Life starts out with everyone clapping when you take a poo and goes downhill from there.

Juice cleansing has been all the rage for some time. And I used the word 'rage' advisedly; one must push a violent flood of liquidised vegetables and fruit through one's system for at least three days in order to perform a 'cleanse.'

My mother is a special education teacher but also an artist, and my father an advertising executive. They are about as wacky as you can get without being alcoholics.

Out of all artists, authors are the least trained for the spotlight. Wanting attention isn't a requisite part of the package.

For me, titles are either a natural two-second experience or stressful enough to give you an ulcer. If they don't pop out perfect on the first try, they can be really hard to repair. Or, worse, if the author thinks they pop out perfect, but the publishing house does not agree, it's difficult to shift gears. And then? Then you go insane.

I find that anything culturally significant that happened before '93 I associate with the decade before it. In fact, Oregon Trail is one of a handful of signposts that middle school existed at all.

Are there moments when I see unrequited crushes or ex-boyfriends slow dancing with their dates and kind of want to stab myself in the spleen with a salad fork? Yeah, sure.