I believe in love, but I don't sit around waiting for it. I buy houses.

Motherhood has never been an ambition. I don't think like that. I never have expectations like, 'When I'm 19 I'm going to do this, and by the time I've hit 25 I'm going to do that'. I just take things as they come, each day at a time, and if things happen then all well and good.

In a partner I'm looking for an encyclopedia and a dictionary. A bit of the Boy Scouts Handbook. A person who is conscientious about the trail he leaves behind him. Love. Unconditional kindness. Basically, I'm looking for the qualities I revere in my friends.

I'm attracted to intelligence and creativity and passion - and not necessarily the romantic kind. I want to learn from someone who is greedy for information and light and laughter and the whole world. Someone who celebrates their days and finds inspiration in what other people accomplish.

I can't think of anything more horrible than sharing what I'm doing all day!

I believe in love, but I'm not sitting around waiting for it. I buy houses. I travel. I take jobs on mountaintops in Transylvania... I know that happiness comes in many ways and if you spend your life hoping to be found by or to find a significant other, you're going to miss out on all that stuff. And that's what makes you special and makes your life rich.

My mum, a strange creature from the time when pickles on toothpicks were still the height of sophistication.