I'm not really interested in making someone endure a performance or stand there for too long. I like to think about the length.

I probably protect myself by not asking myself too much.

Sometimes I start with music on and then I get distracted because I'm working to a different rhythm; I'm not working to myself. So, I don't have music on when I'm working.

I like actual songs and bands, but it's usually parts, like the production, the bassline, the drums, that I'm really attracted to.

I started using Notes [on my iPhone] but I do a lot of hand written notes. It's a very slow, accumulative thing.

Performances have a bit of a life and a time scale to themselves.

I'm one who needs to be in the space [for] a sense of place and order. It's crucial.

I don't analyze too much, because then I'll question, 'Why do I write down all of these random little phrases?'

A lecture has been well described as the process whereby the notes of the teacher become the notes of the student without passing through the mind of either.

Optimism: That effervescent, blindingly- bright, perky, chipper,  twittering quality you want to squash out of annoying people.

We can't all be stars because someone has to sit on the curb and clap as I go by.

If I breathe, what will my heart think?If I vomit, what will my soul think?

Yes, my dear child, monsters are real. I happen to have one hanging in my basement.

Terrorism, too, must be excised wherever it exists, which will take years, and which can't happen without the total commitment and the everyday involvement of the American people.

Happiness hates the timid. So does science.

If it were thought that anything I wrote was influenced by Robert Frost, I would take that particular piece of mine, shred it, and flush it down the toilet, hoping not to clog the pipes.

Truth be told, I'm much more comfortable in a pair of hiking boots or with a rack of climbing gear than in front of a laptop.

I am well aware how odd it must seem to some of you to hear me say that an idea is true so long as to believe it is profitable to our lives