I wouldn't describe myself as a master of anything.

I really like the Observer. I think I'd love to have a column with a broad reach that would enable me to do some proper reporting, but keep it on sort of a humorous level. I've always had a very happy experience writing for them.

My life's ambition is to play a James Bond villain. I have the cat and the eye-patch, so I'm just waiting for the call. For some reason, though, the phone hasn't rung.

I was every Londoner's stereotypical idea of a brash, vulgar American. When I got here, it turned out that London was the Wild West, and New York was like London at the height of the Victorian era, in which everyone was far more obsessed with table manners and status-climbing than they are in London. In London, everyone was just crawling over this blizzard of cocaine. Here, if you have more than a glass of wine with your meal, people refer you to Alcoholics Anonymous.

I was once hired to write a column for 'The Guardian' and then got fired before I'd submitted my first one. That was unusual. Most newspapers wait until I've written at least one piece for them before firing me.

I expect that in 40 years' time I'll be writing political tomes and working for an organisation like Oxfam.

I've become a professional failure - in order to pay the mortgage I have to remain unemployed. Luckily, a disaster always seems to befall me at exactly the right moment.