I sandpapered the roof of my mouth with 3 bowls of Cap'n Crunch - had raw gobbets of mouth-beef dangling onto my tongue all day

Remember: the time you feel lonely is the time you most need to be by yourself. Life's cruelest irony.

Handmade presents are scary because they reveal that you have too much free time.

You can't fake creativity, competence, or sexual arousal.

Fondue sets, martini shakers and juicing machines: three things the world could live completely without.

If a building looks better under construction than it does when finished, then it's a failure.

Big companies are like marching bands. Even if half the band is playing random notes, it still sounds kind of like music. The concealment of failure is built into them.

Eagles are seagulls with a good hairdo.

We decided that the French could never write user-friendly software because they're so rude.

Is there anything in the world more annoyingly creepy than an unspoken dress code?

When we constantly ask for miracles, we're unraveling the fabric of the world. A world of continuous miracles would not be a world, it would be a cartoon.

Seeing a miracle will inspire you, but knowing you are a miracle will change you.

Children are knives, my mother once said. They don’t mean to, but they cut. And yet we cling to them, don’t we, we clasp them until the blood flows.

Everyone who knew [Barack] Obama from being in Hyde Park knew he was the smartest guy in any room he walked into; a decent, compassionate, lovely person; pragmatic, middle-of-the-road and ambitious.

We will cut programs, we will try to rein in the size of the bureaucracy. We will bring federal pay scales that have become so exaggerated into line with market rates.

A multitude of words is probably the most formidable means of blurring and obscuring thought. There is no thought, however momentous, that cannot be expressed lucidly in 200 words.

Bibles laid open, millions of surprises.

My principal job is to make interesting and entertaining films, and I'm not proud of which format or which particular technique I use. I just wanted the film to look good.

Labor cannot stand still. It must not retreat. It must go on, or go under.

I always say I'm Catholic - but a cultural Catholic. I wouldn't say I'm a spiritual person, although I pray every day.

Beware of the clever ones; the dumb ones are safer.