Everyone knows there's only one thing less welcome on a stage than a mime, and that's a clown, because everyone knows that clowns eat people.

You're fighting a battle of good and evil with your dog pimp! Your only weapon is the shimmy! There is power in the shimmy! Make him fear your shimmy! Now, goddamnit, show me your war shimmy!

Small towns are sometimes like that; familiarity runs high, while regard for personal space is low, if nonexistent.

I majored in journalism at Arizona State University, where I began writing the columns I write now, but I cannot, in good conscience, refer to myself as a writer. I'm a columnist, maybe a journalist, I guess I'm an author, but writer... no. That's not up to me to call myself, that's rather lofty. It's for the reader to decide.

Justin Halpern tosses lightning bolts of laughter out of his pocket like he is shooting dice in a back alley. In one sweep of a paragraph, he ranges from hysterical to disgusting to touching--and does it all seamlessly. Sh*t My Dad Says is a really, really funny book.

Books are to me as homemade tattoos are to an inmate. Can't get enough of them.

If you really believe in what you're doing, work hard, take nothing personally, and if something blocks your route, find another. Never give up.