wrongs, and that always left me confused.