I'm not a great shopper but I do buy a lot of books. I'm the publishers' friend - I buy a hundred books a year and read four.

A foolproof plan for not getting a job - show up for your interview wearing flip flops.

I like pubs too, but it's hard for me to go and get proper bladdered in the way I used to. I don't want to moan about being recognised but I do get a bit of grief sometimes.

I'm more inclined to linger in the science pages of 'The Week' magazine. But my principle obsessions are still watching sitcoms and football.

I see myself as a comic but the acting helps sell tickets for gigs.

The thing I'd really like to see is the old London Bridge, with all the old buildings around it like Shakespeare's Globe. I'd like to walk along that. Don't worry, I won't get drunk and fall in.

There's a lot to do when you're a kid - spiders to catch, girls to poke in the eye - stuff to be getting on with.

I dont drive around London much. Any journey around Islington involves hundreds of speed bumps that seem to tear the bottom of your car off.

I liked the idea of all of humanity fitting inside a sugar cube because more than 99.9% of matter is space.

I'm quite a curious person. I don't mind being the one who doesn't know things, a role I often play in QI.

A bambiraptor is a savage baby dear.

All I've ever wanted was a place to belong, and someone to belong to.

Never swap horses crossing a stream

Luck is for the ill-prepared.

Artists rarely do the same thing over and over again. Art is about the new, doing things in a new way.

One travels like a golf ball, hopping from green to green.

America's greatest sin is the refusal to delay gratification.

A story is an invitation, and a challenge, and a choice.

In government procurement, for example, the opportunity German firms have in the United States is 10 times larger than in Canada.

OK, boss, I don't mind shuffling, but I won't scratch my head.

Before I chose Dauntless...I felt assured of my long lifespan, if nothing else. Now there are no reassurances except that where I go, I go because I choose to.