I live in the same house I’ve lived in for 25 years. I haven’t gone off and bought mansions, you know, even though my subject is living… living in a mansion wouldn’t do for my readers. I have to keep my credibility alive with my readers, so we’re in the same place. I just make that place nicer and nicer. And… and that’s a secret. And people don’t know that. People think, oh, she lives in this fabulous place, it’s the same old place. It started out like a farm, it got to be a farmette, then it got to be an estatelet. I built a wall, it helped a lot. But it’s the same place, the same grounded nature.

Over the years, I learned so much from mom. She taught me about the importance of home and history and family and tradition. She also taught me that aging need not mean narrowing the scope of your activities and interests or a diminution of the great pleasures to be had in the everyday.

Never make a big decision without sleeping on it.

Buttons are the fossils of the sartorial world, enduring long past the garments they were designed to hold together.

So the pie isn't perfect? Cut it into wedges. Stay in control, and never panic.

This is a funny story. We'd asked the guards every day for cappuccino. You know, just as a joke. And they'd come in with their cups of coffee and stuff. And so I get here and I have a spot for a cappuccino machine, and it didn't work. So I don't have any cappuccino ... I didn't miss the cappuccino, I missed the idea of cappuccino.

I think baking cookies is equal to Queen Victoria running an empire. There's no difference in how seriously you take the job, how seriously you approach your whole life.