The blues style - moody or rollicking or boastful or bashful - developed in the Delta around 1900 and was, for a time, exclusively African-American. That isn't the case anymore.

Most of us abandoned the idea of a life full of adventure and travel sometime between puberty and our first job. Our dreams died under the dark weight of responsibility. Occasionally the old urge surfaces, and we label it with names that suggest psychological aberrations: the big chill, a midlife crisis.

Hot, dry katabatic winds, like the south foehn in Europe, the sharav in the Middle East, and the Santa Ana of Southern California, are all believed to have a decided effect on human behavior and are associated with such health problems as migraines, depression, lethargy, and moodiness. Some scientists say that this is a myth.

A lot of the physical flirtation with fear I did early on in my career, when I was a much younger person - stuff I wouldn't do now. But I was very interested in the mechanics of risk and fear in those days. And I found out fear pretty much always feels the same, whether it's doing a rock climb or speaking in front of an audience.

You have to first be a writer and somebody who loves to write. If I couldn't travel, I would still write.

A constant ongoing joke among the people that I travel with is my absolutely hopeless sense of direction. I'm able to get lost a half an hour from camp. I don't know how I do this.

An adventure is never an adventure while it's happening. Challenging experiences need time to ferment, and adventure is simply physical and emotional discomfort recollected in tranquillity.