We live in a culture where people are self-centered and careerist and everybody seems to think they have too much on their plate or they just don't have time for other people's pain.

I'm interested in the fact that comics are people who are oddly courageous in their desire and their commitment to sacrificing any sense of normalcy in their lives, any sense of security, and most of them are oddly unique individuals. Let's have a broader conversation with people that have spent their last however-many-years thinking about their lives. I mean, they're philosophers. They're poets. They're people who are on the outside looking in at the world through a different set of values.

Most of the comics that I talk to I've never talked to for more than ten minutes ever. So 95 percent of the time you're really hearing the first conversation between me and that guy on the podcast.

When you commit your life to something and it doesn't work out, it is a tough place to be. Suicide can be the spiritual reprieve of a faithless person. I knew I could always just end it, and there was solace in that.

I just wanted to be a good comic and had no sense of show business, but at some point you want the opportunity to write a show about your life.

I used to do a lot of drugs. I didn't stop because I didn't enjoy them; I stopped because I couldn't handle the commitment.

For my next trick I will make everyone understand me.